In 1992, a 22-year British software engineer named Neil Papworth sent the first short-message service (SMS) text to his friends at a party across town reading, ‘Merry Christmas.
Although there was no way Neil’s friend would reply then, the former Sema Group Telecoms software developer had no idea how revolutionary the technology would be.
30 years later, as of December 3, text campaigns have evolved beyond sending friends personal messages. Business texting is slowly becoming the go-to marketing channel, dethroning email for higher returns on investment.
However, the word in the street is that running text campaigns may seem too intrusive. The bad news is that businesses may lose customers if their text marketing campaigns are ‘copy & paste‘ for all.
The good news is that, with personalization tools and text campaign templates, any business can gain and retain new customers with text messaging.
Keep reading how to launch text messaging campaigns, plus templates that convert and build customer loyalty.
Table of Contents
What is a text campaign?
A text campaign is a marketing campaign that uses SMS (short-message service) and MMS (multimedia message service) text to send prospects or customers information about discounts, new product launches, promotions, or offer instant customer support.
For example, an eCommerce website selling physical products can set up text marketing campaigns for these reasons;
- Package tracking details
- Order confirmation and processing information
- Estimated delivery updates
- Package dispatch notifications
In our experience with business texting at Aloware, text campaigns are designed to educate close sales, build customer loyalty, or mix them all, even for service businesses like law or finance.
How Do I Set Up a Text Message Campaign?
In this age of massive distractions and reduced attention span, setting text campaigns before you launch them can make or break your business. One, consumers are constantly distracted by several other messages; push notifications, email spam, spam text messages, and more.
Two, you have less than five seconds to grab their attention. This means your text messaging campaigns must be contextualized and personalized. Here are the key steps to set up a text message campaign.
- Set a clear goal – What message do you want to deliver to your subscribers? – If it’s a discount, product drop alert, or customer service resolution, stick to that. Mixed messages create a terrible experience and high unsubscribe rates.
- Create one Call-to-Action (CTA) – The first message is likely an opt-in for prospects subscribing to your text campaign sequence. Let the follow-up text messages have one clear CTA as well.
- Nurture using segmentation and personalization – We will cover more on segmenting your text campaigns for better results below. But in the campaign text setup, include segmentation in your contact list to increase opt-in and conversion rates.
Why are Text Campaigns Important in Sales?
Any business that is not closing sales will soon be out of business. While direct-to-consumer brands are tapping into TikTok challenges to increase sales, service businesses like finance can use text campaigns to 10x lead conversion.
I will not compare apples to oranges, but the open rate for SMS vs. Email is way off the charts. While the email response rate stands at 32% and is dropping, the SMS text campaign response stands at 45%, and its open rate is 98%.
Example screenshot by on Aloware branding [ increase the length to fit across both ends of the text length ]
In sales, every lead counts. How you nurture the sales lead to the finish line highly depends on the customer experience you offer along the journey. With text campaigns, you already have one foot in the door, and prospects want to get personalized messages from you.
Here are other reasons text campaigns are essential in sales;
- 75% of prospects and existing customers want to receive offers like discounts and early birdy new product trials via SMS.
- If your target is millennials, 76% prefer texting because it allows them to check their messages on time.
- 9 out of 10 consumers prefer text messaging over phone calls.
- The SMS vs. Email click-through rate is 9.18% to 2.5%, respectively.
A survey in the United States by Statista indicated that 47% of millennials and 44% of Generation Z stated they liked being contacted by brands via text messages. The SMS marketing infographic below gives you more reasons to invest in business text messaging if you haven’t already.
[ Infographic ] – Example template ( Aloware branding)
https://blog.textedly.com/infographics/cool-facts-about-sms-marketing-infographic
Title: SMS Marketing Statistics
Benefits of Text Campaigns
One critical factor to successful SMS campaigns is their mind-blowing open rates. In fact, according to Mobilesquared, 90% of text messages are opened in the first 3 minutes.
Other benefits of running text campaigns include the following;
- Direct delivery
There are no gatekeepers with SMS text marketing as long as your prospects have opted to receive text messages from your business.
However, the business texting solution you choose has a lot to do with SMS delivery. Aloware text messaging solutions go beyond by offering Local Presence. As a result, prospects receive messages from text lines matching their area code. This improves text message delivery through familiarity.
- Cost-effective
Text marketing is the most cost-effective channel after email marketing. However, the cost of sending email campaigns starts to rise considerably depending on the number of subscribers and email provider.
For text campaigns, you can send a message to 10,000 subscribers for only $400. Overly campaign texts are the least saturated form of promoting your business.
- Considerable engagement rate
According to LearnHub, 33% of consumers take action on the text messages they receive. In comparison, the email engagement rate is 21.33%, according to Mailchimp.
4. Easy to personalize
Using area code phone numbers to send text messages is one way to personalize text campaigns. Also, when requesting prospects to opt-in to your text campaign, you can improve the experience with personalized text message forms.
