Getting your tech innovations into the world rests on capturing your audience’s interest. Here are 5 of the hottest marketing trends we see coming in 2023.

The 2022 Marketing Star — Short-form Video

Short-form video vaulted into the top marketing strategy slot last year with strong evidence that these videos increase engagement and lead generation. In 2023, all signs point to this  short-but-mighty-trend remaining a favorite in marketing departments across the board. In fact, the video production company Wyzowl’s 2022 report found that 73% of customers prefer to watch a short video to learn about a product or service, compared to 11% who like to read text, while only 4% lean towards infographics. Most notable for your IT industry is that of the 98% of respondents who watched an explainer video, 78% of consumers credited the video for their software download or purchase.

If you’re ready to add short-form videos to your plan this year, here are a couple of tips:

• The average video view durations on social media platforms range from 15 to 26 seconds.
• Most customers look for value in the first 3 seconds.
• Once your videos are ready, send the video links via email and text messaging campaigns to increase viewership.

Use DMs for to Grow Your Marketing and Customer Service Messaging Opt-ins

Direct messages (DMs) through your social media platforms can help you start a personal conversation and connection with a new lead or customer. DMs are a perfect pathway for gaining text messaging opt-ins and sending links to your newsletter or other materials.

After you have their permission to send texts, you can start campaigns through a messaging platform like SMS-Magic to boost your 2023 marketing game plan. One excellent approach to your DM marketing journey is to use DMs for giving, not asking. You can start by providing a little love to your followers, thanking them for their support with a special reward or discount.

You may also find that your direct message mailbox contains customer questions about an order or feedback about your IT product or services. Use your responses to provide excellent customer service and incentivize your followers. Thank them for their input or help them solve an issue followed by a discount on an upgrade or future downloads.

Digging Deeper with Data

In 2023, how well you know your audience should go beyond simple demographic data. It’s also essential to understand your audience’s interests and passions. Where do they stand on issues, and what difficulties do they face? What IT software are they currently using, and what groups are they a part of?

You can use this data wisely with targeted campaigns to specific groups through email and messaging campaigns. Showing your audience that you get them and want to solve problems for them with your product that suits their challenges can give your brand value. And since this data is ever-evolving and trends are changing quickly, your marketing team’s plan may need to change course during the year.

 Making Real Connections by Humanizing Your Brand

The trend of knowing more about your customers also has a flipside — your customer wants to learn more about you, too. Creating marketing content that reflects your brand’s values can help you connect to your audience in a raw, human way. Where does your IT company stand on certain issues? What role are you playing in the world? Reflect the human side of your brand in your content to leap ahead of the competition this year.

Automations Keep Pulling Their Weight in 2023

Humanizing your brand doesn’t mean you won’t use AI assistance to snag your audience’s attention in 2023. Instead, the trend to use AI to start, continue and maintain marketing conversations through automated text messaging flows or a website chat box is trending upward.

While your customers might be searching for products and watching short-form videos about your app or software in the middle of the night, you don’t have to lose a potential lead if you aren’t available in real-time. And even though you’re automating these conversations, they’ll have a significant impact when you craft with a personal touch. That way, even though you aren’t answering them at the time, it can certainly feel that way with real conversational responses.

Your marketing journey is kicking off this year in the IT industry, and SMS-Magic is here to help you reach your audience with messaging. Ready to get started? Contact our SMS-Magic team for a demo or a free trial today!

Texting is already part of our daily lives, and it has changed the way in which we communicate, especially during the last 10 years. Recent studies show that approximately 6 out of 10 people would rather text a business than make a phone call or receive an email. It just makes sense for law firms to take advantage of this already-preferred avenue of communication.

Here are 3 ways text messaging can help your firm increase business:

1. Messaging helps you increase leads.

We know that people seeking legal representation often shop around before hiring a law firm. Prospective clients want information without a lot of hassle. They generally don’t want to wait on hold to speak with someone, they don’t want to wait for a return call from a voicemail, and often they don’t want to leave a voicemail at all.

