SMS Marketing Myth 1: One Size Fits All in Messaging Solutions

Reality: Every car isn’t a Lamborghini, right? Initiated in 2008, SMS-Magic has never stopped evolving. Beyond traditional text messaging services, we focus on creating genuine engagement and fostering customer relationships. Our SMS platform prioritizes results, evidenced by clients experiencing a staggering 40% hike in conversions.

SMS Marketing Myth 2: It’s Just… Texting

Reality: Think of a master chef crafting a gourmet dish: whether they use secret ingredients or everyday food, they always deliver something fantastic. That’s how we view messaging! SMS-Magic elevates business text messaging into an art form. By prioritizing genuine, resonant content, we’ve become the go-to choice for high-stakes conversations such as finance and healthcare.

SMS Marketing Myth 3: Platforms are Too Complex

Reality: Ever tried assembling a 5000-piece jigsaw puzzle? Daunting, right? But with SMS-Magic, the experience is more like snapping together Lego bricks. By designing a user-friendly interface, we let businesses focus on what they excel at, leaving the SMS intricacies to us.

SMS Marketing Myth 4: Compliance is a Constant Battle

Reality: Imagine a world where you can set-and-forget rules and regulations. Welcome to the SMS-Magic realm! We actively monitor and adapt to regulatory updates and changes , ensuring your SMS campaigns remain compliant. Say goodbye to those tedious manual updates.

SMS Marketing Myth 5: Integration Nightmares Await

Reality: Imagine effortlessly blending paint on a canvas so every color is clear, bright, and tells a story. That’s the integration experience with SMS-Magic. Whether you’re using Salesforce, Zoho, or other CRM systems, our seamless integration ensures fluidity in your communication processes.

SMS Marketing Myth 6: Setting Up is Like Climbing Everest

Reality: With us, it’s more of a walk in the park! Begin your SMS marketing journey with SMS-Magic in a day. Should you encounter any challenges our top-notch support team is just a call away.

SMS Marketing Myth 7: Termination Equals Data Loss

Reality: Consider us the guardians of your digital memories. Even post-cancellation, your data is safely and securely maintained, ensuring your hard work and customer interactions aren’t lost to the void.

SMS Marketing Myth 8: Texts Play Second Fiddle to Emails

Reality: In our digital age, timeliness is the name of the game. While emails sit unread, SMS messages boast a jaw-dropping 98% open rate. Makes you wonder: Who’s truly leading the customer engagement race?

SMS Marketing Myth 9: Bulk Messaging Equals Spam

Reality: We believe in quality over quantity. Rather than bombarding users, our personalized SMS strategies ensure that each message feels personalized, leading to a whopping 75% of users feeling more connected to brands.

SMS Marketing Myth 10: SMS Lacks Engagement Power

Reality: If engagement was a dance, SMS would be leading the Conga Line! Brands that weave SMS into their strategies witness a soaring 30% uptick in engagement. It’s time to join the dance!

SMS Marketing Myth 11: Serious Businesses Don’t Text

Reality: Think of professional SMS communication as the modern-day briefcase: sleek, efficient, and indispensable. From appointment reminders in healthcare to transactional updates in finance, secure business messaging has become a keystone in professional communication.

SMS Marketing Myth 12: SMS Isn’t ROI Friendly

Reality: Here’s some economics 101: for every dollar channeled into SMS campaigns, businesses often see returns exceeding $40. It’s an investment that truly pays dividends.

The prowess of SMS marketing isn’t just about numbers or open rates. It’s about resonance. It’s about conversations that matter. Dive deep with SMS-Magic and watch your business narratives turn magical, one message at a time. After all, in this age of fleeting attention spans, it’s not merely the message, but the connection that counts. Stay ahead, stay engaged, and remember: Magic is just an SMS away! 

First, let’s talk about how messaging can help you sell more insurance, serve your customers better and make your work life a little easier. The bottom line is that you can’t serve customers you can’t reach. Emails, phone calls and voice mail are tried-and-true communication channels, but you can spend hours begging your customers and prospective customers to respond to them, instead of spending time selling or serving.

Most of us have smart phones with built-in texting capabilities, and we carry our phones everywhere. Because of the nature of texting, we open 98% of our messages within three minutes of receipt, and we respond to 40% of them. We only open 20% of our emails, and you already know how hard it is to get a customer on the phone. When asked, 90% of us said we’d prefer to communicate with businesses via text.

