SMS Text Message Marketing

Mobile Marketing and SMS Text Message marketing is a huge growth area for businesses of all sizes. It’s low cost, in the pennies per message, and it’s easy to track the returns you are getting from and SMS Campaign. But most of all, SMS text message marketing is direct, timely and goes to your customers most trusted device, their mobile phone.

Compared to e-mail marketing when you send your customers and prospects a marketing email, it’s probably just one of dozens they’ll receive that day. Most likely only a few of them will open your email, therefore you’d need to send it to thousands of potential customers to make the campaign worthwhile. With SMS Text Messaging your response rate is much better. Mobile Consumers receive very few text messages from and it goes against human nature to ignore a text when it arrives.

Email or SMS Text Message Marketing

If you send 10,000 emails in a typical e-mail marketing campaign, only a few hundred will likely be read. It doesn’t matter  if you have a brilliant headline, great copy, and a must-have offer the open rate is from 1 to 3%. But if you text 10,000 people, the open rate is 90 to 98%. That’s 9000 minimum will open your text message. You can be sure that nearly all your recipients will read your message. Again it’s the human nature of the mobile consumer. If you are using SMS Text Messaging and your conversion rate for SMS marketing is close to your conversion rate for emails, that equal 10 or 20 times as much business. All because of the difference in the open rate.

Before you or your business starts collecting customer’s mobile numbers for SMS Text Message marketing, you need to have several essential items lined up:  you will need to have a great VALUE offer, you must use the right technology, and the most essential item of all, your need to have your customers’ trust you.

Trust Before SMS Text Messaging

The reason most people don’t get as many marketing texts as they get marketing emails is they are not sure they trust the company or person behind the messaging.  They feel that their phone numbers as more personal and more valuable than their e-mail addresses and rightly so. Even avid texters are more careful with who they share their mobile device number with. It’s all about trusting you with their valuable information and treating them right.

The issue of trust is the one thing that will make or break your SMS text message marketing campaigns. Because most people are very reluctant to give out their mobile device numbers, very few businesses have those mobile numbers, and therefore fewer SMS text message marketing texts are sent. This item is very important especially if you want to keep the trust of a potential mobile consumers.

Gaining a customer’s trust can be the greatest obstacle that you, the SMS marketer, will need to overcome. Once you gain the customers trust you must guard it carefully. So how can you persuade customers and prospective customers to allow you access to their mobile device numbers? Obtaining those numbers comes down to your VALUE proposition and your relationship with the customers that you’re targeting with our goods and services.

What this results in are customers and consumers that are unlikely to be bored or turned off from with sms text message marketing texts in the way as they have become by marketing e-mails. The biggest reason most mobile consumers unsubscribe from e-mail lists is because they get inundated daily and most of the e-mail offers are not relevant to them.

SMS text message marketing isn’t always about converting absolutely new, totally cold customers, i.e. those who know nothing about you, your product or your brand. SMS Text message marketing is also about boosting your sales with customers you already have, developing long term customer relationships and generating customer loyalty. If you get your current customers on your subscription list and the new prospects will join as well.

SMS is massively effective when used on warm leads, your current customers, and prospects who know you. Let’s imagine some different situations:

• You own a restaurant and some of your customers really enjoy your restaurant for the food and atmosphere. You even take the time to visit with many of them personally and you’d like for them to come in more often. You mention to these customers that you are starting a VIP club and would like for them to join. Explain that your VIP Club members would get special offers, discounts and sepcial notices in the form of SMS text messages. Ask them to text your keyword to your SMS subscription number. Now all you have to do is send them an occasional text message about twice a month, letting them know about a special discount offer or how about preferred seating. Make this a special group of people.

Would 5 to 10 regular customers coming back to your business an additional 2 or 3 times a month be worth anything to you? Imagine if you had a list of 100 regular customers. All statistics show that you would get a conversion rate of  9 -17%. In other words you would on the average serve between 18 and 34 extra meals a month based on the averages and considering that each responder brings a friend. That has to boost your bottom line considerably.

• You’re an independent business consultant. Part of your services is to notify your clients of new products that can help their businesses. You always get your clients mobile device phone numbers because they already trust you. You can then use an SMS Text Message System to notify you clients of the new products in a direct and timely manner. Always get their permission first and that simple step of asking for their permission will build even more trust.