Messaging makes it simple and allows you to engage a prospective client immediately. The client can text a keyword to your law firm to start the process. A personalized automated response can serve as your initial introduction, can help give your client more information and can gather facts from the client about their situation. You can transition from automated messages to a member of your intake team whenever you want.

The faster a firm can respond to an inquiry, the greater the likelihood of turning a prospect into an actual client. Put another way, the first law firm to respond is the law firm that will win the business.

2. Messaging allows you to stand out from your competition.

In a saturated legal market, a law firm needs to stand out from its competitors, and conversational text messaging can serve that purpose by allowing a swift and personalized response to inquiries. Your team can respond to inquiries quickly – putting an end to phone tag, missed emails and slow responses to client questions.

One of our customers, Kwartler Manus, uses Litify, a legal software program that integrates seamlessly with SMS-Magic. Everyone in their firm has a license to use SMS-Magic and because contacts are centralized in one place and easily accessed, all communications by clients are visible to all staff members. This means that anyone in the firm can respond to a message. If an attorney is in court, away from the office or otherwise unavailable, staff members can still keep clients updated about their cases.

3. Messaging allows you to automate routine processes

Your team can respond to queries at all times of the day with automated responses – establishing instant connections with prospective clients. Your first message can introduce the firm, provide links to more information and let a prospective client know someone from your firm will get back with them as quickly as possible.

After the first text, messaging can help streamline the intake process. You can send, receive, and sign documents, as well as set up consultations, appointments and reminders. You can send updates and information on cases or verify that you received requested information. Establishing a relationship early helps build trust and assures your prospects and new clients that you care about them and their cases. 

In certain circumstances, such as in personal injury cases, text messaging allows clients to quickly and easily upload pictures pertinent to their cases.  This saves the firm and the client time and increases the firm’s revenue by freeing up time for staff members to concentrate on other issues.

Of course, not every situation will be appropriate to text messaging, especially for a law firm, but messaging can serve as an easy and convenient entry point to a conversation. With messaging, you can easily transition the conversation to an email or phone call. If your firm wants to grow your clientele and increase your bottom line, adding text-messaging can be your best solution!

Ready to give messaging a try? Contact SMS-Magic for a demo today!

Each communication channel, however, has strengths and weaknesses and each probably appeals to different types of customers. For example, your Instagram posts won’t be seen by customers who only use Facebook. By combining channels you can overlap your outreach, overcome weaknesses and create more effective campaigns. Each channel can enhance all the other channels.

Our customers have seen significant results simply by adding messaging to their other channels and using it well. Here are 5 suggestions for using messaging to enhance your multichannel marketing efforts:

Create ‘Surround Sound’ With Messaging

Engaging your customers through a variety of channels can create a sense that your business is part of their life. Imagine seeing the same product advertised on a TV spot, a billboard, and an in-store poster. You’d think about that product three separate times, and you’d see it as part of your surroundings. On the other hand, if you saw three separate billboards for the same product, you’d likely tune out after the first one or two.

Reaching out to your customers through multiple channels can have a similar effect. Your customers only want to see so many emails from your business. They’ll also unsubscribe if you send them too many messages. A single email combined with a single message, however, can be far more powerful than sending two emails or two messages. A multichannel strategy ensures your marketing campaign is greater than the sum of its parts.

Use Messaging For Procedural Exchanges

Some transactions and conversations make more sense to conduct via non-messaging channels. For instance, signing closing documents on a house requires virtual signatures and reading lots of fine print, so it often makes sense via email. A thorough explanation of how to apply for an academic program might also require an email or phone call. However, you can still use messaging to streamline these exchanges. Here’s an example of how the conversation might go:

Agent: We got a counter-offer from our buyers today! I’m sending it to your email. Take a look and sign when you get a chance!

Customer: Fantastic! I’m looking now.

