SMS Strategy: 160 Characters or Less
In order for your mobile SMS campaign to be successful, you need to find a creative way to engage your audience. You cannot just blast people with a generic, non-enticing message and expect to see results. Although the SMS messaging format is very straightforward, your campaign doesn’t have to be as cut-and-dry as the system itself. As you read on, check out some of the unique ways SMS can be used. In 160 characters or less, your message may not be long but it can still have a very big impact.
Unlike other kinds of marketing campaigns, you cannot just buy a list of cell phone numbers and start sending text messages. You must receive a consumer’s permission before they participate in your mobile messaging campaign. Therefore, your primary task in developing an SMS campaign is to make your audience want to interact with you. In order to do this, think of what you can offer your consumer. If the pay off is enticing enough, you will be able to build a substantial customer base for your campaign.
The first kind of SMS campaign we are going to discuss is known as alerts or subscriptions. In this scenario, participants sign up to receive multiple text messages from a given brand. Text messages could come daily, weekly, monthly, or at whatever rate the brand desires.
Mobile alerts are great because they add value to your audience. They can notify users when their bill is ready to be paid, let them know when their dry cleaning is ready to be picked up, send them timely information like road closings, weather forecasts, breaking news, etc. These types of alerts could be as simple as texting “weather” to “12345” to get the latest weather updates. This approach also enables you to send the audience interesting product information. Maybe you are launching a new product line and want to spread the word. If this were the case, you could send a message that contained a link to a mobile site. On the mobile site, you could present a video demonstration of the product or allow users to order the product via the mobile web. With an alerts and subscription based SMS campaign, your audience is continuously engaged with your brand.
As SMS campaigns have started to take off, it has been found that one of the best ways to grow and retain a mobile audience is through mobile coupons. In a recent Harris Interactive Study, it was found that 80 percent of teens and 70 percent of adults viewed “cash” as the primary incentive for participating in a mobile ad campaign. While coupons aren’t exactly a form of currency, they do represent money in your pocket. If you want a proven way to increase sales, launching a mobile coupon campaign is a great start. Just like the coupons you cut out of the paper, mobile coupons are redeemed in person and online. You simply send a text message offering a certain discount and instruct your patrons to redeem it when they visit. For a mobile coupon campaign to be effective, you need a clear call-to-action. Your call-to-action can take form on a billboard, a sign in your storefront, a print ad, a radio spot, or even a link on your mobile site.
Today, as people like to take an active role in the media they consume, text message voting and sweepstakes campaigns are also very popular. In fact, the Mobile Marketing Association found that sweepstakes and voting campaigns were among the top applications used. By now, we have all probably seen this type of SMS format on television. American Idol, for instance, allows viewers to text in to vote for their favorite contestant to help keep them on the show week-to-week. Although you may not have the budget of American Idol, this type of campaign works well for brands and businesses of all sizes. Maybe you’re coming out with a new menu item at your restaurant and want your patrons to vote on what that item should be. For those that participate in your election, you could automatically enter them into a drawing so that the person selected receives a free dinner featuring the winning dish. This type of format lends itself to brands of all kinds and enables you to establish a creative marketing approach.
As you can see, there are numerous mobile messaging campaigns that you can use when executing a mobile strategy. Please keep in mind to not restrict yourself to just one of these methods. Since there are many similarities between these approaches, you should look for ways to incorporate many of the different elements into your overall campaign.
