SMS payments and other options

[MrQ]

After reading the "casual games are a dead-end" thread I got thinking about why xbox-live has such a high sell-through compared to the average portal sites and different ways of converting that %98 into something lower.

Heres some of the reasons I think xbox live achieves a higher sell-through rate:
- known trusted company (MS)
- point system?
- range of varied games (easy to pick and wider appeal)
- proffesional look and feel

I'm interested to hear any ideas to make games more accessible through different payment options or ways to assure the public that thier money is safe.

I found this mob who do SMS payments world-wide
http://www.m-enable.com/content/index.php?page=coverage_sms

I'm wondering if there are any other wideley used methods such as paypal? I see SMS payment a really easy and secure option for alot of people.

[oNyx]

XBox360... well, its ease, trust and *drumroll* compatibility.

And SMS... I heard its rarely used on those sites which support it, but it may of course result in a bunch of extra sells you wouldnt have gotten otherwise. Hm. The site you linked doesnt even list setup fees and rates. I guess its ridiculously expensive. And it looks outdated... "Plus another 4 countries scheduled for 2005!" ;)

Whats also bad about those SMS services is that they are frequently abused. There are a bunch of companies who just charge lots of randomly choosen people in the hope that they wont do anything, because its only a few bucks. And all those default subscriptions (for all eternity unless canceled) in the fine print... yuck.

Paypal is just fine, methinks. And CC for those who have one. And that google thing for being trendy. Covers pretty much all you need for the US and Europe, I would say.

[MrQ]

Your right about the SMS abuse, theres a few scams in australia at the moment that call your phone or sms your phone randomly and then try and trick you into responding which locks you into a back and forth stlye conversation that charges you per message.
It may be worth it if there are no huge setup fees and the website highlights the fact you can pay by sms, no cc needed.

But I'm still convinced that alot of people are not comfortable purchasing products over the internet, Especially from smaller websites. I know this because I'm one of these people and I only purchase from large trusted websites. I think this has alot todo with the low sell-through rate from pc portals.

[walkal]

Another limitation of premium SMS as a charging mechanism is that it can't handle refunds.

[MrQ]

That's true although you could probably direct transfer it to the persons account. I also hear that some providers have a limit to payments meaning in order to pay $24.95 or so, you need to text multi-part messages.

[Oaf]

Premium SMS is a nightmare. It's expensive to set up, no one provider seems to cover every territory, and pricing is a problem as each territory has a different pricing scheme for each PSMS sent.

There are low-cost providers out there, like the one I use, but to be honest they're not worth the effort - I typically have to email games to people who couldn't receive their game through some psms system cock up.