I remember, back in the day a decade ago, when people ("smart money investors", ehem) were busy telling me they didn't want to invest in our SMS business because of the imminent arrival of WAP. I recall saying then, as I still say today, that short messaging won't go away overnight. Indeed, of course, it continued to go from strength to strength. I used the analogy of email, and pointed out that just because people bought display ads on the web, others still used email to great success.

I was reminded of all of this by another well-meaning crystal-ball gazer recently. Since I've been working in mobile display and rich-media ads recently, my passion for SMS has fallen by the wayside. However, trying to find a buyer for an SMS marketing company I know of this week, I found myself enthusiastic again in the face of much 'SMS is dead' rhetoric, about the continued ability of this grubby little medium to cut through noise and create genuine engagement. In tandem with your sexy iPhone app, some display advertising and a properly functioning mobile website, the potential for people to live with your brand on their phone is very real.

But here's the thing that people still don't get. Text is all about two things: tone of voice and relevance. Everyone pays lip-service to the latter, yet still nobody really gets the former. The poor content of many marketing texts bring to mind some of the 411 scam emails: where grammar is so poor, simple words are mis-spelled, and the content is littered with factual inaccuracies (I recently received one such email from 'the desk of J.Edgar Hoover'!)

Similarly, a recent text I received from the store where I bought a recent phone mis-spelled no fewer than three words in the space of one text. My provider in the US sends me account balance messages preceded by 'You're Balace is' (sic). Seriously. Two errors in three words from a major household name?

Just because it's lightweight and throwaway doesn't mean it doesn't matter. It almost matters more, if you're going to cut through the noise effectively. I've come to the conclusion that there is room for a dedicated SMS copywriting agency. Maybe I'll start one.