If the agent had simply emailed the customer with the counteroffer, the agent would have waited longer to get a response. Most customers don’t check their email inboxes as often as they check their messages. By alerting the customer that important documents were waiting in the inbox, however, the agent was able to prompt immediate action. The customer appreciated the heads-up, too!

Drive Engagement Through Other Channels Via Messaging

Messaging is a powerful, immediate way to get your customers’ attention. A good message typically includes a call to action – a clear invitation for the recipient to do something. Messaging can be an effective way to invite your audience to take action on another channel. Here’s how a staffing company might use this approach:

Agent: We’ve reviewed your application, and we have a position in mind for you. Would you be interested in taking a typing test to get the process started?

Customer: Sure!

Agent: Great! I’m sending an invitation to your email inbox now.

The immediacy and urgency associated with messaging can help you engage customers via other channels with the same energy. 

Use Other Channels To Promote Messaging

Your customers may not know that messaging is an option if they’re reaching out via other channels. One health insurance company offers a push-button option on their phone menu, asking callers if they’d like to text with an agent instead. If not, the caller can continue to hold. If the caller indicates “yes,” an agent will reach out via text. Now, instead of being stuck on hold, the customer can get their questions answered while going about their daily activities. Most callers aren’t aware of this option before they call, but they’re grateful for the option when it’s offered!

Offer ‘Summaries’ Via Messaging

A good marketing message is short and sweet. By offering just enough to whet your audience’s appetite for more, you can prompt them to seek out the details via other channels. Here’s a great example of how a nonprofit organization might use this strategy:

Agent: Thanks for your contribution! We raised over $200,000 for leukemia research this month. To learn how we’re using these funds to find a cure, visit our website!

Adding conversational messaging to your toolkit makes all your other channels that much more effective. Try it today!

Our customer support team can help you get started with SMS-Magic. Contact us for a demo or a free trial!

The Rule of 7 was devised in the 1930s to quantify how many times a person needed to see a movie poster before they bought a ticket for the movie. During the ensuing decades, the rule held true for most products. A consumer needed seven “touches” from a company before they would internalize the marketing message and act on the call to action.

These days, with all the noisy messages surrounding us, a consumer may need more than seven touches. They may need up to 25 touches before they are ready to respond to your message. Fortunately, we have more channels to try than just movie posters. Multichannel marketing relies on your ability to create the mix of channels that will supply the needed touches to convert a prospect into a customer.

So maybe the Rule of 7 still applies, but it needs updating. Your mix of channels may need a little overhaul, too. Here’s a list of the channels you’re probably already using:

• Email
• Direct mail
• In-person contact at a trade show or conference
• Print, television and radio ads
• Social media
• Online ads
• Sponsorships
• Online communities
• Billboards
• Phone calls

We’d like to make the case for adding messaging to your channel mix. And here are five great reasons this could work for your marketing campaigns.

#1 – Your Customers Are Digital-First

Your customers have been “rewired” to be digital-first, according to a recent report by Adobe and eConsultancy. The lessons of the past several years have taught them to rely more heavily than ever on their mobile phones, their tablets and their laptops. Non-digital channels are still effective, but your customers look first to their digital devices. Messaging can be central to a digital-first marketing strategy.

#2 – Messaging Is Available 24/7, 365

Your customers are trying to solve problems in their own lives. Sometimes, it’s an ordinary task like scheduling a haircut or taking advantage of a great sale. But sometimes it’s a life-changing event like securing the right attorney after an accident or applying to college or buying a home. In those cases, your customer might want information about your company, product and services after hours. They might search for a lawyer in the middle of the night. They might wonder about interest rates in the middle of the afternoon. They might ask for a campus tour when you least expect it. With automated messaging, you can provide a personalized, but automated, response whenever your customers contact you. Once the first contacts are made, you can switch to in-person conversations, increasing your chances of making connections.