What those statistics mean to you is that you can send reminders, have one-on-one conversations or schedule automated messages – and your customers will read your messages and respond faster than with any other channel. They get great service, and you have more time to work on your business.

To help you decide if messaging can make a positive impact on your business, here are the top 5 questions insurance agents ask – and the answers:

1.What should I do before I start texting?

You’ve probably heard about the regulations governing messaging. The regulations will apply when you want to send bulk marketing messages, and you’ll need to get permission from your clients or prospects to text them. Asking them to “opt-in” can become part of your emails, awareness and branding campaigns, applications or quotes. Even if you’re only texting one-on-one, it’s best to have written permission, but it’s easy to get. To make record-keeping easier, SMS-Magic keeps track of customers who have opted in to texting, and more importantly, it tracks who has opted out, so you won’t send them any more marketing texts.

2. Can I use my personal mobile phone?

The SMS-Magic mobile app allows you to use your own smart phone but doesn’t require you to use your own phone number. We don’t recommend that you send business texts from a personal phone number. You should set up texting for your office and connect it to your database, especially if you’re using Salesforce or Zoho. SMS-Magic can also connect to many office-management systems. With a mobile app, when you’re not at your desk, you can message your clients as if you were using your laptop, and yet you still maintain your privacy.

3. How can I handle times when I’m out of the office?

If you’re on vacation, sick or out of the area, you probably want some time away from work. Wouldn’t it be great if colleagues could field a client’s question via text and have all your previous conversations at their fingertips? It’s more than possible with messaging platforms like SMS-Magic. Once the messaging system is integrated with your database, texts are routed to the appropriate agent and the conversation is stored in the client’s record. Anyone with access to the system can read the background and respond. Your client gets great service, and you can disconnect from work knowing your colleagues have your back.

4. What types of messages can I send?

Texting gives you and your clients an easy way to share information. One agency serving a high volume of contractors, for example, encourages clients to use text to request COI’s. It’s easy to take a picture of a business card that has all the relevant contact information and text it to the agent. The agent can respond with a text or email containing the COI. Or a client might send a photo of a VIN by text to add a new vehicle to an existing policy. Another company uses texts to check in with prospective clients they’ve quoted but who haven’t responded. Text is a great way to send reminders for almost anything, including auto renewals and appointments.

5. Do I have to send all the texts myself?

Messaging is a great way to connect with clients, but sometimes you need the system to send automated messages immediately. When a client opts in to texting, for example, they need an immediate response to their request. With messaging solutions like SMS-Magic, you can set up pre-written automated messages that are triggered by certain actions like opting in or asking for more information. Your client gets an immediate response, and you don’t have to monitor text traffic 24/7.

Although messaging has been around for a while, it still seems more relevant to today’s consumers than email. Messaging platforms like SMS-Magic make it easier to conduct business by removing the repetitive chores that eat up your day. Messages are personal and relevant. And your customers love them.

SMS-Magic integrates with many office management systems, so ask us about your system. We’d be happy to talk about your needs. If you’re ready to start, set up a demo of SMS-Magic today!

With email response rates dwindling, brand marketers need to get creative about how they’re engaging with customers. Customer experience is the defining representation of brands and it includes every touchpoint and perception consumers have of your brand throughout their relationship with you.

Business text messaging is unique as a communication channel in several ways:

• Text messaging straddles offline and online and is available to nearly every mobile phone without being reliant on an internet connection.
• Messaging invites two-way conversations, not just one-way pushes of what brands want to say. The way in which consumers respond helps marketers understand and build contextual relevance that enhances experiences with the brand.
• Consumers prefer and respond to text messaging better and faster than other communication channels. How many unread texts are on your phone right now?
• Text messaging complements other channels to help boost traditional campaign performance. Sending a text message reminding your customer to check their email to access a research report, for example, can keep that email from languishing unread and ensure your customers get information important to them through the device where it makes the most sense to engage.

Because our mobile phones are always within reach, it’s prudent to assume that your audience will be reading your messaging and content on their smartphones. Whether email, website, mobile app, video, podcast, Facebook Messenger exchange or text message, the small screen is your entry point to consumer attention and prolonged engagement.

SMS messages are responded to quickly – within minutes – making business text messaging the perfect way to connect content and experiences across channels. Everything is moving toward a mobile framework. So too should your marketing and customer experiences.

Use SMS Messages to Have Contextual Conversations

Marketers must move past the idea that they’re marketing the brand. It’s imperative to think about the purpose and meaning driving your customers’ experience. After all, experiences with your brand are being compared to their experiences with Amazon, Facebook, Instagram, and Google. How easy and satisfying is it to engage with your brand?

