Reports say that text messaging offers 209% more response time than emails, calls, and other marketing channels and whooping 98% of open rates. Sadly, many think SMS marketing is dead and only pursue other channels. But unknowingly, they are losing out on their customer base, fruitful connections, and revenue by doing this. So, are you one of them? Do you want to increase your conversion rates and revenue more? Are you someone who’s using SMS marketing but still not achieving what you aim for? This article is going to help you with all these questions. Just stay tuned.
What is SMS Marketing?
SMS marketing is an evergreen marketing channel that involves sending a transactional and promotional message to prospects and customers through text messages that they can find helpful to take action or get information about your product or services. These messages carry updates, alerts, and offers for people interested in your products/services and have consented to get a message from you. That said, SMS marketing platforms or providers can help you create text messages in bulk and send them to a list of different phone numbers. It can handle all promotional, informative, and transactional messages effortlessly. You can use it for multiple use cases:
Sending offers, discounts, and freebiesmaintaining contact listGenerating reportsAnalyzing response rates Scheduling text message deliveryReminding and notifying customers Sending MMS and automated responsesCreating polls, contests, and surveysDelivering better customer service
Why is SMS Marketing still effective?
In this age of social media and emails, SMS marketing still prevails because it’s relevant, straightforward, and opens directly into your customers’ devices (among many other reasons). At present, approximately 3.8 billion people in the world use smartphones. It’s not necessary that they are all active on social media or check emails regularly, but they receive text messages. Hence, SMS marketing provides an ample opportunity to stay on top of your customers’ minds and increase your conversion rates.
Why use SMS marketing software?
Faster delivery
Spreading your messages through SMS is faster compared to social media or emails. It’s because an SMS delivers directly to your customer’s phone no matter what type of mobile phone they use or from which provider. And they don’t have to go to their social profiles or emails to check the message.
Higher open and click-through rates
As discussed above, SMSs have 98% more open rates than emails, and their CTR rates are also 9.18% higher than other digital marketing channels. Clearly, SMS marketing is efficient.
Measurable results
Using SMS marketing software, you can track the performance of your SMS campaign. You can view the total SMSs sent, how many were opened and answered, and generate reports to review. This way, you can evaluate and improve your strategies based on the results.
Affordable
With bulk messaging options, you can send a large volume of messages to your customers without spending much. Unlike email campaigns requiring more creativity, design, efforts, and the cost associated with these, SMS marketing lets you save on these aspects. Now, we’ll discuss the best SMS marketing services to connect and engage with your customers and drive more revenue.
Sender
Is your small to medium-sized business or eCommerce company looking for a fully automated way to squeeze in more sales and revenue by reaching out to a hungry global market almost instantly? Look no further than Sender, your all-in-one email and SMS marketing platform that helps smart businesses grow their lists and revenue while keeping things affordable. Are you just starting and worried about inadvertent GDPR violations and other possible privacy concerns while growing your SMS list? Choose from a library of privacy-friendly, TCPA compliant, ready-to-send pop-ups and forms, or use the super simple drag-and-drop tool to design your own branded ones. Ready to nurture and close your existing fan base? Use the step-by-step automation builder tool to create powerful workflows to fire precisely-timed or triggered email and SMS steps to operate evergreen, fully-automated revenue funnels that work for your business 24/7. Smartly personalize outgoing SMS messages with the name, location, or custom information to make every subscriber feel like they are the only ones being texted. You can send out targeted and more relevant campaigns by harnessing the highly underrated power of segmentation to see who’s most likely to buy now and who needs more nurturing and can be spoken to later. Get started in minutes by signing up for a FREE Forever plan that includes up to 15K monthly emails to 2,500 contacts and the ability to buy SMS credits for as low as $0.015 (US). Alternatively, our value-filled, monthly PRO plan guarantees $70 worth of FREE SMS credits every month, besides generous email marketing limits. Don’t just think of “SMS marketing”. Get started with Sender already!
