Dominate your market by merging SMS and email marketing
SMS is an incredibly efficient channel to use
SMS isn’t the first channel that comes to mind when marketing. SMS has fantastic open rates, a brilliant response rate, and is perfect for customer engagement. However, it is limited in terms of the more creative aspects of marketing (design, for example, or video).
However, when combined with email marketing, these limitations disappear. A mix of SMS and email marketing can result in engaging and successful customer journeys that lead directly to conversion.
Let’s take a look at the reasons why you should integrate SMS into your email marketing strategy. Then we’ll give you our top six tips for merging SMS and email and dominating your market.
The benefits of SMS marketing
SMS marketing offers many important advantages. By combining SMS with your email marketing, you can benefit from the following advantages:
1. Incredible opening rates
SMS has an immediacy that cannot be ignored. We’re far more likely to drop everything to check a text message than to dive into our e-mail inbox. Only a third of email marketing messages are opened, whereas almost all SMS messages are opened.
The SMS response rate is also fantastic. 45% of SMS marketing messages receive a response – and this figure rises when the recipient knows and trusts the sender.
2. Mobile-friendly
It may seem obvious, but SMS is very mobile-friendly! These days, it’s vital for marketing to be mobile-friendly. People use their phones for everything from taking notes to listening to audiobooks and even creating royalty-free podcast music.
However, the types of mobile devices are very different. It’s almost impossible to optimize most types of content for every type of phone. For SMS, it’s a different story. All phones – from the latest smartphone to the most basic brick – can receive SMS messages. This makes SMS very accessible.
It also lets you reach new audiences. An estimated 3.5 billion people worldwide have access to the Internet. It’s an impressive figure, but one that still leaves some people out in the cold. However, 6.6 billion people in the world have a cell phone and can receive SMS messages.
So by incorporating SMS into your marketing mix, you can open up your message to a much wider audience.
3. Fast delivery
SMS is at its best when you need to get in touch with the customer quickly and reliably. SMS messages reach customers almost immediately. What’s more, with their excellent open rates, you can be sure that the customer will not only receive your message quickly, but will also read it quickly.
This makes SMS ideal for sending important information, such as delivery notices, information on service interruptions and so on. Sometimes it’s vital to get in touch with the customer quickly to provide a good experience. SMS is the way to do it.
4. Works perfectly with other types of marketing
SMS is very versatile. You can use it to reinforce, extend and improve any other marketing channel.
Exploit the advantages of SMS
The advantage of merging email and SMS is that each channel can do things that the other cannot. Used together, they form a perfect campaign.
The main advantages of SMS are its speed of delivery and exceptional open rates. As a fast, reliable channel, SMS is ideal for the following activities:
- Create a buzz around an event
- Notify service changes
- Send delivery messages
- Send passwords or password reset links
- Send discount codes
- Get feedback
SMS is not ideal for transmitting large amounts of information. It’s also pretty basic when it comes to design, creative content and so on. This is where the combined talents of SMS and email marketing come into play.
For example, if you need your customer to absorb a lot of information quickly, you can combine SMS and e-mail in a two-pronged approach. Take advantage of the immediacy and high open rate of text by sending your customer an SMS asking them to check their email (or maybe even linking them to relevant information on your website!).
Or think of your SMS as an object. Use it to grab attention and draw people into your e-mail. Then put all that creativity into the e-mail, knowing that your open rates will be high.
This way, you can keep your customers up to date with important information and increase your e-mail engagement rates while you’re at it.
1. Use each channel to build up the other’s lists.
Lead generation is an important part of any marketer’s workload. And gaining subscribers through a single channel is a thankless task.
However, if you combine SMS and e-mail in your lead generation efforts, this task becomes much easier.
Send a message to your SMS list and suggest that they sign up for your e-mail marketing. Adding an incentive, such as a discount or gift, is often useful. Given the high open and response rates of SMS, you can build up your SMS e-mail list very quickly.
You can do the same with your e-mail marketing. Send a campaign encouraging customers to subscribe to your SMS list.
You can even promote your SMS list in your regular emails. Place a sign-up link at the bottom of each e-mail or in a sidebar (whichever works best for your format).
2. Centralize your data
Every point of contact with the customer is a potential source of important data. SMS is no different. By combining SMS and e-mail marketing, you can collect a wealth of data to analyze and exploit.
Whether you’re using an Azure data lake system, a CRM or a commercial DMP, your data will be best and most useful when it’s in one place, easily accessible. By centralizing your data, you make it accessible to your organization’s teams. They’re easy to find, analyze and use.
A centralized database, with data from all channels in one place, helps you keep an overview. You can draw general conclusions from many different points in the customer journey, rather than isolated conclusions from single points/channels.
A centralized database is also ideal for streamlining your data. Because everything is in one place, there’s no duplicate data cluttering up your system.
3. Use the right technology
We spoke earlier about centralizing your data. To do this properly, it helps to look for the platform or system that’s right for you.
This doesn’t just apply to data, of course. Marketing is undergoing a technological revolution, and there are some very interesting things to discover. The right technology could have a huge impact on your SMS and e-mail marketing, enabling you to combine them in innovative ways.
For example, marketing AIs can create and automate mixed SMS and email customer journeys, sending personalized texts and emails at the perfect time to entice your customer to take the next step.
There are many types of sales support tools that can help you streamline, manage and improve your SMS strategy. From SMS automation to data management platforms and CRMs to centralize your data, there’s plenty to do. Don’t hesitate to shop around to find the martech that’s right for you.
4. Keep it short
We spoke earlier about the comparative advantages of text and e-mail. Long messages are not the strong point of SMS.
People will open your SMS quickly, but if they’re confronted with a wall of text on that small screen, they won’t stay to read it. So keep your texts short. Provide essential information as clearly and succinctly as possible.
5. Be consistent with your message
Brand consistency is important in all areas. If your brand’s voice or values differ from one channel to another, your customer will be confused. To build a relationship with your customer, you need to present a consistent character at all times.
This can be difficult with SMS. It’s hard to convey your brand’s personality in just a few brief words. It can be useful to have the TOV (Tone of Voice) guidelines at hand.
TOV guidelines are useful for coaching the sales team. In future, a TOV document will give salespeople and marketers a quick guide to consult when they’re not sure which formulation to use.
6. Dominate your market with a mix of SMS and e-mail
Few things grab a customer’s attention like SMS. By combining SMS and email marketing, you can create high-converting customer journeys and dominate your market.
Play to the strengths of each channel, and you’ll see leads flowing in and your conversion rate rising rapidly.
