At a time when mobile marketing has become an essential strategy for any all-channel campaign and where users are in high demand, SMS marketing seems to be one of the most effective solutions. It’s also not a very aggressive approach compared to some email campaigns. In short, the ideal solution! We’ll look at good reasons to use this type of campaign, but also what kind of content to send.
What are we talking about SMS Marketing?
According to the Marketing Definition site the definition of this type of marketing is simple:
SMS Marketing brings together all types of SMS usage in terms of commercial or marketing purposes.
So there are many forms of SMS that come into play: Service SMS, Service SMS, the famous promotional SMS or Premium SMS.
It is true that today, it has become common to use the word “marketing” everywhere to give a more “professional” image to their business operations. So we can summarize SMS marketing to send SMS to the customers or prospects to fulfill the need. Often considered too intrusive, it is not at all. Conversely, when it is sent in the right way it is often very well received.
French people and SMS
According to a study conducted by MMA France in 2015*, the reception of advertising SMS is well perceived by the French population.
- 53% of advertisement SMS are read.
- 25% SMS are read and saved.
After receiving such commercial SMS, 36% visit the brand’s website, 22% purchase the related product or 29% visit the point of sale. Lastly, 38% of the respondents believe that promotional SMS are necessary or very useful.
But as seen earlier, in this type of marketing, not only advertising messages come into play. Service SMS is considered very useful or even necessary by 65% ​​of consumers.
Why start an SMS marketing campaign?
Consumers are faced with hundreds of marketing messages a day, they are used to them and above all are bored with them. It is therefore necessary to find new ways to deliver messages to the customers so that they can read and are particularly interested in them. In 2016, with mobile phone devices being the rate for the French population of 92%, this is undoubtedly a channel to be exploited. Furthermore, according to a 2013 study by D. Johnson, the opening rate of an SMS is over 99%. Better yet, 90% of them are read within three minutes of receipt. It should not be forgotten that this is an “opt-in” technology which means that the subscriber has given his/her consent to receive SMS notifications in advance.
But there are many more benefits to professional text messaging:
- better perception on the part of the recipient: An SMS presents less risk of being considered unsolicited than an email that would easily be sent to a spam e-mail without even opening it.
- Simplicity and speed : An effective commercial SMS does not exceed 160 characters, otherwise there is a risk that the recipient deletes it without reading it or unsubscribing. That’s why they are quick to read. Such a short message also has the advantage of being easy to remember. According to an INSEE study, the brevity of the message makes it easier to remember (for 60% of the questioners). This is also an advantage for the company which will not have to spend much time writing the message.
- financial cost is very cheap Classic advertising campaigns (television, radio, press, posters) and on the web (purchasing keywords, banners, etc.) often require a lot of budget. SMS has the quality of being very economical. You will be able to send SMS for an average of 4.9 cents per unit.
- Strong relationship with consumers Privacy: Privacy is more important with text messaging and customers love it when a business talks to them especially when it keeps them up to date.
Don’t miss the opportunity that this strategy presents for your business, with such benefits you have everything to gain!
What material to send?
The content will depend on the goal you want to achieve with your campaign.
- service message: They will allow you to notify your customers about the availability of a product, the follow up of their order and when they can collect it in store. You can also use it to protect your users’ accounts through SMS authentication.
- Reminders and Follow-up Messages : To remind your customers of the date, time and place of their meeting. This will make their life easier and allow you to avoid a lot of absenteeism and reschedule missed interviews. Reminders will allow you to send messages to customers who have initiated an online transaction and have not completed it.
- promotional message : Sending discount coupons to your customers is more likely to be used by them than sending them by mail. In fact, it’s rare to go out without your phone today, so discount coupons are always on hand.
- announcement message : Will allow you to send instant information to your customers. For example, you can warn them when a display blocks good traffic to your store or simply force you to close for the day so they don’t go to waste.
- voting message : They have dual interest, on the one hand they allow you to collect information about the market and preferences of your customers, on the other hand they allow them to engage and take action about your brand.
In short, there is always a message that will help you accomplish your goal!
We invite you to find examples of Pro SMS that customers are ready to receive on their mobiles.
Which SMS tool to launch a campaign?
Now you know why professionals send SMS campaigns and what kind of content works through this channel. It’s time to see how easily you can initiate this kind of communication. How, with what tool we will see.
Just like with email marketing, there are a number of solutions that will allow you to communicate with your client file via SMS. As proof, online tools that originally only allowed sending email now allow you to send SMS. Emailing software publishers starting to offer SMS: Sendinblue, Mailify, to name a few, have started SMS marketing. Other players like Digitaleo are leaders in this area. They entered this market in 2004 and have never left it since then.
In short, when selecting the equipment you will be working with later, it is worth checking a few points:
- an online tool. It saves you from all the problems that can be caused by it by downloading the software and installing it on your machine. One more point, it is no longer necessary to download updates.
- Simplicity of the tool with a clear and step-by-step interface. If the tool guides you step by step in the development of your campaign, it’s time to win!
- The existence of a customer service – a support service that speaks your language. It is essential to have the possibility to interact with someone who speaks your language and who can help you in a simple way. Not many free tools offer this kind of service and you find yourself helpless when you have a technical issue or an error occurs during the upload.
- Tariff transparency. It is strongly recommended to take a good look at the pricing conditions. Typically this is a monthly subscription for access to the service and the features that go with it, then a cost per message sent.
These are the 4 main points to check before choosing your professional SMS sending software. Then other criteria can be taken into account but they will vary according to the needs of each.
So we come to the end of our article and I hope this has informed you about the benefits of SMS marketing today. It’s up to you to have everything you need to get started with SMS marketing campaigns!
*Source: GFK for MMA – June 2015