Mobile Text Alerts
What’s the easiest way to really reach all your customers with SMS marketing? Enter Mobile Text Alerts, an easy-to-use SMS marketing provider you can set up and master in 5 minutes flat. A free 14-day trial will give you full access to try out all the core features – quick setup and no credit card needed. That way, you can easily get a good feel for how it will work for your own business. The enticing features list equips you with tools such as text to landlines, automatic replies, MMS, contact card usage, add-on options such as international messaging, and a lot more to keep you abreast of best marketing practices. You get integrations with Zapier, WordPress, Slack, MailChimp, ClickFunnels, etc., to boost your overall efficiency. You also get API access, so that you can have the flexibility to set up your own integrations. With Mobile Text Alerts, you can easily manage your texting campaigns, regardless of your team’s size, since there is no cap on the administrators per account. In addition, the link tracking feature helps you track the click-through rates at a glance. And your customers can conveniently join the SMS list by texting into short codes and toll-free numbers. So you can monitor your campaigns with ease. You can even register your local business number, to give your customers an even easier way to contact you directly. In the Mobile Text Alerts platform, you also get contact import capabilities, unused message rollover, and two-way messaging for the best customer service. Finally, you can access your messaging account at your convenience with the mobile app. And if you ever have a question, you can chat with support from right inside the Mobile Text Alerts platform.
SlickText
SlickText is one of the most trusted leaders in the SMS marketing space that helps you drive revenue to your business through SMS marketing. It is rich with features that let you efficiently use the software, and it works well on every device. In addition, it never asks for contracts or hidden fees; you can downgrade, upgrade, or cancel the services at any time you want. As people respond quicker to SMS, SlickText allows you to spread your message to customers quickly. You can attach a picture with your campaign to get a better response from customers. From restaurants and retailers to schools and ministries, you can use every feature to ensure your business’s better growth. Send text messages in bulk no matter where you are, and you can also ask your customer to send a text to join the marketing campaign. Save your notes and schedule them by defining the date and time to work effortlessly. You can set auto-reply messages to send replies to your customer messages. In addition, activate two-way messaging to stay connected to your customers. You can also keep track of your customer’s birthdays to send them wishes. Furthermore, manage your text messaging with the free app for mobile. It also contains the same features that support both Android and iOS. For example, you can set repeating messages either daily, weekly, or monthly. With Drip campaigns, you can send a series of text messages to users. SlickText integrates with Zapier which connects your software and other apps to work together. It also integrates with email and Facebook to get better reach. You can also benefit from double Opt-In, built-in link shortening, link tracking, set messages per person, and many more. With all these features, SlickText is an excellent option in every aspect and allows you to take a free trial of 14 days. After that, you can go for different plans starting at $29/month.
Omnisend
Ignore the headache of using multiple tools for SMS; Omnisend allows you to integrate SMS next to your emails. Provide your users with a personalized and consistent experience by combining automated texts with an email to add push notifications in a single workflow. Ominsend has a library where you get pre-built workflows with SMS for birthdays, cart abandonment, shipping confirmation, and many more with a few clicks. You can use features with a hassle-free setup and no-limit use cases and reach your audiences/customers with your messages wherever they are. You can even reach a global audience as it supports every country’s codes for text-only messages so that you can drive international customers to make better conversions. With Omnisend’s TCPA-compliant SMS list-building tools, you can collect site visitors’ contact details through popups, landing pages, wheel of fortune, signup boxes, and many more. Save your energy and time with their pre-built automation workflows. Set up flash sales and promote the latest items through SMS. You can also add images and GIFs to increase engagement. Track how your SMS works and what to include to increase sales. Omnisend integrates with Gorgias to improve retention value with two-way SMS that engages your customers more. Get your free trial now, enjoy the benefits, or choose a plan starting at $16/month to avail yourself of more services.
TrueDialog
Get up and running today. Yes, literally, without having to wait for your IT or dev team to implement an API (although TrueDialog also offers APIs). Additionally, one of the main key benefits you’ll get with TrueDialog is cost reduction. They have spent the time to build direct-to-carrier relationships to enable messaging savings as high as 50%. As far as marketing functionality goes, they have all the bells and whistles a marketer would want.
