EXPLORING CRITICAL FACTORS OF MULTIMEDIA MESSAGING SERVICE – A QUALITATIVE CASE STUDY IN TAIWAN

摘要

While short messaging service (SMS) is discussed often in recent literature, multimedia messaging service (MMS), a media rich successor of SMS, is seldom heard or understood by mobile users in Taiwan. To investigate the development status and market performance of MMS, we tried to elicit opinions and comments in terms of MMS critical factors from the experts and related literatures. An interview with one of the leading MMS system providers in Taiwan was conducted to help sort out and validate these critical factors. Through a 4Ps-based analytical view, various MMS business strategies (including product promotion, user friendliness, acceptable pricing structure, wide sales channels, collaboration with service providers, and others) were suggested for enterprise managers and decision makers for the purpose of the design and development of successful MMS business strategies. In particular,MMS service providers should understand what customers perceive as value, and therefore, improvements in the product content and acceptable pricing strategy together with other critical factors are radical for consumers’ adoption of MMS.