Many of our clients have asked what are the next countries and when are we planning to launch the service there. Well, we have been preparing some countries for some time already.

During this summer Fortumo is expanding to several countries in different continents. In the 1st phase we decided to open our service in China. Why China? Big market, hundreds of millions end-users, one of the fastest growing market may be some of the reasons.

Did you know that:
* there are 1.3 billion people living in China
* China has the biggest Internet user’s community in the world, they have 228.5 million Internet users (2008 first 6 months report)
* China’s mobile penetration was 34% in 2007
* in 2006 mobile phone users sent 429 billion text messages (on average 967 text messages per user)

Stay tuned new countries are coming soon.

Beijing 2008 Olympic games are getting all the attention this week and the next one. Are you also keeping an eye on some event? Great thing is that it is fun to predict who will win and keep the fingers crossed all the time.

What do you think - will Michael Phelps win 8 gold medals in Beijing 2008?

* If you think that Michael Phelps will win 8 gold medals send an SMS to 1066109833 and write X TXT PHELPS YES
* If you think that Michael Phelps won’t win 8 gold medals send an SMS to 1066109833 and write X TXT PHELPS NO
(The cost of one SMS is 1 RMB)

Did you know that you can also create such campaigns? Fortumo.cn can help you

Uniteddogs.com and Unitedcats.com are fun and positive-minded online communities for
dog,- and catlovers all over the world. Create a profile for your dog or cat, upload photos,
post comments, pat other dogs, communicate with other dog,- and catowners and send
virtual gifts to other dogs and cats. These are just some features Uniteddogs and
Unitedcats provide.

“We give people the opportunity to express themselves through their pets, they come
together because they have something really important in common and they know that
here the people understand their “craziness” about dogs and cats.”

How have you applied SMS-services?
At Uniteddogs and Unitedcats we have an internal bonus points system. The members will
be awarded with bonus points according to their activity. Posting to forum, patting dogs
and cats, writing a blog post etc - all these actions will give some bonus points.
Bonus points in the other hand could be used for sending cute virtual gifts to other dogs
and cats or changing the design of the pet’s profile. Now, Uniteddogs and Unitedcats
members have the oppurtunity to order bonus points also via SMS.

Where did the idea of using SMS- services come from?
Well, after launching the bonus points system, we saw a potantial in SMS-services and as
SMS-services are really popular, we wanted to give this oppurtunity to our members also.

Why did you decide to use SMS- services in your web business?
People are very passionate about sending out the virtual gifts and the SMS is the easiest
solution we could offer our members to order bonus points. Nowadays, creating new SMS-
services is just a click-away and why we decided to go for Fortumo, was the reason that
we could create the same service in all Baltic countries. Uniteddogs and Unitedcats are
very international projects, with 15 different language-versions and members from all over
the world. Implementing the SMS-service to different local versions of Uniteddogs and
Unitedcats was easy and already today we’re waiting for new countries for Fortumo to
support.

What has SMS-service additionally given you?
We have given our members a convenient oppurtunity for ordering bonus points. Although
they get a lot of bonus points according to their activity on Uniteddogs and Unitedcats, but
at some cases they would just need more bonus points. Let’s say if you wish to send a
cool virtual gift for all the birthday dogs:)

Starting from this week, we have put a live stats counter on top of the Fortumo.com frontpage (currently only seen in the English version). This counter tracks the number of users and number of new services in real time.

Lets work together on growing these numbers!

This week we launched some important improvements that you have been asking lately. Check them out and we hope you will like what you see.

New short code in Latvia - 1897

To make end-users’ life easier we have opened new short code in Latvia - 1897. From now on, you can create services in Latvia with this new short code. We have also activated all the current services with the new code. It means that you can replace previous three short codes with one in your promotional materials. The old short codes will remain working until 18th of May. After that, only the new one is used. Replace the information and you will see your users getting happier

New keyword WIN in use

We have added new primary keyword WIN for Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Mainly it was demanded for campaign services, but it can be used for other ones as well. Spring is the time for some cool text-to-win campaigns - try it out!

New end-user price added in Latvia

Many users have asked for higher end-user price in Latvia. Now it is possible to create services that cost 2,50 LVL (approximately 3,64 EUR), so you can monetize more expensive content and earn bigger revenue.

Additional security measure for Premium SMS-connectivity service

The HTTP GET requests that Fortumo is making towards your script are now signed with a shared secret. You can check the added signature parameter to be sure that the request is made by Fortumo and not someone else. The shared secret can be found from the service settings page. Full explanation and an example PHP script that checks the signature is included here. However, you don’t have to add the signature check, if you don’t want to, it’s fully optional.

Just wanted to let you know that Fortumo will be attending CTIA Wireless in Las Vegas on 1-3 April. If you happen to be there as well, then we would love to set up a meeting or just have a cup of coffee somewhere. Please e-mail rain.rannu@fortumo.com to get in touch. See you in Vegas

We are very happy that Mobile Monday finally launches in Tallinn, Estonia. Fortumo is obviously there, as well as many of our customers. The opening event will be held at 18:00, Omega Hall, Olümpia Conference Centre.

Mobile Monday is a world known networking format for everyone in the mobile business. Meetings in Estonia are scheduled to be held monthly, alternating between Tallinn and Tartu. Tallinn events will cover general and marketing-related topics, with international speakers and a wide audience. Tartu events will focus on mobile development topics.

Yes, of course Fortumo will be present at GSMA Mobile World Congress (former 3GSM) in Barcelona from 11-14 February.

No, we are not exhibiting. By being efficient and not wasting money on expensive stand helps us to give more money to you guys who create our services. This is what Fortumo is all about.

To set up a meeting in Barcelona or catch me over lunch or a cup of coffee, please get in touch at rain.rannu@fortumo.com

Pay for video enables you to charge for your videos. You are able to monetize videos on your website and earn revenue from every spectator and you don’t have to worry about video hosting. You just have to have videos uploaded to Youtube or some other video sharing community. Create pay for video service, choose videos you want to monetize and embed them to your blog or website. Users send a keyword via SMS to a short code and get a password in a reply message that allows them to see the video You make profit from every SMS sent.

Why to use pay for video?
* it is really easy way to monetize your videos
* people who do not have a credit card or Paypal can see the videos
* people can stay anonymous while using your service
* service is flexible - you can always upload more videos
* you will have great database to whom you can advertise your other services directly via SMS
* you will make profit for every sms sent

Who should use pay for video?
Mainly website owners or bloggers who have interesting video-material uploaded to Youtube or other video sharing community that others might want to see and are willing to pay for it. Small movie producers or artists are able to share movie trailers or music videos with others in their website and at the same time earn revenue from that.

Few weeks ago we revealed our plans to provide SMS-services for Facebook. This week the services are available. But why are we making services for social networks?

Social networks are developing into open web portals, where in addition to personal profiles we can find presence of bands, companies and other organizations.
In these portals people can make their pages more original and interactive with different widgets. We find that this could be beneficial to the profile owner as well.  So from now on you can add SMS services to your Facebook profile or page. Since we see a huge potential in mobile services in social networks, these services won’t be the only ones.

Check out our new service and make money in Facebook.