Can your consulting business use more product sales or more billable hours. Build you a list of your current clients and watch your billable hours and product sales go up. Develop the trust, make a value proposition and the law of avrages will take care of you real well.

• You run a Car Dealership, selling new cars, parts, and accessories. Of course you also service what you sell. As before your customers have purchased from you and you have their trust. Just ask them to sign up on your SMS text message list by sending the keyword to your SMS subscription number. Now you can text your customers every time you have a special, a sale on parts, or to let them know their car is ready for pickup etc.

All of this sounds real good so far. Build a list, send text messages and watch the sales come in. Yes it can work that way, but you might be asking yourself, ‘why would I send a text message when I could use the telephone to call my customers on their mobile phones?’ It’s simple so be honest now, have you ever had a simple meaningful 5 second phone call with a customer? Most likely not. Most cell phone calls always interrupt things like meetings, meals, or other conversations and always run long. However SMS Text messages don’t interrupt anything. Excepting an emergency or something else time sensitive most people read them and usually go back to what they were doing. When their schedule opens up they will act upon that text message.

How To Get The Numbers

How can you persuade your customers to give you their mobile device numbers, and also give you permission to market to them? Trust, you first have to establish the customers trust in you.

There are two tactics involved in getting mobile device phone numbers from your customers, direct and indirect.
1.    Direct: this tactic means you are specifically asking for your customers’ for their mobile device phone numbers. You tell them that your purpose is to stay in touch with them for the purpose of letting them know about products and offers. This is an upfront approach that has a slightly lower success rate than getting their numbers indirectly. However it is very upfront and deals directly with the situation of getting permission. Be prepared to have some say no. Yes, there are people who do not want to receive text messages from you or anyone else. Respect their rights. There is no need to worry because there are plenty who do want text message marketing.

2.    Indirect: this can be done several ways. One way is asking for your customers’ numbers for purely practical reasons (e.g., confirming appointments, reminding them about service dates, letting them know their order has arrived). This tends to be very effective. But now you have to also let them know about your intentions to market to them as well.

Another tactic is a combination of the direct and indirect tactics to get your customers mobile device numbers. What you do is  advertise your SMS Text Message list and make your current customers and new prospects aware that you have a list. To do this be prepared to post notices in your business, on your business cards, in your regular print advertising and make up flyers etc. Now what you do is make a VALUE proposition to those who send your keyword to your SMS subscription number. Make sure your proposition has  VALUE to the person with the phone number. It does not have to be expensive, it just needs to present a perceived VALUE to your customers and prospects. This can be a discount on a purchase, a small free gift or anything that your customers and prospects perceive to have value. My first hand practical experience has shown this last method to produce the most subscribers with the fewest opt-outs.

How To Keep The Numbers

After you have received your customers and prospects mobile device numbers, you will want to make sure that your clients, customers and prospects remain happy with your marketing efforts. Make sure that your subscribers know how to opt-out of your list and that you honor that request. This is the law and very expensive fines can be levied by the courts should not do this.

The very best way to keep you subscribers is to keep them happy. How do you do this? By treating them with respect in regards to their time and mobile device. Always be aware of the time of day you send your messages. Respect their time like it was your time. Don’t send your text messages every single day. If you bombard and pester your subscribers with text message after sms text message they will opt-out in large numbers. Do not always be trying to sell your subscribers something, try to send them valuable information once in awhile. Lastly make sure you’re sending genuinely good offers that are likely to be of value to them.

It‘s very important to make sure you’re abiding by the data protection rules and guidelines. Since data protection rules and the rights of individuals differ from place to place make sure that you know the rules.

Use The Right SMS Text Message Technology

There are several different technologies available to the SMS Text Message Marketer. You can use scripts to capture the mobile phone number from your website. Sometimes this method can be effective because it saves time, but you should really use another method as well.

The best technology for gathering and storing mobile device phone numbers is using an SMS Text Message Platform. There many of these platforms out there to choose from. Some are expensive, some are priced in the mid-range, and others are outright cheap. Be aware that you can pay too much and you will always get what you pay for.

The best advice is to first decide how you want to use SMS Messaging in your marketing strategy. Next take a demonstrations of the platform you are interested in using. Finally when you make your final comparisons be sure you are comparing apples to apples on sms text message platforms.

If you are looking for an SMS Text Message Service or Platform be sure to take the time to evaluate SMS Message Pro. Yes it our product but it works very well, is affordable and has many features. Choose from sms text message service packages or purchase  sms text message platform.