SMS marketing is a direct marketing channel too often underestimated by companies. To communicate with prospects or customers, they still prefer e-mailing. With an average open rate of 18%, and a click-through rate of 2.6%.
With a read rate of 98%, SMS campaigns are fast and effective in reaching your target. 4 out of 5 consumers say they want to receive messages from their favorite brands. By opting for SMS marketing, you can be sure that your message will be read, remembered and welcomed. In this guide, we give you the keys to exploiting the full potential of mobile marketing.
Back to basics: what is SMS marketing?
SMS marketing enables you to get in touch with your customers and prospects. It has the power to reach a very large proportion of your target audience:
- 77% of French people have a smartphone;
- 94% of them use it every day.
Brands use commercial SMS as a supplement to their marketing strategy. It complements other channels such as e-mailing. SMS can be used to transmit one-off or urgent information. E-mailing allows you to go into more detail.
SMS content can be promotional or informative:
- Transactional SMS messages include notifications, payment confirmations, delivery confirmations, access code transmissions and more. It will account for 60% of messages sent in 2021;
- Commercial SMS. Used in advertising, direct marketing, drive-to-store, etc. It accounts for 40% of messages sent by brands.
SMS marketing is highly regulated in France:
- Sending commercial SMS messages is prohibited between 8 p.m. and 8 a.m., on Sundays and public holidays;
- SMS can only be sent to contacts (B2C) who have given their consent to receive them(prior consent);
- You must include a opt-in unsubscribe (free) at the end of the message (STOP SMS to XXXX);
- In B2B, contacts must be informed of the use of their number for commercial prospecting purposes. They must be able to object to this in a simple, free way(right to object).
The benefits of SMS marketing
Discover the benefits of commercial SMS for your brand.
Ease of use
SMS is suitable for all smartphones and mobile operators. Its ease of use saves marketing teams precious time. Group SMS, business appointment requests, mass SMS, commercial SMS... Thanks to their multiple formats, SMS campaigns are accessible to all business sectors.
Immediate effectiveness
After receiving a text message, 66% of French people have already visited a store they usually go to. More than 9 out of 10 mobile phone users read messages within 4 minutes of receiving them. The unsubscribe rate is just 0.13%.
Customization
An SMS is limited in size (160 characters max, 70 if you include emojis or other special characters). To optimize read rates, it's essential to personalize content with customers' first and last names, IDs and order numbers.
Interactivity
SMS marketing improves customer relationship management. It's possible to send a message on a customer's birthday, to follow up on an order, to remind them of an appointment, a meeting, and so on. These are just a few of the many ways to strengthen brand relationships at every stage of the customer journey.
6 best practices for SMS marketing
- SMS OneClick. The customer clicks on the link in the SMS and is taken to a landing page where no data entry is required. Customer data is hidden, with no form or data entry required. Tracked short links (between 16 and 20 characters) can be used to redirect recipients to a document, Facebook page, application or website. Tracking makes it easy to evaluate the results generated by your SMS marketing campaigns.
- Send to the right people, at the right time. Automating the sending of SMS messages simplifies their integration into different channels: CRM, applications, websites, business software, etc. It allows you to create precise scenarios, sending messages according to predefined objectives: loyalty, conversion, etc. As with e-mailing, there are certain days and times of the day that are best suited to increasing SMS open rates. The best times are Tuesdays and Thursdays, from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. or from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m.
- Personalize your SMS sender name. Avoid using automatically generated 5-digit numbers like "36XXX" or "38XXX". Instead, replace it with your brand name.
- Run a multi-channel campaign (SMS + e-mail) to make sure prospects remember you.
- Comply with regulations: check that you have obtained the consent of recipients to receive an SMS.
- Test SMS campaigns before sending them out en masse. This can be done using the A/B testing method. The aim is not only to optimize the results of your SMS campaigns, but also to improve the user experience (UX). The principle of A/B testing is to :
- Construct and then test hypotheses by observing whether the changes made have had an impact ;
- Better identify the elements that perform best with your targets;
- Understand how some of them influence your audience.
Launch your Interactive SMS campaign in three easy steps with Dataventure ! Local, multi-local or national: we offer you the geotargeting solution best suited to your objectives. Our experts will work with you to devise multi-channel scenarios to amplify your message. Want to engage your core target audience? Contact us, and an expert Dataventure will get back to you within the hour!