One of the things we do as marketers is make assumptions. We have a standard for collecting email addresses, so we email messages we want our customers to see. But when was the last time you asked them what device or mode of communication they prefer for specific messages?

Podcasts are most often listened to on mobile phones. How easy are you making it for consumers to listen? Can they tap their messaging queue and tap the link to listen or do they have to scroll through an endless email inbox to find it?

Do you know which topic they’re interested in learning more about or are you assuming because they clicked on several web pages of your site that they’re interested in a topic you covered on one of them? With text messaging, you can ask them. In fact, you can post a sidebar message on an article about the latest in fall fashion for rock climbers that invites them to text ROCK to receive notifications about new arrivals for that category. When they opt-in, you’ve got context around their interests.

Knowing that context and facilitating it seamlessly is what will set your brand apart and bring higher engagement. And the beauty of it is you can continue to engage them with automated messages on that topic.

Marketers are often a bit removed from customers. Text messaging allows you to close that gap by asking a consumer about their preferences or inviting them to ask questions about your products or services that you can answer in real time.

With every message – incoming or outgoing – recorded as a conversational history within their lead or contact record in your CRM, you’ll build that 360° conversational history that helps you personalize your messages without that “creep” factor. When you use what you learn from information your customer has shared, they see the effort and the care you’ve taken to converse with them.

Initiating and continuing contextual conversations with consumers will transform the customer experience. It’s time to break out of the way you’ve always done it and think about how to create more meaningful interactions with your customers.

The Bottom Line

Embracing mobile is not about shrinking experiences made for PCs to fit on a small screen. Advanced text messaging platforms enable marketers to use text messaging as a catalyst for transforming the customer experience.

Using SMS Messages Invites Marketers to:

• Think proactively, rather than reactively.
• Think dialogue, rather than monologue.
• Think context, not just content.

Consumers care about receiving the messages they Opt-in for on the device that’s appropriate for that information. Send an order receipt via email to be filed away for a record of the transaction, but send that coupon offer via text so it’s easily redeemable in store and top of mind.

When marketers look beyond the content to the context in which it will be used, channels blur and the focus is on the experience and the interaction.

Your customers will thank you.

Anyone can execute an SMS marketing campaign, but the success of the campaign depends on rules, compliance and using the right strategy. Without a strategy, marketers may be executing campaigns completely unaware that their text message marketing tactics are causing them greater damage than good. SMS marketing campaigns requires Opt-In and Opt-out options to be given to your audience.

If you do not want to become one of those businesses that sees more customers opting out than opting in, note the following reasons people Opt-Out from SMS Marketing campaign and what can you do to increase Opt-Ins.

Why Consumers Opt-Out Of SMS Messages & Campaigns

1. SMS Marketing Tone and Content: What you say is important, but it’s also how you say it. Make sure your message is professional, that your company is identified and that the intent is clear and easy to grasp at a glance. Don’t be too casual or use jargon or emojis that can have your message be misinterpreted.
2. Irrelevance: Relevance is an imperative in an inbox considered by many to be a personal communication channel. Irrelevant messages will harm your relationship, rather than enhance it. Irrelevant messages result in customers opting out. If you have not provided an easy Opt-Out option, they could choose to mute the conversation which is the equivalent of sending an email to the junk folder.
3. Too Many SMS Messages: Frequency is a careful balance. Best practices indicate 4 messages per month. Your audience may expect more or even less. Make sure to set expectations when customers opt-in (also required by compliance) and then stick to the expectations you set.
4. Wrong timing: Sending messages at the wrong time can greatly impact opt-out rates.The Frost & Sullivan report found that the rate for opt-outs on messages sent during the week was only 1.8 percent, but that number jumped up to 5.8 percent when messages were sent out on the weekends.
5. No Incentives: If you fail to provide incentives to customers, then you can count on them quickly opting-out. They expect some kind of offer from the brands and companies when they Opt-In for your text marketing campaign. Give them a reason to take action, learn something or be entertained; otherwise your messages become clutter they can live without.
6. Lack of Responsiveness: Remember that texting is a two-way dialogue. Should a prospect or customer reply to your text, make sure a team member is ready to respond quickly or that an automated response is set to trigger. Consumers consider it rude when their text messages aren’t met with timely response.