#3 – Attention Spans Are Getting Shorter

You don’t ever have very much time to attract attention, and messaging helps keep your appeal short and sweet. SMS messages are 160 characters long. Multimedia messages can be longer, but they often contain images or videos, making them very appealing. Customers expect messages to be short and to the point, and they are generally willing to give you the 30 seconds it takes to read your message. Use the message wisely and you can have a real impact. Customers trust that you won’t waste their time.

#4 –Premiums Are Effective In Most Campaigns

You probably offer incentives when you make an appeal. Coupons, sweepstakes and bonuses, among others, can help spur your audience to action. Offer something your audience values and you’ll see your response rate rise. Messaging allows you to ask for immediate action. For example, a university might send this message: “Text APPLYNOW to 534567 to waive your application fee.” The reply text might trigger an automated message that leads to an in-person conversation with an admissions counselor. In other industries, you might link to online coupons or offers, tailoring the offer and the response to your situation.

#5 – Compliance & Analytics Are Critical

You probably use a CRM to segment your audiences, direct your campaigns and report on the results. After all, knowing how your campaign performed is critical to your continuing success. The essence of marketing is to design and launch a campaign for a particular audience, gather data about how it performed, and use the analysis to design even more effective campaigns in the future. You probably are also impacted by privacy laws and regulations. They protect consumers and require certain adjustments for marketers. Messaging allows you to work seamlessly with your CRM and to prove compliance with its reporting capabilities.

Increasing your use of messaging in your multichannel marketing mix makes sense in today’s world. People are using messaging systems for an ever-increasing list of tasks, including very private functions like their banking. Other channels are also effective, but messaging can give your marketing an added boost.

If you’re ready to give messaging a try, contact SMS-Magic for a demo or a free trial today!

One caveat: Before you send surveys via text messaging, your respondents must have opted into receiving messages from you. Like other types of solicitations, you must have their permission before the first message is sent. If you’re already working to grow your opt-in list, this requirement will just be another part of your overall marketing strategy.

Designing Your Survey

Conversational messaging lends itself to two different kinds of surveys. The first is a survey conducted entirely through messaging; the other is a text invitation that links to a web-based survey.

Using messaging for the first type of survey is growing in popularity so it’s possible that you might have taken a “quick” survey that only has one or two questions. Responses are generally limited to yes or no and numerical ratings.

For example, the text might read, “Reply and rate your experience today between 1 and 10.” If you reply “8,” your message goes through. If you answer anything other than a numeral between 1 and 10, however, you might receive a message to try again.

When you use this type of survey in your business, it will be powered by an automated messaging sequence that you’ve designed and written specifically for this task. The first message is generally triggered by something your customer does online or with their mobile phone. You determine the trigger, the sequence of messages and the wording of the messages.

You’ll have to consider what message to send if the input you’ve asked for isn’t what you get. For example, if your customer answers the question above with “Loved it!” you’ll have to write a message that asks them to try again.

The second type of survey invitation contains a link to a web-based survey that lives on your website. You can use any survey design software you prefer to create the survey. Customers will use the link in the texted invitation to access the survey, but they will complete the survey on your website. The survey questions can be yes-no, multiple choice or fill in the blank. You can even provide space for longer qualitative answers, if you want those responses.

How Effective is Conversational Messaging in Surveys?

Researchers at the Pew Research Center wanted to know how effective text messaging is when it’s used as an invitation to take a survey. They didn’t have to worry about getting permission to text during the experiments because they already had a study group whose members had opted into text messaging.

The Pew researchers sent invitations by both text and email to one group and just by email to another. Within 30 minutes of sending the invitations, 15 percent of the text-and-email group had competed the survey, and only 6 percent of the email-only group had. Although the research showed that text recipients initially responded faster to the survey than those invited with an email, by the end of the experiment the responses were equal between the two groups.

Text invitations may be especially effective if your campaign values quick responses. Some contests, for example, could benefit from leveraging fast response times.

Researchers also found that, when invited by texts, more respondents completed surveys using smart phones. A little more than half the respondents invited by text completed the survey using their phones. Only 33 percent of those in the email group completed the survey with their phones.

