Introduction

 

Ready to add another dimension to your business messaging strategy and take it to the next level? Rich Communication Services (RCS) is the future of messaging technology, providing enterprises and brands with a powerful tool to engage with customers. With its visually appealing interface, and rich and advanced functionalities, RCS creates an immersive customer experience that can help businesses establish two-way branded communication and build stronger customer relationships in the SMS inbox.

The benefits of RCS are already being realized by various industries, including banking and finance, e-commerce platforms, ride-sharing services, and major retailers, which are seeing impressive results in customer engagement.

In this guide, we answer the most pertinent questions regarding RCS. Read to learn more.

 

What is RCS?

 

RCS is an IP-based messaging service available on Android smartphones in the Google Messages and iMessage in Apple smartphones via carrier networks. RCS leverages the global reach of SMS with interactive and rich chat features similar to OTT messaging platforms like Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Telegram, delivering a compelling and engaging user experience.

Business communication over RCS is called RCS Business Messaging (RBM). This can include both A2P and P2A communication. With RCS, brands can leverage multiple rich functionalities like suggested action buttons, click-through delivery, location sharing, high-res videos, images, audio, and gifs, delivering engaging and interactive customer experience without worrying about security or privacy.

RCS is an extension of SMS. It is not a new communication channel, so the transition is seamless. Currently, there are more than 1 billion RCS users globally, and with RCS now being available on Apple, this number will further increase beyond 2 billion.

Why is RCS a game changer for brands and enterprises?

With its rich set of capabilities, RCS helps brands grab customer attention in their very own SMS inbox delivering customer delight.

With RCS, verified business trust marks replace random numbers or acronyms in text conversations, increasing consumer confidence in the authenticity of the brand. Furthermore, each message wears your brand logo and color, helping you leverage your branding and making you stand out in your customers’ SMS inbox.

 

Enhanced conversational capabilities

With RCS, brands can deliver a truly conversational experience with pre-configured replies and suggested actions.

Suggested Replies

Brands can offer suggested replies to a particular query, reducing the time required by users to type, and improving query resolution and response time.

Suggested Actions

With suggested actions, customers can quickly complete any task that leverages the functionalities of the device. For instance, an ‘Add to Calendar’ suggested action button under flight detail communication by an airline will add the flight details to the device’s default calendar. Similarly, there are action buttons like share or view location, open a URL, or dial a number that brands can incorporate as per their use case.These replies can be set in a chip list or buttons that appear as a horizontal set of buttons above the user’s reply box that simplify the customer journey, leading to faster and more efficient interactions.

 

Rich Card And Carousels

Using rich cards, brands can include text, images, videos, suggested replies, and suggested action buttons in a single message. This helps brands enhance the user experience by providing all necessary details about a use case in one go rather than an interrupted and broken back and forth.Carousels are a collection of rich cards which are horizontally scrollable. It usually includes a title, subtitle, image, and suggested action and reply buttons. Using these features, brands can showcase a catalog of their products or services.

Deeper Analytical Insights

RCS offers valuable and detailed analytical data and metrics, including read receipts, click-through rates, and response time, enabling businesses to gain deeper insights into their customers and tailor their marketing strategy accordingly.

Advanced Automation

RCS allows for the integration of AI-powered chatbots that can handle simple queries and automate simple tasks, freeing up live agents for more complex inquiries. This not only helps reduce response time and improve query resolution but also help businesses reduce cost and get better ROI.

Safe, Secure, And Fraud-proof

As per the GSMA, RCS Universal Profile Standard, every RCS sender has to be verified and authenticated by RCS service providers, making it a secure and safe channel. This ensures that customers are protected from fraud, duplicity, and phishing, making them feel comfortable about sharing personal information in banking and legal use cases.

Transform Your Brand Experience with Unique RCS Features

PDF Sharing

RCS empowers brands to go beyond simple text messages by seamlessly sharing graphically immersive brochures, catalogs, and other promotional materials in PDF format. This feature is perfect for showcasing new products, announcing events, or delivering detailed information directly to opted-in customers.

Imagine sending a beautifully designed product brochure to customers right on their smartphones. With RCS, it’s not just possible—it’s a reality. 

QR Code Scan

QR codes have become ubiquitous, appearing in print ads, digital displays, and even store entrances. RCS leverages this technology by allowing users to initiate conversations with brands simply by scanning a QR code. This opens up a new avenue for customer engagement and streamlines the process of starting a dialogue.

Person-to-Application (P2A) Journey

RCS enables a two-way conversation between brands and customers. Users can initiate chats with your RCS agent by simply saying “Hi.” This empowers customers to ask questions, seek support, or explore products and services on their terms.