The reasons above provide plenty of motivation for your prospects and customers to opt-out of your SMS marketing Campaigns. Let’s look at the flip side to the steps you can take to give customers reasons to opt-in to your text marketing campaign.

Steps To Increase SMS Marketing Campaign Opt-Ins:

• Invite Your Customers to Text You (integrating SMS across all channels): Advertising and promoting your SMS campaign is essential for building an opt-in list. Make people aware of the value they’ll receive by including a mention in emails, promoting your campaigns on your website, and via social media. You can also offer a reward just for opting in. Customers love to receive discount coupons, free desserts, and exclusive access to new collections, for example.
• Be Clear and Respectful: The clearer customers are on exactly what they are signing up for, the more successful your SMS campaign will be. Tell them why they should opt-in, what they’ll get, and how often they’ll hear from you. SMS opt-in promotions must follow compliance regulations and the more transparent you are in your SMS marketing campaign promotions, the more trusting consumers will be and the more willing to opt-in for the value you’ve promised.
• Personalize Your Messages: With an advanced text messaging solution, you’ll have a full history of all your conversations. You can ask questions to profile your customers and learn more about their wants and needs. You will know what they’ve responded to in the past. Align your messages to their behavior, purchase patterns and responses to increase the performance of your SMS marketing campaigns. Give them a reason to stay.
• Maintain Value: Make sure that every message delivers on what you promised for the program people gave their consent to participate in. If some new reason comes along to communicate with your prospects or customers, start a new campaign. Because you have their consent, you can text them to invite them to reply with a new keyword to also receive the new messages. If they don’t respond, respect their rights.
• Humanize Your Messages: There’s a difference between marketing language and language that engages your customers. Because SMS text messaging is considered a personal exchange, make sure your messages sound human. Because of the length limitation to 160 characters, marketers often try to put too much in one message. It’s harder to write short than long. Take your time and craft a message that demonstrates empathy. This is what drives engagement and invites people to respond to your offers.

The Bottom Line

It’s just as important to be aware of what causes consumers to opt-out as to opt-in to your SMS messages and campaigns. Use these steps to proactively manage your text message marketing to expand reach and solidify a position in your target markets. These dos and don’ts for SMS marketing campaigns will help you formulate a winning strategy to drive high-performance outcomes. Given the noisy channels you’re up against, text message marketing definitely has its upsides.

The effectiveness of SMS messages continues to grow as marketers use SMS messages to connect with their target audience on a personal level. Let’s face it,  your customers increasingly live on their mobile devices In 2018, 52.2% of all worldwide online traffic was generated through mobile phones, up from 50.3% in the previous year (Statista, 2018).

Once you have decided to use SMS campaigns, three factors are key initiate campaigns.

• Business Text Messaging Solution: A business text messaging platform that integrates with your CRM, records conversational histories to lead objects and enables you and your team to easily manage consent and connected conversations, send automated campaigns and measure performance (like an email marketing platform) is your foundation for SMS marketing.
• Active Database: To start SMS marketing, you’ll need mobile phone numbers for your contact database to send text messages. This data can be acquired via opt-in invitations at various touch points with your target audience.
• Customer Consent: Consent from a prospect or customer is required by various regulations, including GDPR, TCPA, and others. Fines for non-compliance are expensive. You’ll want to make sure that the business text messaging solution you choose provides a process flow that ensures you meet compliance regulations.

Once you’ve addressed these factors, you can initiate your SMS campaign. To ensure your SMS marketing campaigns are successful, you’ll want to incorporate best practices in execution.