That result may impact your survey design. If you use text to invite respondents to take your survey, you’ll also want to be sure the survey is easy to read and complete on a smart phone.

Finally, researchers found that using short codes to deliver survey invitations allowed cellphone carriers, device manufacturers and/or individuals to block delivery. Short codes are five- or six-digit codes that allow transmission of messages faster than a traditional 10-digit phone number.

Pew researchers chose to use short codes because of the volume of messages they intended to send. Short codes allowed messages to be transmitted faster, even though some of the messages were blocked.

If you are sending a high volume of messages, you’ll need to determine if short codes will perform better than long codes overall. Using long codes would allow access to those respondents who have blocked short codes but would take longer to send.

How Can SMS-Magic Help You?

Staying in touch with your existing customers and getting to know your potential customers has become a requirement in today’s business world. SMS-Magic, through conversational and automated text messaging, can help you reach out to customers with surveys about their experience with your company.

SMS-Magic offers a free trial so that you can get a feel for our product. If you’re as pleased as we think you will be, you can choose the level of service that’s best for your company.

Contact us to set up a demo or to start your free trial. Let us show you how you can engage your customers in new ways!

To help you master this part of text messaging campaigns, we have compiled 6 things that we’re sure your boss wants you to know. Here they are:

1. You must have express written consent before your company can legally send text messages to anyone. That means more than just asking for their phone number. It doesn’t matter who it is – an existing customer, a former client, a trade-show lead, or someone on a purchased marketing list. Before that first message goes out, your customer must say it’s okay. In other words, they must opt in.

2. Several governing bodies regulate commercial text messaging. They include individual countries, including the U.S., consortiums of countries like the European Union, state or local governments, and the carriers who deliver messages around the world. Your text messaging partner, like SMS-Magic, should be able to help you navigate the rules for your campaigns.

3. Include the following in your first text:
   • Your company name. Don’t make your customers guess who’s sending the message.
   • The promotion premium. If you’re offering a coupon, discount or e-book in exchange for permission to text, do it at the beginning of the text.
   • Message frequency. Let your customers know how often you plan to send.
   • Message and data rates. Remind customers that they might be charged to receive SMS messages.
   • How to opt out. “Reply STOP to unsubscribe” works well.
   • How to reach customer service or ask questions.

You’ve probably received opt-in requests from companies you do business with. Take a look at how well they’ve provided information to their customers. Some of the offers we’ve seen have been really creative. One was on a parking meter. Learn from the best.

4. Track opt-in and opt-out requests so that you send only to the customers who have specifically asked you to. European laws also require you to “forget” a customer at their request. That means purging all their information from your system and being able to show your work. If regulators ever ask, you must be able to prove you have permission to text.

5. In the United States, commercial text messages are governed by the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA). It prohibits the following types of text messages:
   • Unsolicited Text Messages – businesses are not allowed to text consumers without their permission.
   • Requesting Payment – businesses may not request payment or additional identifying information before revealing the actual message.
   • Scrambled Messages – businesses must send readable texts. They may not scramble the message or use unintelligible audio.
   • Do Not Call Registry – businesses must respect the Do Not Call registry established by the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission.
   • Robocalling & Automated Dialing – businesses may not use robocalling to generate phone numbers or send text messages.

6. The last thing we think your boss wants you to know has nothing to do with rules and regulations. Instead, it’s about being authentic in all your customer interactions. Behaving like a trusted friend helps you build customer relationships that can last for years. Text messaging is the perfect channel for building trust.

Staying in touch with your existing customers and getting to know your potential customers has become a requirement in today’s business world. SMS-Magic, through conversational and automated text messaging, can help you reach out to customers in new ways.

SMS-Magic offers a free trial so that you can get a feel for our product. If you’re as pleased as we think you will be, you can choose the level of service that’s best for your company.

Contact us to set up a demo or to start your free trial. Let us show you how you can engage your customers in new ways!

