An SMS message can perform multiple functions for businesses either internally or externally. SMS uses include:
- Sales and marketing
- Appointment and reservation management
- Customer engagement and interaction
- Brand building
- Customer support
- Communicating important information with customers or staff
- Recruitment and ongoing staff management
If you’re still not convinced, here are eight reasons you could benefit from a text messaging service:
1. It’s Affordable
Mobile marketing is far more cost-efficient than other marketing methods. The service itself is really cheap and comes with a guarantee that you will reach a wider audience than ever before.
Customers can have their needs met on their mobile device by using two-way SMS automation which can be managed by your SMS marketing platform. Automated SMS can manage enquiries such as:
- Product information
- Payments
- Customer service issues
- Online orders
Use keywords to enable customers to receive automatic responses to their mobile phone instantly. If it becomes clear that the customer requires further assistance, the interaction can be moved to a real member of staff for completion. The cost of SMS messages when compared with staff costs is hard to ignore.
2. Boost Return on investment (ROI)
When you weigh up the relatively low cost of using SMS marketing with the number of customers you can reach in minutes it’s easy to see how you can achieve a high ROI.
When using other marketing tools only time will tell if you have hit the mark. How can you guarantee that customers are seeing your ads? SMS campaigns are trackable from the moment you send out your text messages. You will know within the first few minutes if people are responding to your content. Using a reliable SMS platform will enable you to see how your recipients have engaged. You will be able to check your click-through rate (CTR) and rate of engagement. If your campaign is not achieving what you hoped it would, you can change it at any time.
3. Efficient at reaching people
Who can argue with a 98% open rate? Smartphone users are obsessed with their mobile devices. It turns out that we want to do as much as we possibly can from the palm of our hand.
According to 99firms 78% of customers wish they could send an SMS text message to a business and 50% wish that they could receive SMS messages back.
A good SMS platform allows you to communicate across the world, regardless of the market you want to reach. With SMS segmentation, you can close in more specifically on your target audience. By selecting particular fields on your customer database, you can choose which customers to send your SMS marketing campaigns to. You can segment demographically, geographically, behaviorally, and psycho-graphically.
4. Immediate delivery
SMS is the fastest way for you to reach most people. No other channel can capture the attention as quickly as SMS text messages. Let’s face it, with the average person looking at their phone every 4 minutes, it would be pretty unlucky for your content not to be viewed.
You can personalise your SMS messaging to include the customer’s name, favourite products, special dates, and much more. This will add a level of trust and credibility to your SMS campaign and encourage people to open the text messages and engage with your brand.
5. Permission-based
Many other marketing channels are exposed to all potential customers regardless of whether people are interested in the brand or not. Some marketers may feel that this is a good thing, surely reaching more people will mean greater sales. That’s not necessarily true.
If you are looking for a good conversion rate to support your ROI then targeting your SMS messaging with customers who have a genuine interest will drive more conversions.
SMS marketing is permission-based, meaning that recipients are required to opt-in to receive text messages from brands. Once opted in, your customers become subscribers and you can start to build an ongoing relationship with them.
Just as the customer opts in, they can also opt-out at any time and choose not to receive your marketing texts. This may seem like a negative point but, it means that you are only marketing to subscribers who are interested in your brand and therefore more likely to purchase from you. Subscribers are great leads to nurture, being interested is half the work done before you even start.
Sending messages to opt-in subscribers will save you marketing costs. Always add a “STOP” option to your texts, it builds a level of trust in your brand.
6. Simple and easy
Text messages by their nature are more clear and concise than other communication. This is probably because they can only be a maximum of 160 characters long. Don’t let this put you off, it’s a really good thing. You can get straight to the point of your messages without boring your subscribers.
We have busy lives so being able to communicate with subscribers in one or two lines of text with a clear call-to-action (CTS) is an advantage to everyone concerned. Marketing emails can be lengthy and often the CTA or methods of contact can be found at the very bottom. Most readers have clicked off before they even reach the CTA.
Texts are generally easier to read and understand and can take advantage of universally accepted acronyms, abbreviations, and emojis to get the message across.
7. SMS is still popular
SMS is still one of the most popular forms of communication. With over 10 billion texts being sent per day in the UK alone, it’s safe to say that you will reap the benefits of communicating with customers this way.
The added advantage of two-way communication will keep the conversation between your brand and your customers going throughout the customer life cycle.
If you want to keep up with the competition, take note; because if you’re not using this method of communication, you can guarantee your competitors will be.
8. Environmentally friendly
Using SMS has a positive impact on the environment. Reduce your carbon footprint and cut down on direct mail, poster campaigns, and newspaper ads immediately. Switching to SMS can also reduce fuel costs allowing staff to work more flexibly and from home as SMS can be managed remotely as well as in-house.
Imagine a business whereby customer support was managed via text messaging. No more poor-quality calls between customers and home-working call centre operatives. Instead, your customer support handlers will be able to deal with more complex issues using text communication. We know that your customers will love it!
Get in touch!
If you would like to know more about SMS marketing services get in touch with our friendly team today.
Start a free trial to discover the benefits for yourself!