Mobile Phones and Current Trends in Marketing
In today’s fast-paced world of instant communication, the trends are obvious; everyone has a mobile phone. Mobile phones are not simply used for communication, as first envisioned, but used to do just about every daily task you can imagine. Pay bills, watch a movie, play a game; and most importantly for your business: make purchases. Social networking was originally designed to allow users to connect with friends and family with pictures, videos, and others. However, many business owners also saw this growing connectivity trend as an opportunity to effectively advance their marketing campaigns. It is this connectivity and high-speed communication that can allow a business to reach consumers and get rapid feedback. Near real-time tracking of demographic data to identify what is working best to continuously improve their marketing.
Put simply, bulk SMS marketing is the most effective method to reach new and existing customers. It is the most cost-efficient way to communicate all the great things your business has to offer. If you are not in step with this trend, you will see your business trailing the competition very soon.
What Exactly is SMS and Why SMS Marketing?
SMS (short message service) is the text messaging service element used in mobile phones and internet browsers. Short text messages are sent via standardized communication protocols and allow the connectivity over communication networks that phone companies and internet service companies provide. SMS marketing is simply leveraging this messaging capability to reach your customer base quickly, and build a database of essential customer information.
Most SMS marketing campaigns start with a promotion to reach new customers. For example; your car wash business decides to offer a free car wash on weekdays. You can bulk send to a list of mobile phone numbers an offer to text 12345, or some similar shortcode to FREE_WASH. Then send those that respond with the details on the weekday offer. Often consumers will forward great deals to their social network. Given the ease of mobile communication these days and the whole social network trend discussed above, word travels very fast. The networking concept here is that “word of mouth”, advertising can travel at light speed with today’s mobile and internet capabilities. Your business needs to continue to leverage this capability to stay competitive.
Over time, the messaging and feedback can allow your business to build a database of customers, and sales trends. Which customers responded? Which days were the free wash most often used? How many new customers, were added as a result of networking, or those that were contacted by their friends.
Is Bulk SMS Marketing Really Effective?
Bulk SMS is simply sending your company’s message and marketing offers to many existing and potential customers in a single batch delivery. It is highly effective in terms of cost. SMS marketing is currently, the least expensive method to target a list of potential clients. Along with customer feedback and demographic tracking that is an essential component of your SMS marketing campaign. If you want to expand your customer base and keep advertising expenditures in check, bulk SMS marketing is a must. Your customized messages go out; and even, in the event, your customers are driving with their phones off, as soon as their phone is turned back on, your message is delivered.
A key to the overall effectiveness of SMS bulk Marketing is that you do not need any specialized skill to get your SMS marketing campaign going. You do need to obtain some web-based software to help organize, send and track your messaging, but again this type of service is relatively inexpensive and easy to initiate your SMS delivery process. An SMS marketing campaign is a great way to let your customers know about new products, specialized services and unique offers that your company may have coming their way. SMS bulk Marketing is a highly effective way to stay in touch with your customer base, thereby increasing both sales and customer loyalty.
How to Get Started on the Initial Bulk List
To get started the first step is to define the basic data set your business needs to build your customer database. For our car wash example, the business may want to track the following:
- Customer Mobile Number
- Customer Email Address
- Customer Name: LNAME, F_NAME
- Address/Zip Code
- Last Date of Car Wash
- Service Code: wash, wash and wax, super wash, custom clean
- Car Make/Model
With this data definition, the next step is to start collecting. Easier said then done, but there are likely ways your business is already gathering this information with existing customers or could start as a point of sales or deliveries are completed. This is also a process where getting help from an established SMS marketing firm with a robust tech platform can really help. SMS.to is an excellent SMS support platform that can really help grow your business.
SMS.TO Mission
The SMS.to mission is to . SMS.to offers a smarter way for a business to communicate with customers to include full support to Bulk SMS marketing. So far in this article, we have only covered SMS platforms, but SMS.to can extend the bulk SMS concept to WhatsAPP and Viber as well. The SMS.to offers the robust platform components (OmniMessaging & SMS API Gateway) that can integrate your company’s messaging and really start connecting with your customer base.
In today’s fast paced world of instant communication, your business must get better connected to new and potential customers. Your business can jump start its bulk SMS marketing campaign with the help of an experienced SMS marketing tech solution firm: SMS.to Your company defines the message and data requirements and SMS.to integrates your workflow into the robust gateways that can effectively reach your target market segment.
Bulk SMS It is the most cost-efficient way to communicate all the great things your business has to offer and SMS.to mission is to simplify the process and help your company gain marketing share quickly.