Most of our customers say it’s virtually impossible to get a customer to return an email. And we hear comments like, “No one answers the phone anymore” or “They won’t answer if they see a strange number on caller ID.”

So the question is: If you can’t reach customers and prospects, how can you provide a service or sell a product?

As a software-as-a-service company developing SMS and MMS texting solutions, we think we know how to reach your customers, but we thought it might be better to let our customers show you how text messaging works in their businesses.

Why Use Text Messaging?

Before we get to the great ideas, let’s take a minute to talk about the reality of communication in 2022. Emails were great when everyone read them sitting in front of their desktop computers and the alternative was sending mail through the postal service. Voice mails, too, served their purpose.

These days, however, emails are easy to ignore. In fact, we only open 22% of the emails we receive. And the more mobile we’ve become; the more unwieldy emails have become. It’s just not convenient to reply on the run.

And most of us don’t even listen to the voice messages we receive. It’s likely we will wait for a text.

Texts are quick, easy and always with you. We send more than 5 billion texts every day, and we read 98% of the ones we receive. Clearly, text messaging is the channel we prefer.

Here are some great ideas from two of our customers. You can apply these ideas directly to your own business or modify them to fit your unique situation.

When You Have Seconds to Respond

In the high-stakes legal world, the key to winning new business is responding quickly. When legal prospects have a need, they normally shop for an attorney online. One of our customers estimates that he has seconds to reach out to a prospect before they move on to a competitor.

To engage a prospect quickly, our customer has developed a series of automated text messages that are triggered by where the prospect is on the firm’s website. Different practice areas are housed in different sections of the website, so it’s possible to tell where the prospect’s interest lies and tailor messages specifically for that need.

No matter what the prospect needs, the initial messages introduce the law firm and ask how the firm can help. As the prospects reply, the conversations continue with pre-programmed messages. And when it’s appropriate, a member of the intake team takes over with live messaging and continues the conversation.

The system is designed to be active 24/7. The automated messages launch even if the prospect is searching at 3 a.m. National practices can benefit from a time-neutral system because prospects may shop for an attorney at any hour of the day.

Once a prospect becomes a client, SMS-Magic makes staying in touch easier than ever. Our customer uses Litify to manage his firm, and SMS-Magic is designed to work seamlessly with Litify. Messages are tracked by SMS-Magic in the Litify environment. That means everyone in the firm opens one application, rather than two. They can see all the client’s information, including all text communications, in one place.

If an attorney is away from the office, anyone at the office can respond to queries and a different attorney can continue working on the case. The case doesn’t stop because the lead attorney is unavailable. It saves the firm time and better serves the client.

When You Must Respond on the Fly

Another of our customers manages large rental properties. They wanted to handle maintenance issues as quickly as possible, and they asked their residents to email maintenance requests to a dedicated address. Staff members responded as soon as they were in front of their computers.

It was a great plan, but it didn’t work. Residents complained that their requests weren’t handled quickly enough and started texting requests instead using email. Residents liked the immediacy and the convenience of texting.

The workflow, however, wasn’t designed to accept requests via text. Trying to make sure texts were transferred promptly and accurately created extra work for the management staff. The staff was missing requests and couldn’t always be sure issues had been addressed. And staff members could only respond to requests when they were in the office.

Our customer’s CRM was Salesforce. SMS-Magic is designed to work with Salesforce, as well as other CRMs, and the integration made using a text-based system for maintenance requests easy. Once our customer installed SMS-Magic to handle all their text messages, maintenance requests began to flow smoothly.

SMS-Magic tracked all customer contacts, no matter what the source of the contact. Our customer was able to track all maintenance requests – by email, phone or text. And anyone on the staff could access the record. That meant anyone could give a resident an update on their request.

It also made sense to equip each staff member with the mobile version of SMS-Magic. With the app, they could answer texts from either their own phones or from company phones. The system would track the contacts in Salesforce no matter what phone was used. No longer were staff members tied to their desks. They could visit company properties and respond to maintenance requests at the same time. Our customer said it was a game changer for their business.

