It seems like it wasn’t very long ago that Denver Mobile Marketing Expert, JC Soto was helping local small businesses to realize how important it was to build an online presence. “If your business didn’t have a website, it was stuck in the Stone Age,” Soto explains. Nowadays though, if you aren’t taking your business mobile and using text marketing, you will once again quickly get left behind and potential customers will never realize your business exists, because your competitors who have realized the value proposition of mobile services, will be capitalizing on the waves of the new marketing, customer service and sales that mobile users are looking for.
“Being able to use text marketing in your mobile marketing strategy, is a great way to help attract new customers, generate leads, and keep current customers engaged. While you want your text marketing to have great sales results, you also want to use this type of marketing in ways that will create value for the subscribers, that way they will remain subscribed and will also hopefully, share the information they receive from your business with their friends and colleagues. Knowing how to accomplish all of that can be tricky if you are new to text marketing,” Soto says.
Here are Soto’s seven text marketing ideas to get you started:
Number One: Product Updates
Texting product updates to subscribers are helpful if you have products that update often such as technology products. A quick text that gets them to your product update page on your mobile website is one of the best ways to accomplish this.
Number Two: Appointment Reminders
If your business sets appointments or does any sort of regular service for customers, sending text reminders is a value added service that many mobile users prefer over a phone call.
Number Three: Customer Appreciation Events
Invitations to special events such as webinars or other occasions such as customer appreciation gatherings, are always a nice way to let customers know when you have something going on that they would be interested in attending.
Number Four: Polls and Surveys
Quick polls and surveys are great and can be as easy as “Text back ‘Y’ for yes and ‘N’ for No”, for yes and no type questions that are relevant to your products and services. A way to get immediate sales is to text “Text back BOGO if you want a ‘Buy One Get One Free’ Coupon, or some other sort of discount or promotional offer. Do not overdo these though. Once a month is enough or your message will risk coming across as spam.
Number Five: Contests and Games
Contests and games are a fun way to engage customers, but again, do not do this more than once or twice a year. Some businesses have found success with trivia text games or text message Bingo. Prizes can include gift cards or discounts.
Number Six: Members Only Offers
Creating an exclusive feeling for your subscribers, is always well received, and sending “members only offers” type of texts with special discounts or some other benefit could help keep them subscribed.
Number Seven: Limited Time Offers
Due to the immediacy of text messages, limited time offers are also a great idea and taking advantage of this idea right before a holiday or during prime shopping times is ideal.
For more great marketing ideas go to: linkedin.com/jcsoto.