AI on RCS

Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming the way we communicate. With AI powered RCS agents, brands can understand and respond to unstructured replies from customers. This means your RCS agent can intelligently gauge intent and provide relevant responses, even when customers don’t use specific keywords or phrases.

RCS & the Google Ecosystem

RCS is deeply integrated with the Google ecosystem, offering exciting possibilities for brands:

Google Calendar

With a single tap, users can sync event reminders from RCS messages directly to their Google Calendar. This ensures that important dates and appointments are never missed, enhancing the customer experience and driving engagement.

 

Google Maps

RCS allows users to find locations on Google Maps without ever leaving the chat. Whether it’s a store location, event venue, or point of interest, this integration provides convenience and seamless navigation for customers.

 

Google Wallet

Customers can effortlessly save check-in information and boarding passes to their Google Wallet directly from RCS chats. This feature simplifies travel and eliminates the need for physical documents, making life easier for your customers.

 

 

 

RCS on Apple Now

The introduction of RCS on iOS 18 (expected in September) is a game-changer, significantly expanding its reach and unlocking untapped potential for brands, especially in Apple-dominant markets. 

This expansion allows businesses to engage a wider audience on Apple devices with enhanced messaging capabilities, including rich media, interactive elements, and personalized experiences. This increased reach translates to a broader customer base, enabling brands to extend their marketing and communication efforts to new segments. 

For businesses operating in Apple-dominant markets, adopting RCS provides a significant competitive advantage by offering a richer and more engaging messaging experience compared to traditional SMS. 

Moreover, the global impact of RCS on iOS is substantial, as Apple devices are widely used worldwide. This enables brands with a global presence to create consistent and compelling messaging experiences across diverse markets, regardless of the dominant mobile operating system.

RCS Best Practices for Brands

To maximize the impact of RCS, brands should consider the following best practices:

• Understand Your Audience: Tailor your RCS messages to your specific target audience. Personalization and relevance are key to driving engagement.
• Leverage Rich Media: RCS supports rich media, including images, videos, carousels, and more. Use these elements to create visually appealing and engaging messages.
• Interactive Experiences: Incorporate interactive elements like suggested replies, quick reply buttons, and product carousels to enhance the user experience and guide customers through their journey.
• Omnichannel Integration: Integrate RCS into your broader omnichannel messaging strategy to provide a seamless and consistent customer experience across all channels.
• Measure and Optimize: Track key metrics like open rates, click-through rates, and conversions to measure the effectiveness of your RCS campaigns. Use this data to refine your strategy and optimize your messages over time.

How can brands integrate RCS with existing business messaging channels?

Wonder how RCS can integrate with your existing business messaging channels? RCS apart from being replete with rich functionalities can also easily complement your existing business messaging efforts.

RCS with SMS

As per the Universal Profile, all Android phones will have Google Messages as the default messaging app. However, currently not all Android devices support RCS. So, how does RCS promise 100% reach? It fallbacks to SMS.

RCS messages can be sent to any number across the world. However, in devices that don’t support RCS, it falls back to SMS, ensuring you reach your customer despite this limitation. Furthermore, RCS will replace SMS in the 5G standard. However, 4G and 3G are more prevalent across the globe now, again proving to be a limitation during the transition phase.

RCS is available along with SMS in the same native messaging app, making it easier for businesses to leverage the benefits of RCS with the benefit of fallback to SMS, ensuring seamless customer communication.

RCS with OTT messaging platforms

When it comes to rich capabilities, RCS and OTT messaging platforms are at par. However, as RCS is available in the user’s native messaging app unlike OTT messaging platforms, it eliminates the need to download a third-party app. OTT messaging platforms can also work as fallback options for RCS when users cannot receive RCS messages.

RCS along with other prevalent OTT platforms can help businesses gain deeper reach, expand customer base, and offer seamless support across platforms as per customer convenience.

Guarantee Your Message Reaches Your Customer with Fallback to Other Channels

In today’s omnichannel communication landscape, ensuring your message reaches your customer, regardless of their preferred channel or any potential delivery obstacles, is paramount. Fallback mechanisms play a crucial role in achieving this goal.

When Fallback is Essential

Fallback becomes indispensable in several scenarios:

• User Unavailable on Channel: If your customer is not actively using RCS at a given moment, fallback ensures the message seamlessly transitions to another channel they are likely to engage with, such as WhatsApp or SMS.
• Template Rejection or Paused Campaigns: In cases where an RCS template is rejected due to policy violations or a campaign is paused, fallback prevents the message from being lost entirely. It can be rerouted through alternative channels to maintain communication.
• Message Limits Reached: Some channels have limitations on the number of messages that can be sent within a specific timeframe. Fallback guarantees that even when these limits are reached, your message still finds its way to the recipient through another route.
• Delivery Delays: Network congestion or technical issues can sometimes cause delays in message delivery. Fallback ensures that time-sensitive messages, such as OTPs or payment reminders, reach customers promptly through a different channel if the primary one is experiencing delays.

