Wizard or API: picking the right way to build on AppLink

Every AppLink service ends up in the same place: on the handset of a Banglalink subscriber, billed to their mobile account, with a share of the revenue settled to you. What differs is how you get there. The Wizard is a guided, no-code builder. The APIs are HTTP endpoints you call from your own server. Both are free to sign up for and free to publish on.

The Wizard in one paragraph

The Wizard turns four proven service formats into forms: Voting, Contact, Alert and Scheduled Messages. You type the messages, pick the keyword or the schedule, choose how subscribers are charged and publish. AppLink hosts the service, runs it and bills for it. There is no server to keep alive and nothing to deploy.

The APIs in one paragraph

The APIs open up the network itself. SMS sends and receives messages on your short code. USSD runs menu sessions on any handset. Subscription bills subscribers daily or monthly. CaaS takes one-off charges approved by OTP. OTP verifies a number before you trust it. Your code decides what happens with every message, which means you can build almost anything, and it also means the uptime is yours.

Choose the Wizard when

• Your service fits one of the four templates, as most consumer SMS services do.
• You want to be live today, not after a sprint.
• You would rather not run, pay for or monitor a server.
• You are testing whether an audience exists before you invest in code.

Choose the APIs when

• The reply depends on data you hold: exam results, order status, an account balance.
• You need an interactive USSD menu that works without data.
• You want to charge inside your own app or website with CaaS.
• You are adding SMS, OTP or subscriptions to a product that already exists.

Start with one, graduate later

The choice is not a one-way door. A common path is to launch a Wizard alert service, learn what subscribers actually stay for, then rebuild the winning idea on the Subscription and SMS APIs once it needs logic the template does not have. Your developer account, your Service Provider profile and your revenue share are the same either way.