NATIVE integrations with Salesforce.com. Attribution of leads and opportunities becomes easier because Sales reps will work out of Salesforce.com in a truly native TrueDialog environment. Are you using Microsoft Dynamics/D365? No problem! Their integration with it is industry-leading.Campaign creation: Using flows, you can easily create mass text campaigns for your opt-in users. And opt-outs are easily managed as well. They also have integrations with Marketo, Hubspot, and Eloqua.Concierge Customer Service: Even though the TrueDialog UI is intuitive, sometimes it’s hard to get going. TrueDialog understands that, and to ensure you get the most value from their solution, they will hand-hold you through the process, from onboarding to utilizing all features through U.S.-based customer service.
As you grow, you will probably want to add customized features. For those customers that have specific needs to build around, they also have an API too. Lastly, we’ll reiterate their incredible pricing per message because they have direct-to-carrier relationships. Other features: Short and Long Codes: Shortcodes for mass marketing & long codes for 2-way customer communications. Reliable Infrastructure: ISO 9001 cloud database with 99.9% uptime & reliable delivery. Mass and One-to-One Texts: Send bulk texts to an unlimited number of recipients or engage in personal, one-to-one texts via web or mobile. Start a trial or request a demo.
ActiveCampaign
Keep your customers engaged with your product through SMS marketing and text message with the help of ActiveCampaign. It helps you find a better way to reach customers quickly and provide an exceptional experience to them. ActiveCampaign helps you to add SMS automation to send follow-ups, notify agents, and more. As your users like to read texts more than check emails, this software makes it easy to send quick reminders and flash sales. Schedule the delivery time by defining the exact day and time to maintain good workflows. Let your users provide their contact details, which helps you collect the phone numbers by importing or manually managing them. This way, you can stay in touch with every customer and market your new offers, promos, campaigns, etc. Get your slot according to your number of customers and start using the best service at a starting rate of $9/month.
EZ Texting
EZ Texting is another nifty tool helping you scale with SMS marketing. You can easily import and give a personal touch to the SMS campaigns by creating customer groups for better conversion. Besides, there is no cap on the number of contacts, and there is two-way messaging to contact specific customers on a 1-to-1 basis. Additionally, you can include images to assist the texts and include an opt-out for healthy customer interaction. Moreover, the pre-designed templates and Shutterstock integration give your marketing efforts a unique touch. You can include signup forms and QR code redirects on your website and social media channels to enrich your SMS list. However, you will also have keywords that your users can send to dedicated numbers to register for the campaigns. There is also automated texting, replies, scheduling, reminders, etc., ensuring you never miss an important lead. And EZ Texting supports integrating with Hubspot, Constant Contact, and Mailchimp, and one can deploy Zapier for further connecting it with thousands of applications. However, you can also use their Rest API to build customized integrations. Finally, the features like tracking & analytics, smartphone app (iOS), role-based access to team members, text-to-landline, and 14-day free trial make a solid case for them as a top-notch SMS marketing platform.
TextMagic
Make your customers feel good with an easy-to-use SMS marketing provider – TextMagic. It allows you to send alerts, confirmations, SMS marketing, and notifications at any time from anywhere. Send personalized text messages through the mass texting software to your staff, suppliers, and customers. Once logged in to your account, you can send mass texts to users in more than 190 countries. Convert emails into SMS and deliver them to any smartphone. You can integrate SMS gateway API to the text directly from the application. Use the software on your Mac or PC desktop easily to send and receive SMS online. TextMagic lets you send accurate and short messages to partners, employees, or customers with an efficient, cost-effective, and secure way of communication. Get features like virtual mobile numbers, schedule text messages, SMS attachments, MMS, mail merge templates, SMS opt-out management, and many more. TextMagic is the all-in-one business text messaging software with services like sub-accounts for members, enterprise SMS solutions, single sign-on for enterprises, secure text messaging, analytics, reports, incoming messages automation, email lookup, number validation, and more. Reach your customers at the right time through text on your iOS and Android devices. Send messages up to a length of 918 characters when you think 160 characters is not enough. It supports languages like Arabic, Russian, Chinese, Japanese, English, and other languages. Moreover, allow your potential customer to call by forwarding your TextMagic number to a phone. Every visitor is a possible lead, so let them join with powerful subscriber forms from TextMagic and catch details today.
