Sending SMS from your website

Did you ever see the form for sending SMS on the mobile operator's site? Such form is an efficient way to attract customers and to return them to your website again and again. There is a plenty of applications for the SMS web service, starting from a free service for premium customers and finishing by an access to the GSM messaging service to the personnel working at home.

The engine for sending short GSM messages is not as difficult to deploy as you may probably think. Here is all you need to deploy such service:

• The computer which is permanently turned on (SMS server)
• Microsoft Windows OS running on the server
• GSM/GPRS modem connected to the computer
• Headwind GSM Modem Driver
• .NET framework for running custom scripts to retrieve messages from the web server
• Web-server with the storage database

Our company provides you with the heart of the SMS engine, the platform "Headwind GSM Modem Driver". We can also develop a custom solution for best fit to your business' needs and consult you on the SMS server deployment. Contact us for more information.

Details of the website SMS solution

Let us briefly describe how the SMS message submitted by the website visitor reaches its recipient.

• SMS is transferred from the client's web browser to your company's web server (POST request of the HTTP protocol)
• The message is stored in the database. The database is usually placed together with a web server, so if you are using third-party web hosting, the database will be also placed at the hosting provider's server.
• The SMS server (located at your office) periodically asks the database for incoming SMS and retrieves them. This is done by a custom .NET application running on the SMS server. You may use database connector directly (use SQL protocol) or use the HTTP protocol (when the hosting provider's database is inaccessible).
• When the SMS is arrived at the SMS server, it send it over the air through a GSM modem. The source address of the SMS message is an ordinary mobile-station number (MSISDN).
• The recipient may write a reply to the SMS. This solution allows to capture the replies at the SMS server.