Types of Fallback

There are various fallback options available, each tailored to different needs:

• RCS to WhatsApp to SMS: This multi-layered fallback first attempts delivery through RCS. If unsuccessful, it seamlessly transitions to WhatsApp and, as a final resort, to SMS, ensuring maximum reach.

 

• RCS to SMS: A simpler fallback where RCS is the primary channel, and SMS acts as a reliable backup if RCS delivery fails.

 

• WhatsApp to RCS to SMS: In this scenario, WhatsApp takes the lead, followed by RCS and SMS as successive fallback options.

Benefits of Fallback

Implementing fallback mechanisms offers a multitude of benefits for brands:

• Higher Reach: Fallback maximizes the number of customers you can reach by utilizing multiple channels, increasing the likelihood that your message is delivered and seen.
• Optimized Campaign Costs: By prioritizing the most cost-effective channel and resorting to fallback only when necessary, you can optimize your campaign expenses while maintaining effective communication.
• Critical Communication Delivered: Fallback ensures that critical messages like OTPs, KYC verification codes, sign-in alerts, payment reminders, and renewal notifications are delivered promptly, even in the face of challenges.
• Better Customer Experience: Smart fallback reduces the spam associated with bombarding customers on multiple channels. It prioritizes delivering the message through the most relevant and convenient channel for the recipient.
• Channel Optimization: Based on the type of campaign and message content, fallback allows you to choose the most suitable channel. For example, RCS might be preferred for promotional messages with rich media, while SMS might be more effective for urgent alerts.

RBM use cases in the real world

Subway

Challenge:
Subway wanted to personalize its SMS campaign of weekly offers to their customers to drive sales and increase customer engagement.

Solution:
They chose to run RCS campaigns with rich cards and interactive features for the promotion of their sandwiches and meal deals. To track the impact of RCS campaigns, they even set up a control group using the existing SMS channel.

Results:
Subway saw a tremendous growth of 140% increase in conversion for sandwiches and 51% increase in conversion for meal deals compared to SMS. (Source: Google Jibe)

World Health Organization (WHO)

Challenge:
During the pandemic, WHO wanted to disseminate actionable information regarding prevention and safety measures for COVID to the citizens of the world. It faced the challenge of how to send accurate information across the world and ensure high open rates.

Solution:
WHO in partnership with OutThereMedia and several carriers, launched a global RCS messaging campaign. The campaign objective was to deliver links and notification to pertinent landing pages containing information. To help achieve this objective, an RCS bot that could answer people’s queries in their native language was launched.

Results:
The campaign saw immense success with a whopping 96% read rates and a 46% engagement rate. (Source: OutThereMedia)

Vodafone

Challenge:
Vodafone, a telecom network, wanted to reduce its support staff’s workload. Vodafone realized a major chunk of its support staff’s time was being wasted on resolving repetitive and simple customer queries.

Solution:
Automation was the obvious answer to their problems. So, Vodafone deployed an AI-powered RCS chatbot named TOBi. TOBi was a customer service chatbot, using which customers could ask general queries or get help with simple tasks such as checking account balances, swapping SIM cards, buying bundles, and more.

Results:
The RCS bot saw a 90% increase in customer conversion rate, something unheard of with any previous channels. Additionally, it helped reduce the workload on Vodafone’s customer care executive, allowing them to focus on solving critical and complex customer queries.

More case studies on RCS can be found on Google Jibe and MEF website.

Elevate Your Customer Communication Strategy with Gupshup’s RCS Solution

 

Customers expect personalized, interactive, immediate, and transparent communication. With RCS and its many features, you can not only deploy highly impactful, result-driven campaigns but also earn customer trust and further nurture your customer relationships.

As RCS evolves with more features and use cases, businesses already using RCS and keeping track of its trend, are perfectly positioned to avail all the benefits of this relatively new communication technology in business messaging.

Gupshup is the #1 Conversational Engagement Platform for Marketing, Commerce, and Support automation powered by conversational AI chatbots, for businesses to deliver human-like conversations, that boost customer satisfaction and revenue at scale.

With Gupshup’s RCS solution, you can reach your customers on every smartphone, including non-RCS devices. You can offer seamless automated support, deploy spam-proof messaging campaigns, and launch your campaigns across all carrier networks.

Stamp your brand’s presence in your customers’ SMS inbox and gain deeper insights into their behavior with Gupshup’s detailed analytics.

Ready to elevate your customer communication strategy with Gupshup’s RCS solution? 

Request for a demo today.