ManyChat
SMS marketing can be frustrating for an eCommerce business if you don’t know where to start. However, a reliable tool like ManyChat can help send text messages to users and close sales for a chat. Now easily reach out to your customer and chat with them without disrupting their day with constant calls. Using this tool, one can send coupons, sales, and content to contacts within 3 minutes. It is easy to connect and combine Messenger or Facebook with SMS and Emails allowing businesses to chat with customers for free. Also, it is possible to send one-to-one messages to customers for updates, customized content, appointment reminder, special offers, and what not to interact with brands. It is also essential to have two-way text conversations with the customers to collect feedback or reviews with surveys. One can also create SMS drip campaigns such as monthly newsletters and 7-day challenges nurturing customer conversation. It is easy to collect numbers from an eCommerce store for a seamless experience and creative multimedia messages.
Drip
Send texts with Drip and drive more profits with dynamic and personalized product recommendations at the right time. With Drip’s easy workflow builder, you can automate the processes to get a better outcome. You can also connect to your users/customers through SMS that is immediate, easy to consume, and to the point. They are the perfect channel to establish a deep connection with them, send valuable messages, and generate revenue. Maximum customers prefer SMS over emails and phone calls, so use the easy Drip form to add top users to your list. Although many customers like text messages, they like it more with some promos or discount codes. With the benefit of SMS marketing, you can reach your customer wherever they are with simple clicks. Use SMS to grab attention, crank up users’ loyalty, and drive urgency by sending holiday promos, product launches, time-sensitive offers, VIP campaigns, and more. People do not like long and spam messages; keep your text simple, short, and easy to understand to drive more customers. You can also add delivery date and time and automate the workflow to prevent skipping any customer. Start your free trial for 14 days or choose a plan according to your number of customers, starting at $7.50 for 500 sends.
EngageBay
Enhance your business with EngageBay to market your product, offers, etc., through SMS marketing. Track all your responses in a single dashboard and send SMS to thousands of people by personalizing your campaign. EngageBay stores various attributes like first name, last name, age, company, location, and more. You can even add them all by collecting information and sending SMS in bulk. You can add SMS functionality in automation workflows and send SMS based on customer behavior or events like failed payments, product updates, cart abandonment, promotions, etc. Use filters to choose the subset or prospects of customers of your demand. It includes the source and location of contact based on date, actions, etc. Moreover, you can also add custom space to segment contacts and send relevant text message campaigns. Use EngageBay’s simple designs for your marketing workflows without requiring any coding knowledge and use every tool it offers to grow your business. With powerful visuals, you can organize marketing campaigns for sending SMS to customers effectively. EngageBay allows you to monitor each SMS marketing campaign through robust metrics. You can track your campaign success rate and progress that software records to learn about your customers and succeed with campaigns. You can use EngageBay for free for 500 contacts and 1000 branded emails. However, if you have more connections, you can choose a starting price of $8.99.
Sendinblue
Sendinblue helps you connect with your customers directly through SMS messages. Collect the list of contacts from Sendinblue for sending bulk campaign and event messages in a click. Next, you can write your text, choose a particular list according to their location, demand, etc., and schedule your messages to be sent according to your set date and time. With Sendinblue, you can also set up shipping updates, transactional SMS, order confirmations, and a lot more according to your business using API, tons of plugins, and marketing automation. Create your personalized messages by using segmentation and adding individual attributes for different contacts. For example, you can define the first name, last name, date, company name, and other information. With the help of key engagement metrics, get ideas on what works and then improve on it to drive better results. In addition, you can monitor and track the performance of SMS campaigns. Based on the engagement statistics and deliverability reporting, you can solve the related issues in real time for different SMS campaigns. No matter where your customers are, this simple way to reach out to them allows every customer to keep track of your promos, discounts, and many more. Choose a free plan or paid plan according to your needs and avail the benefits.