Best Practices for SMS Messages and Campaigns

• S.M.A.R.T. Goals: Setting a Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Reliable and Time Specific (S.M.A.R.T.) Goal before starting SMS campaign defines the objectives and business goals for each SMS marketing campaign.
• Call-To-Action: A all-to-action is what you want your customers to do interact with the brand/company. A call-to-action can take a variety of forms, including a keyword response, clicking a link embedded in the message or redeeming an offer or promotion presented in a message. A keyword is a unique word or phrase that people text to a short or long code to opt-in or participate in your campaign. For example, Rachel, a salon owner, is opening a new salon. To build a customer base she posts signs around the location with this message: Text HAIRCUT20 to 520520 and get 20% off your haircut.
• Leverage Incentives: Incentives provide something valuable to your customer, something relevant to them that will motivate their intent to engage with and buy from you.  Incentive can be monetary as well as non-monetary.Examples of non-monetary incentives include:
  • Personalization – “We’ll notify you when your favorite item comes in.”
  • Reminders – “Your shipment will be delivered today.”
  • Engagement – “Tell us how we can help you.”
  • Access – “You’re receiving exclusive early access to this New Summer Collection because you’re a VIP.”
  • Privileges – “Earn VIP points with every purchase to redeem as you choose.”
• Permission required: A customer’s consent is essential for a successful SMS campaign. Opt-Ins can be achieved in two ways:a) The Call-To-Action as mentioned in best practice #2, above
  b) A prospect or customer including their mobile number via a web form or personally, during an event in agreement to receive text messages from you.For example, a real estate broker holds an open house for home buyers and asks those who tour the home to sign a guest log and check a box to receive text messages alerting them to similar listings in the future. When a suitable listing becomes available, she sends these contacts a text message, alerting them to the listing. She also includes: “To learn more, reply 74OAKST or you may reply STOP to opt out from receiving messages.” This information ensures the prospective home buyers have the option to choose whether to permit the broker to continue sending them text messages or not.
• Timing: You want to make sure you’re sending messages that align with your business and your customers. Best practices follow business hours of between 9AM and 6PM.Of course, if you’re a night club and you’re promoting open seats right before a show at 9PM, your customers’ expectations will vary. The key is to understand that the nature of text messages is considered in real-time. Sending your messages in a time frame that relates to your offer and your audience will generate better response.
• Consistency: Timing and consistency are related and can help build expectations from your prospects and customers. For example, a restaurant that sends a text offering discounts every Thursday at noon for weekend specials will have customers come to expect these texts on Thursdays.
• Less is Better: Text messages allow for 160 characters. The format forces brevity. It’s best to write concise messages using correct grammar, rather than try to fit too much in by using acronyms or emojis your audience wouldn’t expect from you. Focus on one key point and make clear what’s in it for them and what you’re asking them to do.
• Measurement: SMS Marketing is measurable. You can easily track messages sent, messages delivered, keyword responses and conversations, as well as promotions redeemed, as long as the promotion has a code used only in your SMS marketing campaign. After every SMS campaign, you should evaluate your strategy and iterate for improvements in future campaigns based on what you learn from the results.

The Bottom Line

SMS messages and campaigns are growing in receptiveness for your prospects and customers due to their increasing reliance on their mobile devices. Business text messaging platforms, like SMS-Magic, can help you comply with regulations and embrace best practices to build relevant conversations that grow your business more easily than other channels where it’s becoming more difficult to rise about the noise.

SMS text messaging is more personal and has a greater chance of engaging your audience. While adding another channel to a marketing mix can be more challenging, the payoff is higher. A business text messaging solution that integrates with your CRM, will reduce your workload.

There are many reasons lead nurturing programs can fail. Here are four common mistakes marketers make while nurturing leads.

Don’t quit too soon

A relationship needs to be ongoing, but some marketers give up early because they mistakenly assume their prospect will buy on their marketing timeline. Marketers need to shift from a campaign mentality to a customer journey approach that meets buyers where they are in their buying process—including the mix of content and channels.

Numbing prospects with repetitive content

Marketers often blast their audience with the same content over and over. Track your communication and tweak it if it’s not getting results. Besides turning off prospects, you risk your communications becoming classified as spam.

Using only email for lead nurturing communications

In addition to mixing up your content, marketers can boost performance by integrating various communication channels. This approach will help you identify the channels your prospects prefer and where they’re most responsive. Try adding a call to action for them to choose text messaging for future communications. Build your opt-in list and commence with adding texts to your nurturing program.

Once you’ve done that, remember to sync all your communications with the prospect on one platform. This will help you customize your conversation with your buyers. You’ll increase the chances of continuing response rates as your nurturing program progresses. Using multiple channels increases your response rate by 37% according to a study. And that’s just what you want to see.

Treating your audience as if they’re all the same

Same content, same channel, to all prospects completes this short list of marketing mistakes. A prospect is more likely to respond if you send relevant and meaningful content. For example, a woman interested in purple sweaters is much more likely to respond to a promotional offer on a new shipment of purple sweaters than to a generic 10% discount offer. Or, a new home buyer looking for a 3-bedroom home with a pool who receives a property listing update for a 2-bedroom condo will just hit delete and wonder why they opted in to hear from you in the first place.

A marketing automation platform will help you apply segmentation so it’s easy for you to personalize your content for different needs within your audience. Seventy-three percent of consumers surveyed in an Accenture study said that they would rather buy from retailers who used personal information to make their shopping experience more relevant.