How Can You Test Drive SMS-Magic?

Would your business benefit from an integration between your CRM and your texting platform? We’d love to help you start texting or help scale your texting to a higher level.

We have experts ready to help you take SMS-Magic for a spin for FREE! Schedule a demo or start a free trial today! We think you’ll love what you see!

What is multichannel messaging? It’s very much like it sounds – connecting with your customers via messages sent through a variety of messaging channels. Those channels could include SMS, MMS, email, web push or most social media. The reach they afford is huge.

Meta (formerly Facebook) reported that in 2019 more than 1.3 billion people used Facebook Messenger each month. People and businesses sent an average of 20 billion messages back and forth to each other every month in 2019. The numbers have only grown since then, and that’s only one channel. There are many others.

And by using a variety of channels, you are more likely to reach an audience that increasingly values personal connection. As you establish a one-on-one relationship, you can provide positive customer experiences, building brand identity and customer loyalty.

But what are the real benefits to using multichannel messaging? Here are 5 benefits for multichannel messaging and 5 benefits for using SMS-Magic:

1. Messaging is convenient.
   It allows your customer to connect with you through their mobile phones when they’re on the go rather than waiting until they’re sitting with their laptops or tablets. By then they could have forgotten all about you. Are you trying to reach a customer to make an appointment or to connect with a phone conversation? Messaging lets them tell you immediately when connecting would be convenient so that scheduling becomes possible with minimal fuss.

2. Messaging provides an immediate personal experience.
   Unlike a chat bot, that requires the customer to wait for an agent or the system to respond, messaging is immediate. And because the customer is interacting with a real person in real time, it’s personal.

3. Messaging is efficient.
   Because of the format, texts are shorter than emails. Your customers can ask specific questions and you can return specific answers. You don’t necessarily need to send tons of information, but you can if it’s warranted.

4. Messages can contain text only or a variety of media.
   SMS messages are faster and cheaper to send but still allow you to link to more information in any format. MMS messages allow you to include multimedia elements like images, videos, emojis and GIFs to liven up your message. They can be great attention getters.

5. Time zones become irrelevant – or irrelevant to you.
   You can schedule automated messages for delivery at any time, on any day. You can bridge a 12-hour gap with ease. Set up delivery when it’s convenient for your recipients with a process that convenient for you.

So what are the advantages to using SMS-Magic?

6. SMS-Magic helps you manage messages across popular messaging apps.
   SMS-Magic can handle messages from messaging apps around the world from Messenger to Whatsapp to WeChat. Working with your CRM, SMS-Magic consolidates all contacts from a customer into one record, including phone calls, emails and messages. You can consult with team members and respond to customers quickly because all the facts are at your fingertips.

7. SMS-Magic helps you stay compliant.
   We can help you keep up with the details like customer permissions as they opt-in (and perhaps opt-out) of your messaging campaigns. Our back-end systems are structured so that we can display individual requests, and we can prove you’ve complied with customer requests. You won’t have to worry about regulators asking to see your records. We use on-going processes to collect and store information about distribution and can share it with regulators, if necessary.

8. SMS-Magic helps you automate.
   SMS-Magic is perfect for sending automated messages to your customers and prospects. We provide templates for your use and have lots of information about creating effective messages and campaigns. You can switch from automated to live in an instant so your customers know they’re talking to a person.

9. SMS-Magic allows you to respond from anywhere.
   You can use our mobile app to respond to messages from your own phone. The app works with your CRM to log the message appropriately. No longer will your agents by tied to a desk and your customers will get the response time they expect.

10. SMS-Magic works with your favorite CRM.
    We work and play well with others. We are a preferred provider for Salesforce and Zoho, and we integrate easily with Litify. Contact us to see what we can do with your existing architecture.

We have experts ready to help you take SMS-Magic for a spin for FREE! Schedule a demo or start a free trial today! We think you’ll love what you see!