ClickSend
Send marketing messages online to your customers from a web-based SMS portal with ClickSend, making business messaging easy. You can send thousands of messages throughout the world with the Web to SMS service. You can even control transactional SMS through the SMS Gateway API. ClickSend’s online SMS gateway gives you access to send messages to individuals or many contacts at a time through an online service in simple steps. ClickSend also uses Microsoft Outlook Plugin to send text messages. In addition, you can send bulk SMS through the online service or existing application. Once you add the list of customers and their details, the SMS service will handle the rest, making your job simple and easy. With the SMTP gateway, you can also send bulk SMS, which lets you feel the powerful performance. With all these features, plugins, etc., you can send marketing messages, transactional SMS, promotional SMS, events, reminders, and a lot more with ease. ClickSend assures you a 100% uptime guarantee and is confident in delivering your messages to the end-users. In addition, it offers a super easy dashboard that lets you use the service and track each record in one place in a simple way. Moreover, you can set some keywords for the software to respond to customers’ messages to respond quickly. Finally, measure your success and performance through the reporting and analytics that ClickSend provides to generate actual business value. You will get more features like a secure SSL, auto top-up, low credit warning, 1224 character limit, high performance with 4800 messages/minute, lightning-fast message delivery, sender ID customization, access to online SMS software, status monitoring, free replies, no setup fees, and many more benefits. You can have the option of flexible payment, both prepaid and postpaid.
Textlocal
Smart customers choose smart services like Textlocal which brings you the real-time SMS sending facility for your users. To raise brand awareness, enhance the customer journey, and optimize your communications, use bulk SMS service that is reliable, scalable, and one of the best SMS platforms. There are many ways to send messages as per your market needs. You can pay as you go with the increasing list of your contacts or opt for outsourcing your messages. In this case, managed services will help you with your designed SMS solutions regardless of your business. Also, Textlocal lets you discover a high-density API gateway for your business. If you’re a developer, you will find SMS API more versatile and customizable. Due to this feature, you can integrate Trextlocal with any other application to work as fast and powerful as you want. Furthermore, you can easily add website links, personalized vouchers, attach videos, images, files, and more to each receiver. Interacting with your customer and monitoring your performance becomes effortless with Textlocal. When you start your Textlocal account, you can access a free SMS specialist, dedicated keyword, partner accreditation, two-factor authentication, and a GDPR-certified platform to ensure security.
Klaviyo
Don’t make your customers wait for a long time to get a notification in SMS. Klaviyo helps you get your own toll-free number to keep your customers satisfied with your exceptional service. This solution enables you to build business relationships with your loyal customers and grow your revenue. Klaviyo integrates with more than 200 eCommerce tools and platforms to have everything with you when sending a message to your customer. Greet them by their name, wish them birthdays, even share order details of any product, inform them about the stock status, send quick reminders, and much more with this SMS platform. Double your marketing channels rather than doubling work by sending both emails and texts in the same series so that customers will get to choose the option they like the most. Klaviyo shows precisely what is necessary to grow your business by allowing you to track and monitor your sales performance through SMS messaging. You can set automation workflows to specify a delivery time and date. Klaviyo also provides a lot of options templates to choose from. Additionally, let your customers register themselves through a form or subscribe buttons. You can estimate your price by checking the number of contacts you have and paying accordingly.
Best practices for SMS marketing
Ensure everyone in your contact list has opted to receive your SMSKeep in mind the message timing must be based on customers’ location. Never send an SMS during odd hours.A direct and short message is a good way, and you can also include relevant links. Emphasize the first line of the SMS to compel the receiver toward the messageInclude your brand name and personalize the messageAdd important disclaimersBe consistent and watch out for the frequency.
Conclusion
SMS marketing is not dead; in fact, it’s evolving with technology. Thus, choose any of the above-mentioned best SMS marketing service platforms and start leveraging its benefits to connect and engage with your customers while increasing your conversion rates. If you are just looking to send SMS without analytics, or marketing stuff, then you can try SMS API.