Easy Fixes to Get Lead Nurturing Right

Now that we’ve seen what marketers are doing wrong, let’s talk about how they can leverage the data and tools that are available to them, to increase engagement.

Segment and personalize

Segmentation can help you deliver relevant communication to your audience. Targeted messages can increase engagement significantly, compared to a single communication blast. You can segment leads by source, function, level of product interest, or activity, for instance.

Use your CRM to better know your prospects and customers and apply that knowledge in your communication. Just a few tweaks to a content piece can personalize it by industry or lead source, earning better results.

A software company used progressive profiling to get prospects to opt-in for text messaging by providing their mobile number and website URL to access a resource. It then texted them, offering a free analysis of their website, naming the prospect, company and URL. Responses were swift as text messages are opened in short order. The immediacy of the personalized message enticed them to reply.

Blending channels brings advantages

Use email and text messaging together to get the best out of both. For heavier content that people may prefer to access via their PC or laptops, use email. After a few days, send a text to those on your list who have not opened their emails, reminding them to look with a teaser message about what they might be missing.

You can also promote a VIP program with exclusive offers and content to those on your nurture list as a way to identify prospects who are more interested in your products and services. Or you can invite your prospects to ask questions about the topic of the information you just sent them by asking them to text a keyword for a quick answer. There’s no need to worry – you can set up alerts to ensure a messaging user is advised to respond quickly to incoming questions.

Focus Nurturing on the Customer Lifecycle, not the Initial Sale

Anticipate your prospects’ next move. Create different nurture tracks based on the segments you identified. If your prospects’ behavior shows that they are interested in a product related to the one they first looked at, you can send them to the nurture stream for that product.

Your nurture should be flexible, so that as your prospects shift focus, your content is still relevant to them. SMS text messaging can help you do this more easily then email, through keywords. If a prospect selects an option from a choice of keywords in a text, you can send the next text based on that keyword.

Think long term when it comes to nurturing a relationship, not a one-night stand. You need to get a conversation going with your prospects, whatever be the medium. Rather than relying solely on email, diversify with other channels, including SMS text messaging. This way, you’ll amplify engagement and momentum towards conversion—again and again.

Traditional lead nurturing programs rely on email. Response rates for email have declined, but even more challenging is that email nurturing programs are usually one-way monologues, rather than two-way conversations.

If a prospect is not opening an email—or acting because of it—then it’s time to switch channels to find resonance. SMS text messaging is more personal and has a greater chance of engaging your audience since nearly all text messages are read within minutes of receipt. Even better, should your prospect reply, you’ve got a conversation started. And that’s a big advantage over email.

You may think adding another channel to a nurturing program will introduce challenges in consistency and coordination, but we can simplify that for you. An advanced text messaging platform with native integration with Salesforce keeps your effort low but ensures the payoff from your nurturing programs is high.

4 Common Mistakes Rectified with Lead Nurturing with Text Messaging

Marketers quit too soon.

A relationship is built via ongoing communications, but marketers often give up early. If what you’re selling takes a bit of thought, two touches and a sales pitch won’t get the job done. But it could also be the timing. Maybe it’s not convenient today, but they’ll buy next month. To capitalize on your target market, it helps to shift from a campaign mentality to a customer journey approach.

Automated lead nurturing campaigns with text messaging will help you keep in touch with your prospects. Incorporating calls to action to have them reply with keywords for more information when they’re ready means you have a higher chance of creating connected conversations that inspire purchasing. Where an email nurture doesn’t allow you to step in when appropriate, as soon as your prospect responds via text, you’ll get an alert, so you can step into the conversation in stride.

Sending the same content that repeats the same message.

Sending the same content that didn’t engage prospects the last time is not a solid plan for gaining traction. Track your communications and tweak them if response rates are low. It’s important to think of nurturing as a progressive story meant to drive education and engagement. Show prospects something different that piques their interest and you’re on the right track.

Lead nurturing with text messaging also allows you to insert simple surveys into the stream to allow you to personalize your content and offers based on your prospect’s interests.

For example, if you sell furniture, ask them which room they’re furnishing. Use keywords for the replies so you can automatically trigger the follow-up message. You can ask them, “Are you interested in options for BATH, KITCHEN or LIVINGROOM? Reply with your choice and we’ll show you our latest arrivals.”

Using only one channel.

