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Twitter SMS Acision

Twitter Alerts launches to help users receive accurate information from credible organisations during emergencies

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By Ishbel Macleod | PR and social media consultant

September 26, 2013 | 2 min read

Twitter has announced the launch of Twitter Alerts, a feature which will allow users to get notifications directly to their phones during emergencies whenever a credible organisation account marks a tweet as an alert.

Following on from Lifelife, which Twitter launched in Japan last year to help Japanese users find emergency accounts during crises, Twitter Alerts looks to help users get important and accurate information from ‘credible organisations during emergencies, natural disasters or moments when other communications services aren’t accessible’.

Those on Twitter for iPhone or Android will receive a push notification, although everyone signed up for alerts will receive an SMS message.

Koby Amedume, global director of marketing and communications at mobile messaging specialist Acision, discussed the use of SMS as the main means of communication: “Acision’s own global research shows that 95 per cent of the UK and US mobile citizens still use SMS as part of their messaging habits, co-existing with OTT and IP based applications. This popularity would have been part of the deciding factor in Twitter’s decision to use this platform alongside, SMS’ ubiquitous nature, unrivalled reach, speed and ease of use across all mobile devices and operating systems.

“The service has already seen positive take-up across many countries and continents with more than 60 organisations signing up for the new system, including the emergency management departments of Florida and New York, as well as the American Red Cross, FEMA and International organizations such as The World Health Organization and the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department."

The alerts themselves will also appear differently on the home timeline to regular tweets, as they will be indicated with an orange bell.

To subscribe to notifications from an agency, users go directly to an account’s setup page, which you’ll find at twitter.com/[username]/alerts, such as https://twitter.com/fema/alerts, which will ask which ways a user wants to receive notifications.

Twitter SMS Acision

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