For customizing the messages, use Aloware text scheduling features and a calendar to send campaigns at the right time. Nobody wants message notifications hitting their phone at 3 A
5. Opt-in & Opt-out option
The option to become an SMS subscriber or opt-out by sending the word; ‘STOP’ for most providers builds trust and better customer service. This is not the case for some email marketing campaigns. The button for unsubscribing is hidden under several layers making receivers report incoming messages as spam.
The TCPA (Telephone Consumer Protection Act) protects consumers from being subscribed to text campaigns without their consent. Violating this legal compliance can cost as much as $18,936 per case.
6. Build customer loyalty.
With SMS message open rates of almost 100%, you can promote your customer loyalty program using text campaigns. The first step is to invite consumers to opt-in to your text marketing campaign with incentives like coupons or discounts. Then you can nurture the subscribers along the buyer’s journey and retention.
7 Best Practices for Text Campaigns
- Request permission for opt-in:
SMS marketing requires you to send consumers a message requesting them to opt in. As a business, it’s prudent to uphold this legal compliance.
Give consumers a clear message for opt-in and if they reject the offer, keep a pulse on the negative for future messaging that converts. Identifying yourself through a logo or any other branding will increase your opt-ins, rather than sending text messages from random numbers.
- Get brand-friendly.
Depending on your brand, you can send more than text messages that captivate and engage your audience. One way to build a friendly brand through text is to include emojis, GIFs, and even videos.
You can build meaningful connections with your customers with campaign text solutions like compliant local phone numbers.
- Send timely text messages.
Most businesses are global now. And since your customers live in different time zones, ensuring your text campaign schedules match the time they are more likely to see the message is essential.
Aloware text solutions enable you to avoid mishaps with text message campaign delivery.
- Uphold consumer privacy
Consumers are tired of too much text spam. If they opt into your SMS marketing campaigns, ensure to uphold their privacy and let bad actors steal their data for malicious purposes.
Also, double-check the messages before sending any text campaign to ensure they do not include data requests like credit card information. This will make the text campaign look spam even though it’s legit. Such sensitive information should not be requested via text.
- Offer immediate value.
The goal of a text campaign is to deliver instant value using very few words. Consumers don’t have time to read long text messages without a clear call to action.
For example, if you have a new product launch and looking for beta users, state what the product is about and the problem it solves to capture ideal prospects.
- Offer consumers an easy opt-out option.
This one is a hard pill to swallow for any business. However, customers trust a business willing to let them go more if they don’t like the text campaigns being run. A simple reply ‘ STOP ‘ to unsubscribe is all you need to include in your campaign text.
- Measure what works.
Use the right SMS business solution to track consumers’ sentiments during text messaging campaigns. This insight can dictate your messaging for better conversions.
For instance, if you run a team of agents managing several campaigns, our Aloware AI analytics summarizes performance, activity, and agent status such that other team member doesn’t need to ask about the progress.
5 Ways to Segment Your Contact List
Consumers feel spammed when an irrelevant text message hits their inbox. Businesses can segment their SMS contact lists into different categories to minimize this problem.
SMS segmentation also allows for timely personalization, reducing unsubscriber rates and improving customer experience. Here are several ways text messaging segmentation can work;
- Location
Location-based segmentation is designed to send text campaigns in the right time zone and events that would affect your business.
Let’s say you are an automotive dealer looking to attend the next car dealership show in the next town. You can segment past customers or prospects living in that area with a message inviting them to the event to meet you.
- Generation
Generation Z prefers being texted to phone calls from our previous SMS marketing statistics. Segmenting your contact list in terms of their age bracket enables you to send the same message in their preferred form of communication with businesses.
- Subcriteria
Some prospects still need to be ready to take your offer. With business texting tools, you can segment such contact lists so that you can nurture them until they are ready to convert—another subcriteria would-be customers who are engaged or unengaged in your contact list. You can remind the unengaged about your business by offering coupons and related incentives.
- Brand engagement
In this age of social media, several customer touch points are involved. It can be a reply on LinkedIn or a mention on Twitter. Businesses with large audiences can segment using these customer sentiments for better text messaging campaigns.
- Buying behavior
Any business generating revenue has a segment of prospective customers yet to convert. You can segment this contact list and tailor campaign text designed to;
- Solve common objections
- Offer one-time discounts
- Invite them to free webinars
- Send product comparison content
Templates Section
Is it possible for the graphic design team to make better templates showing the Aloware brand, and dashboard before text messages are sent?
Template Url; https://aloware.com/blog/effective-text-campaigns-templates-you-can-use/
Example Design; – bit large and on brand
Launch Effective Text Campaigns with Aloware
A verified user in the computer software space had this to say about Aloware on G2 Reviews;
‘ The texting feature for sure! I wasn’t able to text on our old phone system.’
Kimberly G., an Insurance Account Specialist, added; ‘ Aloware is simple to use, with everything easily accessible from the Dashboard. It is a very user-friendly system. Additionally, it is easy to track all calls and text messages at the click of a button. ‘
Aloware business texting empowers you to deliver effective text campaigns that convert. Start for Free today.
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