As a small business owner or manager, stretching every dollar in your marketing budget isn’t just vital, it’s essential to the success and health of your brand. Unfortunately, actually implementing this approach isn’t always easy when every talking head on the web tries to pull you in a different direction for customer interaction and outreach. With this in mind, we’d like to go beyond the generic “SMS marketing is great!” conversation and offer up the hard facts that prove this practice really is effective for small businesses like your own.
Almost Everyone Has SMS Functionality
According to Mobile Marketing Watch’s Michael Essany, it’s hard to start this discussion with any point other than the fact that the vast majority of your target audience has a phone that can send and receive text messages. Specifically, over 95 percent of all consumers have text capable phones, so SMS marketing serves as a universal channel that is both relatable and widespread.Meanwhile, The Toronto Star’s editorial team notes that direct mail is heading in the other direction. With postal service volume and the demand for physical mail dropping steadily over the past decade, Canada Post has had to toss around the idea of eliminating home deliveries completely as the organization seeks out a cost-effective way to remain in business.Simply put, people are gravitating toward digital channels like SMS marketing and leaving behind dated practices like direct mail, so your brand also needs to follow this trend. Otherwise, it runs the risk of adopting an approach to customer outreach that’s not only ineffective, but also a hefty burden on your already strained budget.
People Actually Open Text Messages
Aside from the fact that people prefer the convenience of mobile devices to older channels and conduits of communication, Essany also points out that going the SMS route actually means that your content will be opened and enjoyed by its target audience. While most people toss their piles of junk mail and advertisements into the trash without a second glance, text messages enjoy an average open rate that easily tops the 90 percent mark.The best part about this high open rate? Not only does your small business get the chance to create quality content that it knows will be seen, most text messages are opened and consumed less than five minutes after delivery. In other words, you can expect a response from your audience in real time; something that’s definitely hard to come by if you’re leveraging other marketing channels.
Creating Effective SMS Content Is a Breeze
Speaking of creating quality content, Brett Nuckles of Business News Daily explains that one of the biggest reasons brands should try out text-based marketing within their outreach operations revolves around the fact that crafting a winning offering on this front only requires a sentence or two of engaging copy. For a small business owner or manager who simply doesn’t have the time to devote hours and hours toward writing pages of marketing copy, it’s easy to see why the notion of getting content primed for a big marketing push in just a few minutes is a major selling point.
Reaching out Via Text Is Cheap
Nuckles goes on to suggest that the executives at the helm of a smaller business or brand should give text-based marketing a try for perhaps the most important reason of all – it doesn’t cost an arm and a leg to get a campaign up and running. Unlike the substantial price tag that comes with taking out full-page ads in the newspaper or banner selections on a target site, this form of mobile marketing often stands as the most cost-effective method for consumer outreach. When paired with an understanding of just how effective SMS marketing is in comparison to other channels of consumer outreach, this scenario creates a unique value proposition that’s hard to pass up.
SMS Marketing Builds Brand Loyalty
Finally, it’s important to understand that – from a long term perspective, SMS marketing can generate a significant amount of brand loyalty. In his look at this process, David Wachs of Venture Beat notes that connecting via text serves as a two-way street for communication, allowing your audience to interact and offer feedback. This connection helps forge a deeper bond with these viewers, thereby ensuring that customers always think of your brand first when comparing products and services to other, less outgoing, market players.At the end of the day, there’s virtually no end to the amount of stats, facts, and figures that prove just how effective SMS marketing is for small businesses. Fortunately, with this new understanding leading the way, your organization should now have plenty of insight and information at its disposal to make the right choice when the time comes to reach out and connect with the people that matter most.
