When we say texting, the first things that come to mind are emojis and short messages between friends and family, right?
Have you ever considered texting as a way to reach your customers?
It’s a great way to expand your communication reach. Businesses that do use SMS as a marketing channel tap into a whole new world of opportunities. Here are 9 reasons why you should invest in SMS marketing.
1. All about mobile-friendliness
Fact: it’s a mobile world we live in. And some of us prefer the mobile over any other device type. Show your audience you embrace the mobile trends and adapt your offers, landing pages, coupons, and communication. This is the kind of exposure and type of customers you don’t want to miss out on.
2. Cost-effective and budget-friendly
We remember a time when texting was expensive. Today, sending text messages in bulk is cheap and won’t make a big dent in your budget. Prices vary across countries but can go super low like a couple of cents per text.
3. Immediate
Successful SMS campaigns are fast and easy to create. There is no waiting for designs, visuals, prints, or materials to gather. All you need to do is come up with your message type and send it. And because of the limitation of 160 characters per text, you have to be short and precise.
4. High open rates
Check your phone. How many unopened or ignored emails do you have? And how many text messages? That’s right.
People are picky when it comes to sharing their phone numbers with businesses. They’ll only opt-in if they trust you and would like to hear from you. That’s why the open rate of text messages is 98%! This leads to a high click, i.e., a high open rate of your links in texts.
5. High response rates
SMS can be so much more than just a one-sided communication. You can engage both ways and give your customers the chance to reply. Achieve this with the use of keywords you can easily set up. The most common keywords you can come across are STOP to unsubscribe, JOIN to subscribe to the newsletter, YES to accept an offer, NO to decline. But, you can set up different ones depending on your campaign.
“With our phones acting as supercomputers in our pockets, we can find, learn, do, and buy whenever the need arises—or the whim strikes.”
Lisa Gevelber
6. No promotion tabs
This is the struggle with email. Because of its vast popularity, it’s quite easy for your email to end up in Gmail’s promotions tab and get lost among other emails.
On the other hand, text messages go straight to the contact’s phone, so the chances of them being overlooked are slim. However, mobile carriers have spam filters, which you can easily trigger by making some of the most common texting mistakes.
7. Personalization of messages
Tailor the message or parts of it to the recipients by using variables and segmentation or even custom links. As with any other communication, people love reading or receiving stuff that matches their interests.
And by using personalization, you’ll create one text whose content dynamically changes depending on who receives it. Stick to the information you need to make their experience better; there’s no need to be creepy and freak people out.
8. Integration with other channels
Text messages shouldn’t be the only thing in your marketing toolbox. Add some variety and combine them with landing pages, emails, prints, social media, and more. You can ask people to subscribe to your blog or follow you on Instagram. Create the ultimate experience for people by smoothly incorporating different communication touchpoints.
9. Trackable results
Monitor your SMS campaigns. You can see how your text message campaigns perform individually and together over time. More intelligent tracking will show you unsubscribes, how many texts were sent, which ones failed, and why, which contacts received the text and which links were opened, and by whom. All of this will ensure you get the most out of your SMS marketing.
If you think about boosting your marketing efforts and expand your reach, you might want to give SMS marketing a go. It’s quick, easy, and cost-effective and will provide you with great results. This makes it perfect for any business, big or small.