SMS Marketing Best Practices

SMS marketing also known as mass text messaging is a marketing technique that uses permission based text messaging to send promotional messages to prospective and old customers. It is one of the best methods for businesses and brands to market their products and services. It is an effective method of marketing compared to other methods of marketing like; Email marketing, Social media marketing billboards, flyers, radio announcement etc. Some of the reasons for this is that all mobile devices have the ability to receive text messages. Also, recent research has shown that 98% of the text messages sent are received and opened within 3 minutes by the recipient. These statistics have made SMS the best choice. SMS texting is becoming a fast and widely accepted form of communication which can be sent to a lot of people at the same time or to a specific targeted audience. There are service providers like ExpressText that provides the platform alongside amazing features for businesses to send Mass text messages to people. However, if this method is not properly utilized it can affect the business or brand negatively. Therefore, it is advisable and important for businesses to know SMS marketing best practices in order to properly utilize the marketing method and get the desired result. In this article the best practices would be listed, and they are:  

Consent

It is very important for businesses or brands that intend to send text messages to customers to get their consent first, before going ahead to send such messages. Most people do not appreciate receiving texts from businesses that they are not subscribed to, they find it disturbing. Therefore, they won’t bother to go through the text to find out what it is about. It is easy for businesses to get the consent of their customers before sending text messages. Businesses can send a ‘consent’ text first, asking customers to send a word to a particular short code. For example, send “FOOD” to 2222 to get marketing texts from a restaurant. If they reply by sending the word to the short code, it means they have given their consent to receive promotional texts from the said restaurant. This way businesses can get positive responses from their marketing texts. 

Understanding the laws

Any business that chooses to use SMS text messaging to market their products and services, should first learn and understand the Telephone Consumer Protection Act. (TCPA) regulations. The TCPA sets the standards for telecommunication including various interactions with mobile devices. An important rule of the regulation is that businesses should only send promotional messages to customers who have given their consent to receive such messages. Unlike other marketing methods like Email marketing where you can send promotional messages to people who have patronized your services. SMS texting is needed to reach out to a target consumer who is willing to opt-in or subscribe to an SMS texting campaign. If a business has breached any of the provisions of the TCPA regulations it may lead to legal consequences, which is why it is important for businesses and brands to make sure that they have gone through the regulations, and they have also fulfilled all the necessary requirements in order to carry out an SMS campaign according to the regulations of TCPA.

Timing

When sending promotional texts, it is important for businesses to consider the timing. Many businesses don’t pay attention to this factor and it greatly affects the way their texts are being reacted to. It is safer to send promotional texts during business hours, this way it gets a positive response from the recipient. Text messages sent late in the night are likely to be ignored by the reader due to the time the message came in. Sending a text at the right time is a significant factor that determines how useful the text would be to the recipient and how the customer would respond to it. Different seasons determines the way businesses would send out texts. For instance, when it is Christmas businesses can send out promotional messages that are in line with the season like Christmas wishes and offering special discounts. 

Consistency

Consistency is a major key to success and achieving anything. This also applies when sending promotional text messages to people. Businesses and brands need to be consistent when sending out texts to their clients or prospective customers. For example, if a company sends text messages out on Wednesday by 12:00pm. It is professional and advisable for the business to send their subsequent messages during that period, so that their readers know when to expect a text from their favorite brand. It also helps the readers have it in mind that they are expecting a text, so when it comes they read it and respond to it appropriately. However, in an attempt to be consistent, it is important to understand when the texts are becoming too much. Three to four texts a month is still considered appropriate.   

Personalization

Everybody loves to be treated special and important. Customers especially, love to be treated special by their favorite brand. The best way to achieve this through SMS is by personalizing the texts that are being sent out to the customers, so that each message is constructed in a way that is unique to each customer. This can be done by including the name of the customer receiving the texts at the beginning of the message. This way the person would be eager and willing to read the text. In addition, businesses can register the date of birth of their clients and other personal information, so that they can send them personalized messages on their birthday. This would make the customer feel special and would encourage the customer to patronize the business more often. Personalization makes customers have the feeling of one on one communication with their brand which is good for business. 

Incentives

Customers love it when the brand they patronize offers them free products or provides them with discounts on certain products and services. Incentives, it is a creative way to promote brands and increase sales. It can also be used to attract positive responses from promotional messages sent by businesses. For instance, a salon can offer 20% discount on its services when a customer subscribes to their SMS campaigns. This way the business increases their clientele. Also, promotional codes can be included within the texts sent to customers so that they would be encouraged to read the texts and find the code that would allow them to receive a prize from the business. They can also show the text they received to claim the offer.

Language

When communicating with customers through text messages it is important to keep the message simple, short and direct. However, in an attempt to achieve that, businesses must not result to using casual languages or writing in short forms or using slangs. This would make the business look unprofessional and make them loose customers. Also, the limited amount of characters is not an excuse to use short languages or catchphrases. The tone of the language should be interactive and compelling. The text should include terms that relates to the business. Businesses should avoid sending other irrelevant messages with the text because it can end up annoying the readers with information that are not necessary. The way a business constructs their text messages shows how professional they are. 

Option to opt out

Businesses and companies need to put the option to opt out or unsubscribe from the services. Customers have the right to opt out from any SMS texting campaign whenever they want to. For example, customers can opt out from receiving messages from a particular business or brand by telling them to send the word “STOP” to a particular shortcode in order to opt out from the service. It is important for companies to take note of this because if there is no option to opt out of a particular SMS campaign they can face legal actions. In order to track the quality of their promotional texts, businesses can send out forms to customers asking them why they opted out from the service, this way businesses can keep track of the success of their SMS texting campaigns. It also gives the customers the confidence that the brand is not out to annoy them with unnecessary messages.

In conclusion, the outside image of any business is very important and the way a business markets its products and services would determine how fast they would grow as a brand and increase their customers. SMS marketing best practices are tips that make a texting campaign successful. Apart from having a reliable and affordable service provider like Express Text which has all the necessary features to make SMS marketing easy and efficient.  It is also necessary to follow the tips listed above in order to get positive responses. Texting when properly utilized helps to build customers loyalty and generates sales. SMS texting is a powerful mobile marketing channel.