In a normal economy, it could take weeks or months to advertise, interview, offer and accept. Slow-to-hire companies often lose out on the best prospects, leaving themselves with average workers. That’s in a normal economy.

In 2021, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, more than 47 million people voluntarily quit their jobs, many of them responding to life changes brought on by the Covid-19 pandemic. Low-wage workers led the pack, but they were followed by women with increased childcare responsibilities, retiring Baby Boomers and people who wanted better pay, greater flexibility and less stress in their work lives. Job openings have increased to records highs. Welcome to the “Great Resignation,” aka the “Big Quit.”

So what’s an excellent company to do? Home Depot, a Fortune-500-ranked company, plans to hire 25 percent more workers for its spring season this year by speeding up the application process. The company plans to offer jobs in as little as one day, up from an average of five days previously. The company is also holding virtual job fairs to fill 100,000 full- and part-time job openings.

Your business may not involve selling building supplies and you may not be able to offer jobs in 24 hours, but evidence shows that speeding up your hiring process can help you fill open positions with the talent you need. Hiring fast allows you to recruit top talent and to give them a better candidate experience. You’ll experience higher acceptance rates because a faster timeline gives candidates less time to consider other offers.

It also keeps the candidate from “ghosting” the hiring company. The term ghosting comes from the dating world where it means someone has simply disappeared from all communications. A recent Indeed survey indicates that 76 percent of employers have been ghosted – even after a candidate has accepted a job – and 57 percent believe ghosting is more common than before.

Some ghosting occurs when a candidate receives a better offer and chooses not to inform other interested companies, but lack of communication also plays a large role in candidate frustration. A recent CareerBuilder survey finds that 51 percent of applicants are discouraged by a lack of information. More than a third of respondents said that need to know what their status is during the process and employers don’t share that information. Slightly less than a third of respondents said employers don’t even acknowledge receiving their applications.

The results? Frustrated applicants are more likely to ghost the employer.

Liz Cannata, vice president of human resources at CareerBuilder, said in a Fast Company interview: “If the candidate doesn’t understand where they’re at in the process or how long the process will be, they can lose interest and become disengaged. Similarly, if the process is too long and feels like it’s dragging out because the employer keeps adding one more interview or they’re unsure of when they’ll have a decision, that can also lead to drop off.”

We would like to suggest that using text messaging during your hiring process can make a big difference, especially for staffing companies. By including permission to text the candidate on your application, you can communicate with applicants initially via a series of automated texts. When you’re farther along in the hiring process, you can send group texts to let applicants know they aren’t progressing in the hiring process and send individual texts to those whom you’d like to interview.

Once you’ve narrowed down the selection, you can move to one-on-one conversational messaging to set up interviews and gather any additional information you need. Your applicants get the information they need quickly in a format they prefer.

We know applicants prefer texts because globally we send 5 billion texts a day, and we open 98 percent of them. Conversely, we only open emails 22 percent of the time, according to Gigaom. Research from Asurion shows that we look at our phones 96 times a day or once every 10 minutes. You can bet that job applicants are just like the rest of us.

We also know that managing the flow of information is critical, too. If you use a CRM like Salesforce or Zoho, SMS-Magic can help you track of all your applicant interactions. All of your incoming texts, emails and phone conversations, as well as your responses, can be archived in your CRM.

It’s a competitive world and if you’re able to respond to candidates faster than your competition, you have earned an amazing competitive advantage. Quick responses to applicants help you recruit the best possible candidates while enhancing your hiring brand in your industry.

Being authentic in your hiring process is increasingly important in today’s business world. Staying in touch with talented applicants has become a requirement. SMS-Magic, through conversational and automated text messaging, can help you reach out to applicants faster and with better results.

SMS-Magic offers a free trial so that you can get a feel for our product. If you’re as pleased as we think you will be, you can choose the level of service that’s best for your company.

Contact us to set up a demo or to start your free trial. Let us show you how you can engage applicants in new ways!