Besides trying different content, you should also try various communication channels. Where some communications are better facilitated by email, others can play well to an SMS or MMS message. You can even send an email and then send a text to remind them to check their email using a teaser statement that gets their attention. When done well and thoughtfully, using both channels will help you customize your conversation with your prospect. Using multiple channels increases your response rate by 37% according to a study.

Advanced messaging solutions that also integrate with your marketing automation platform will help you facilitate a cross-channel nurturing program that’s in sync and designed to help you start and continue connected conversations with a full history of related behavior for both texts and emails.

Sending the same content to your entire database.

Different prospects have varying needs, interests and issues to solve. Sending the same message to everyone is what gives marketers a bad rap. 73% of consumers surveyed in an Accenture study said that they would rather buy from retailers who used personal information to make their shopping experience more relevant.

Just as marketing automation can help you apply segmentation so that you can personalize information for different members of your audience, so will an advanced messaging platform. Even better, the two can work in sync to coordinate your content flows. You can segment leads by source, function, level of product interest, activity, for instance.

Because text messaging invites replies, questions and responses and all incoming and outgoing messages are recorded in the lead’s history in your CRM—along with response to emails sent by your marketing automation platform—you’ve got a record of the entire conversation.

By analyzing what they respond to and which messages they ignore, you can tweak and tune your nurturing program to get the most from each exchange, as well as using the channel that garners the best response. And, when your leads’ behavior indicates their interests have shifted, it’s easy for you to move them into a nurturing program that better meets their needs.

The Bottom Line

It’s not clear why nurturing has been pursued as a single-channel marketing strategy. But what is clear is that channel preferences are changing, along with expectations. It’s time to start taking a multi-channel approach to your lead nurturing programs for better engagement and outcomes.

Think long term when it comes to developing customer relationships. You need to get a conversation going with your prospects, whatever be the medium. Rather than relying solely on email, consider adding diversify with communication channels like SMS text messaging. This way, you’ll amplify engagement and momentum towards conversion.

Smarter customers expect smarter exchanges with companies

Brands with relevant messaging campaigns have a better chance of engaging and satisfying customers when proactively choosing to use a preferred channel and device for communications. Business text messaging is proving to be a powerful way for brands to get customers’ attention. It’s intimate and immediate. And we rely on our mobile phones more now than ever before. In fact, more than half of consumers say they wish they could do more with their mobile devices.

Consumers want brands to anticipate their needs through SMS messaging

This includes personalized messaging, relevant offers, and timely rewards informed by their behavior and preferences. Even though technology has influenced consumer expectations and preferences, they still prefer a human connection with a brand. SMS messaging campaigns can provide insights to facilitate this, as well as the responsiveness consumers crave. This is because text messaging is one of the few channels that’s direct to the consumer and invites easy response without being considered intrusive.

It’s critical for businesses to provide an easy-to-use mobile experience, say the majority of customers in the Salesforce study. Texting, an application that’s native to all mobile phones, smart or dumb, makes it easy for both customers and companies to communicate easily with each other.

A consumer traveling on a bus could think of a product question for your customer sales representative and dash off a text message. She would then expect an instant reply, because that is inherent to the nature of texting as a medium of communication.

Time is even more of a premium when it comes to business buyers. So it’s crucial that your communication be mobile friendly when it comes to this segment.

It’s important that companies communicate with customers based on what they know about them and their preferences. Otherwise, they run the risk of being discarded in favor of companies that engage with them in the way they prefer.

Rules of engagement for customer communications

Even though consumers expect quick responses, they want these responses to resonate. The more relevant your communication, the more your customer will pay attention. Personalize your SMS messages as much as you can with merge fields. You can use customer data from your CRM to do so. Don’t be afraid to ask your customers for information. Sixty-three percent of millennial customers are open to sharing data with companies that send personalized offers (Salesforce’s State of Connected Customer report).

Ensure that your communication is consistent. If you’re calling your customers by their first name in a text, a follow up text shouldn’t miss out on doing that as well. Three in four consumers expect companies to provide a consistent experience when they engage with them.

More than seventy- five percent of consumers want to work with a salesperson who aims to fulfill their needs rather than on completing a sale quickly. For example, your sales team can use texting to nurture leads with links to content rather than constantly pushing leads to request a demo.

Business text messaging applies to the entire customer lifecycle

Now that you have a good idea what consumers want from your messaging campaigns, it’s time to look at why SMS messages are relevant across the customer lifecycle, at every stage.

