TXTing Students (for free!)

Right now there are PLENTY of resources being developed to help youth leaders communicate easier/better to our students. With the widely available resources like txsignal.com and SYM’s “TXT”, we decided to let you in on a little-known secret out there that would allow you to TXT groups of students FOR FREE from your Internet Browser window!

Did you know that you can send a text-message to a cellphone from within AOL Instant Messenger?!

(If you did, there’s no real reason to keep reading…)

AOL allows you to send TXTs to cellphone numbers very simply - just add a new buddy to your buddies list in this format: +1 555 555 5555 (without spaces).

When you get students contact information, update your buddies list with their cell phone and be sure and keep them informed of updates to your ministry schedule and special events via TXT!

Another suggestion: use a service like Meebo™ or Pidgin™ to keep track of your students Instant Messaging screen names and cell phone contact information. These services allow you to connect to multiple IM services (AOL, Yahoo, Google, etc.) and add buddies in categories! Just be sure and add cellphone numbers under the AOL IM service tab and place in a category like “Youth Cell #s” or something similar.

This ability to TXT students from within AOL Instant Messenger is a FREE method of opening communication-lines with students.

If you haven’t tried adding students’ cellphone numbers to your IM service before, try it and leave a comment letting others know how easy (or difficult?) it was for you!

Posted in: General, Online Resources

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 9th, 2008 at 2:40 pm and is filed under General, Online Resources. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

3 Responses to “TXTing Students (for free!)”

Eric Ebbinghaus September 9th, 2008 at 2:46 pm

I’ll tag another note on that. If you’re a Mac user (born again), then you can use a free program called Adium X to compile all of your messengers in. AOL, MSN, GOOGLE, YAHOO, etc.

PlugRug.com September 20th, 2008 at 10:44 am

TXTing Students (for free!)…

Did you know you could TXT your students for free using your computer and something as simple as AOL Instant Messenger?…

Tim Schmoyer September 20th, 2008 at 9:01 pm

I used to use AOL IM for text messaging, but it’s really cumbersome if you have a large group of kids. Plus, there’s no easy way for students to automatically and unsubscribe themselves from the text list, which means you have to manually manage the whole thing. Furthermore, you can’t queue up messages and YG reminders to automatically send in the future either. But, I guess you get what you pay for, too.

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