SMS marketing or text marketing automations enable you to reach your customers or leads at the right time with the right message, increasing engagement, conversions, and revenue.
But how exactly do you use SMS marketing automations to engage leads and convert them into paying customers?
This post explores everything you need to know to help your business increase customer engagement, conversions, and ultimately, revenue.
Understand SMS Marketing Automations
SMS marketing automations allow you to send personalized messages to customers based on their behavior or preferences. Automated text messages get triggered by specific events or actions that leads or customers take, such as subscribing to a newsletter or making a purchase.
Businesses set up SMS automations to stay connected with customers at every step of the customer journey and provide a more personalized experience.
Common ways of using automated texts include sending:
- new customer welcome messages
- abandoned cart reminders
- post-purchase follow-ups
- appointment reminders
- promotions and deals
Automating these types of messages results in unified messaging, increased engagement, stronger customer relationships, and of course, higher conversion rates.
Choose the Right SMS Marketing Platform
There are many SMS marketing platforms available. Each platform has its own strengths and features that help businesses accomplish different goals with text messaging. Carefully research different SMS marketing platforms to find one that fits your business’ needs.
For example, some common issues that businesses struggle with are low engagement, infrequent outreach, or a lack of unity in communication. Features such as two-way messaging, scheduled messaging, and customizable message templates help solve those problems.
Once you recognize your specific needs, look for features that solve them. In general, look for a platform that offers automation capabilities, easy integration with other marketing tools, and analytics. Demo a few platforms to see which one works best for you and your business goals.
Know Your Audience
To use text marketing effectively, understand your audience. Who are your customers? What products/services do they want? What kind of messages do they respond to? The more you know about your audience, the more targeted and effective your SMS marketing messages and campaigns will be.
Use customer data and what you know about your audience to segment your contacts. Then write messages for each segment related to what will resonate with them specifically. People don’t want to receive messages about stuff they have no interest in.
Set Goals
Before you begin any marketing campaign, set clear goals. SMS marketing is the same. What do you hope to achieve with your SMS marketing? Do you want to increase sales, drive website traffic, or build brand awareness? How will you measure the success of your SMS campaigns?
Define your goals early on to create SMS campaigns designed to achieve specific outcomes that align with your overall business objectives.
Decide On Messaging Automations
To set up SMS marketing automations, you need to know which subscribers or customer segments you want to receive the messages. The specific goal of your SMS campaign determines who you’ll message and what action you want them to take. That action determines the triggers for your automated messages. As mentioned earlier, triggers are based on specific events or changes.
Messages can trigger when a customer:
- Completes a purchase
- Abandons a shopping cart
- Reaches a certain milestone (such as a loyalty program)
- Has a birthday or anniversary
- Requests information or support
- Schedules an appointment
- Interacts with a specific ad or promotion
- Clicks a specific link in a message
When you know your goal and what you want your trigger to be, you create personalized, targeted messages more likely to engage and convert your audience.
Create Engaging and Effective SMS Messages and Marketing Campaigns
The success of your SMS marketing campaigns depends on the quality of your messages. Keep your messages short, sweet, and engaging. Messages need to be relevant and useful, providing information or offers that your customers find valuable, if you want to achieve your set goal.
To create effective SMS messages, consider the following:
- Personalization: Use the customer’s or lead’s name and reference relevant data from your CRM to personalize your message.
- Timing: Send your message at a time when your subscribers are most likely to read it and do something.
- Call-to-action: Include a clear call-to-action (CTA) that encourages customers to take action.
- Value: Share information or promotions that customers actually find useful.
Practice writing engaging SMS messages, especially if you’re used to writing emails. Then, test different messages to see which ones resonate the best with segments of your audience. If you find that one message performs better than others, create a template that you can easily use later on.
Measure Your Results
Measure your SMS campaign results to optimize your future campaigns. Some key metrics to track include:
- Click-through rates
- Reply rates
- Appointment set rates
- Show rates
- Conversion rates
These metrics help you understand how your customers engage with your messages, whether your messages actually drive the desired actions, and identify areas of your campaign that need improvement.
For example, if a certain offer or promotion generates a high response rate and drives conversions, you likely want to allocate more resources to that campaign or replicate it for future campaigns.
Similarly, if a message or campaign isn’t performing well, use those messages to identify areas for improvement and adjust the content or timing of the messages.
Achieve Your Marketing Goals With SMS Automations
When used effectively, SMS marketing automation is a game-changer for your business, helping you build stronger customer relationships, increase sales, and achieve your marketing goals.
To effectively use text marketing, you need a great marketing automation platform. Skipio is specifically designed to help you achieve all of these goals and more. With features like personalized group messaging, contact segmentation, and automated drip campaigns, Skipio is the perfect solution to get you started on texting your customers.
