TEXT MESSAGE MARKETING
Text message marketing is more personal than other forms of marketing and can help a business gain traction. SMS messages should follow a structured, efficient marketing campaign. Text marketing involves bulk text messages sent to qualified leads. Text message marketing is the ongoing process of communicating business news, sales, promotions or other relevant information to your customers via SMS (short message service) text messages on their mobile devices. It is a type of digital marketing strategy that helps build brand awareness on a more personal level. Consumers must opt in to your messaging before you begin sending texts to them.
You can send bulk messages to groups of customers or audience segments, or customize the experience even more by sending individualized messages. This tactic allows you to bypass other marketing noise – social media ads, email marketing campaigns, etc., – and go directly to consumers’ phones. Text message marketing relies on a database consisting of your customers’ names, cell phone numbers and other information (geographic region, customer categories, customer interests) that helps you track the sales process. Text message marketing targets a specific audience. As with any marketing endeavor, the more information you have on hand and the more specific your customer segments are, the better. Similar to how Facebook ads target people within a certain area, by age, and by interests, the best text message marketing is highly customized and geared toward a specific target audience.
Text message marketing acts as part of an overall marketing campaign. As a marketer, the most important thing to remember about all mobile marketing (i.e., marketing that relies on technical and digital methods to reach mobile users, as opposed to printed materials) is that it should be part of an overall marketing campaign. No company should start text messaging marketing without a game plan on how it all fits together to reach new customers. Text messaging isn’t appropriate for every marketing scenario. Yoni Ben-Yehuda, head of business development at Material Good, advises marketers to use it for things like a delivery status, a secondary message after you download a certain mobile app or program, a receipt of purchase, or an exclusive discount. Text message marketing is only effective for brands with an audience that prefer this form of communication.