Awareness: The awareness stage is also known as the discovery stage or when a consumer learns that your product may be able to solve their problem. Most consumers will start with an internet search to learn about their options. When they find your product and click through to your website, they may have questions. Providing an option for easy text opt-in enables them to initiate a conversation on their terms in the moment they need to. Since mobile search has surpassed desktop, it’s likely they’re already on their mobile device.

Consideration: Once prospects have opted-in to text with you, a messaging campaign is a great way to keep them informed about specials, related products, and to provide more information that can help them make a buying decision. You can also survey them to learn more about their interests and provide more relevant information.

Purchase: Providing offers, discounts, or coupons when a consumer’s behavior indicates an intent to buy can be the tipping point for them making the decision. Text messaging campaigns can also be automated to send purchase confirmation and shipping details.

Customer Service: Once the customer has your product, they may have a question or want to re-order or look for accessories. Providing a means for them to do so quickly and conveniently through text messaging can show them that you’re always putting their needs first.

Loyalty: Customer lifetime value (CLV) is an important facet of the customer journey. Using texting as a key component of your loyalty program can be instrumental in driving repeat business. Send texts with offers on special dates like birthdays, anniversaries, or when you think it’s time for your customer to order more of the product they have already purchased. Text messaging campaigns are also a great way to collect feedback, testimonials, and to monitor NPS and customer satisfaction.

In a world where only the fittest survive, technology will help you and your customers develop better relationships with each other. Simple technology like business text messaging will enable you to create messaging campaigns that communicate smartly with today’s consumers at every stage of the customer journey.

Online surveys have been around for years. Many brands send emails after a service experience or product purchase requesting customers to take a survey to provide feedback about their experience.

But response rates hover between 10 – 20%. This can be frustrating for businesses trying to go the extra mile to delight their customers.

Companies that use SMS text message surveys with customers can achieve as high as 50% response rates. Response rates like this mean you’ll gain valuable information that provides solid traction for improving customer experiences.

Crafting Your Text Message Surveys

It’s not just the channel that makes the difference in response, but the quality of the message or survey you send. Just because a text message is read within minutes of receipt doesn’t mean it will be responded to. And, since you can only text customers who consent to being contacted via SMS, you want to make sure every text message survey you send results in an engaging experience.

3 Steps to Designing Your SMS Customer Feedback Survey

1. Identify Purpose and Use. There can be many reasons you ask your customers for feedback. They don’t all need to be service or transaction related. Learning more about your customers’ needs, preferences, likes and dislikes can help you improve marketing programs, sales communications, and the ways in which you respond to service requests.

Some ideas to consider include:

• Product interest
• Attributes of interest; color, size, features
• Net Promoter Score
• Experience satisfaction from product purchase or service provision
• Topic / Function interest

Make sure the information you ask for will be used. There’s nothing more frustrating than providing information yet never seeing its impact. By acting on the information discovered through a text message survey, your customers will feel appreciated and experience more relevant conversations with you.

In other words, if you’re not going to use the information, don’t ask for it. The cost could be higher than not communicating at all.

2. Define When and Who. Timing and relevance are everything in conducting successful surveys. Wait too long after a purchase and you may miss your window. But asking too quickly may result in skewed answers if the customer hasn’t had time to try your product.

Asking a question relevant to a recent activity is a solid choice. Luckily, with intelligent text messaging, you can automate your surveys based on triggers, such as recent purchases, purchase history, content interest, and service requests.

Additional examples of When and Who include:

• Lapsed customers who haven’t purchased in the last 6 months
• A specific segment of your customers to learn their interest about a new product you’re considering stocking
• VIP customers who are frequent purchasers to learn what else they find valuable

3. What’s In It For Them? Surveys are often better responded to when an incentive is offered. Incentives don’t always need to be discounts or promotional offers. An incentive could also be helping them find exactly what they want or need right now.

A survey can be as simple as a “pick one” choice. For example:

“What does Autumn mean to you? Reply COZY or CRISP to see what we’ve got.”

Customers who reply COZY could receive a link to hot chocolate related items. Those who reply CRISP could receive a link to apple cider related items, for examples. Creativity helps provoke curiosity. And that curiosity gap can help to increase your response rate. Just make sure that the correlations to your key words will make sense to your customers given what you sell.

The Bottom Line

Surveys have been used for years to better understand how customers feel, what they want and how they perceive the experiences had with brands. As customer expectations grow, there’s no better way than asking them, to learn what’s most relevant. Text message surveys are an easy, effective way to do just that.