If you are like most business owners, you know how important marketing is for your business you’re just not sure which method of marketing is the most affordable and effective. Naturally, you want to get the best return on your investment (ROI). Take a look at the top 6 reasons your business should use text message marketing, it might be the exact solution you have been looking for.
Immediate
One of the biggest reasons businesses love text marketing is the immediacy of the message. This goes with creating the message, as much as with the delivery of it.
Traditional marketing often requires weeks of planning and organizing. The timing of specials or promotions has to be coordinated with how long the printing time is, when the mailer will be delivered, or how long the website design will take, etc. All of these things are dependent on someone else doing their job, forces that are out of your control.
With text marketing you can decide to do a last minute lunch special to draw in some extra business on a slow day and you can have the promotion in the hands of hundreds of contacts within minutes, or seconds. Marketing on the fly, and it’s extremely effective!
Direct
Text marketing is a very direct form of marketing. Because it is completely opt-in based, all messages will be delivered to individuals that have agreed to, and are interested in, your product or service. This makes it easy to deliver a short, direct message with the information that you want your customers to receive. The more direct and targeted your advertising is the more potential it has to be effective.
With mass mailers you are investing a lot of money and reaching a very broad range of people but what is the return rate? How many of those people are actually interested? When you send a direct message via sms marketing you know exactly who is receiving it, the people that requested to get information about your product or service.
Personal
Because text marketing is limited to a standard 160 characters, it is essential that you make the message direct and personal. There are different ways to make your message personal, you may offer different specials to different demographics or you may make it individual to the point that you are sending an appointment reminder or birthday wish. It’s really up to you how personal you want your text marketing messages to be.
A restaurant may have a group for those that frequently come at lunch and another group for those that come at dinner, by keeping them separate you can send the specials that are most applicable to each group. A church group might send out a prayer request on behalf of an individual that was in an accident or needs surgery.
Again, because your message is very targeted it can be very personal.
Effective
When a business considers how effective their marketing is they usually think in numbers. What is my ROI? If I spend $50 this month on text marketing, how many new customers will I bring in? How much will that increase my revenue? As with any marketing, this numbers can be quite speculative because it is hard to track exactly why a customer came in and spent the amount of money he/she did. So we look at trends over time and what we were doing different during peak times, including marketing efforts.
Independent studies show that upwards of 90% of text messages are opened within 5 minutes of being received. Make your message valuable and include a strong call to action and see just how effective your text marketing message can be!
Simple
Marketing can sometimes seem overwhelming and difficult; text marketing is so simple! As mentioned previously you don’t have to put a lot of time and effort into creating a marketing plan. Messages go out instantly and are received within a matter of minutes.
Whether you are sending out the weekly special or a last minute lunch deal, all you have to do is log in and send the message. It’s as easy as texting your mom to see if she wants to meet you for lunch. Most text marketing providers use a web based application so there is nothing to download, no programming or technical aspects to learn you literally just login, select your contact list, and type up your message. Marketing really doesn’t get any simpler than that.
Cost-effective
The bottom line is money, whether you are spending it or making it. In a business you have to know how much you can spend and still increase revenue. That great news about text marketing is that it doesn’t take a lot of money to participate.
Text marketing can cost as little as $10 per month. You really can’t afford to not participate in text marketing. This is one of the most cost-effective marketing options currently available, and it has the best response rate of any marketing plan we are aware of.
When considering the best marketing options for your business, if you are looking for something that is immediate, direct, personal, effective, simple, and cost-efficient give text marketing a try. We really haven’t found any down side and the potential is enormous!