Interesting post. I agree that SMS is a real hot topic in the business space, really underutilised at the moment.

Carlo, if the functionality you need is to send an SMS easily from your PC, that you are effectively on line most of the time (I assume with your email client open), that you can not be bothered to go to a specific website, that you want this to be integrated into your email solution, ie: have it integrated with sent and receive emails, that you want the recipient to be able to respond via sms and the sms to be received into your inbox or your mobile at your choice, and are looking at even more functionalities, I suggest to have a look at http://www.redoxygen.com.

Incidentally, SwissCom uses Red Oxygen solution for their business solution.

Any question, do not hesitate to let me know, herve dot humbert at redoxygen dot com

I asked a friend, who is with Sprint, to try out the MyPCS portal’s SMS utility. He said he could only send text messages to other Sprint customers – which seems pointless.

I have been using teleflip.com for the past year and it great. I can only send outgoing SMS from my desktop email program, but it IS to anyone, and I don’t even have to know what carrier they use. As far as tracking the sent messages, I just use the mail program’s out box.

When, O, when will there be the means to send and receive SMS from the desktop to anyone and track it like email?

Carlos how about a MobHappy post that compares the various SMS services, with a focus on utility and carrier neutrality? A “SMS Shootout” if you will.

Thanks to everyone for your comments, I learned alot!

So, I can access a Swisscom website as an authenticated subsrciber and send an SMS using a web form, without any extra account or billing step. Is this what you mean ?

David.

Mac users have also been able to do this for quite some time with little program called Salling Clickr. http://www.salling.com/Clicker/mac/

Besides letting you control virtually every component of your computer with your cell phone like a remote control it also has a feature that allows you to go into your Mac address book and send SMS from your computer provided your phone is hooked up to your cmputer via bluetooth.

I have been using it for about a year now.

http://www.andybudd.com/archives/2005/08/using_the_sony_ericsson_d750k750w800_on_os_x/

In any case, are those services integrated with a user’s mobile account, or is it separate? The facility to send SMS from a web site has existed here for quite some time, however, this is the first example I’ve seen where it’s integrated with a phone. Having two separate accounts (and having to maintain something in addition to my usual mobile, as the commenter above suggested), seems like it be a lot of effort without enough benefits.

The Mac thing would be pretty ideal for me, if it would work — I’m using an SE K750i, any tips you can share?

See here (French version) – “SMS Box”, in the middle under the navigation bar. Billing is done through the internet access package.

And the Mac address book thing…. well I’ve been using it to send & receive SMS with various Sony Ericsson phones for ages.

Have you had a look at BulkSMS? http://usa.bulksms.com/

You will have to buy credits to use it and you can’t send a SMS as yourself (or maybe you can?) or be charged according to your cellphone payment plan, but you can send messages by email or desktop.