5 Key SMS Opt-In Best Practices for Marketing and Outreach
5 Key SMS Opt-In Best Practices for Marketing and Outreach
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5 Key SMS Opt-In Best Practices for Marketing and Outreach
For any business, an increase in the number of opt-in subscribers is a healthy sign that reflects a growing interest in its product or service. A clean list of opt-in subscribers is a valuable asset for a brand but requires consistent effort to grow and maintain. After all, you are not only competing with other businesses to grab the attention of your audience&#;while complying with legal guidelines&#;but also trying to convince customers to receive your text marketing messages. The trick is to incentivize your potential customers to subscribe to your text messages without appearing pushy or &#;spammy.&#;
If this sounds difficult, or you are having trouble growing your list of opt-in subscribers, here are 5 SMS opt-in best practices that you can implement today.
5 SMS Opt-In Best Practices
When you are looking for ways to increase your number of SMS opt-in subscribers, there are a few key strategies and best practices that you need to consider. Let&#;s dive a little deeper and show how these best practices can improve the performance of your text marketing campaigns and the size of your opt-in subscriber lists.
Incentivize Your Audience
It is estimated that around 75% of customers are comfortable receiving text messages from businesses after opting-in. Such customers redeem SMS-delivered coupons 10 times more than those received through other marketing channels. Your potential audience is more likely to subscribe to your text messages when the call-to-action is supported by a clear incentive. By offering valuable incentives such as discounts or coupons, you can be sure to increase your opt-in subscriber conversion rates.
Follow TCPA Guidelines
This is one of the most important considerations when growing your list of SMS opt-in subscribers. The Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association (CTIA) guidelines make it outright illegal to purchase lists of numbers for text marketing campaigns. The Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) and the CAN-SPAM Act prohibit businesses from sending unsolicited commercial text messages without the explicit consent of the recipients.
These guidelines also ensure that a recipient can opt-out of a subscriber&#;s list at any point. Disregarding these regulations can lead to heavy penalties as well as a loss of trust with customers. If the nuances of these rules are not known to you, be sure to consult the linked resources to be sure you are compliant with these laws. However, partnering with the right SMS marketing platform can save you the hassle of learning all of this information and give you peace of mind that your messages are fully compliant with all laws, as we will discuss later in this article.
Use Brand-Specific SMS Keywords
As a marketer, you may want to uniquely target every segment of your audience demographics via text marketing. One of the best ways to do so, aside from keeping correspondence targeted and valuable for the recipient, is by using SMS keywords that potential subscribers can easily relate to your brand or product and that evoke something they may want.
For example, a skincare company looking for new customers might encourage the audience to subscribe to its text messages by typing SMS keywords such as &#;Radiant&#; or &#;Glow&#;. By texting these on-brand keywords to the shortcode used by the company, customers can often redeem a specific offer while consenting to receive future text marketing messages. Don&#;t be afraid to get creative here!
Provide Real-Time Responses
The faster you act as a business, the higher your chances are of converting potential customers into customers and opted-in subscribers. Since customers hold the power of purchase, it is important to value their time with immediate responses. With the help of an auto-responder feature, you can act quickly and efficiently so your customers feel that their time and effort is being valued and respected.
Offer Relevant Information
Opt-in subscribers are likely only going to stay if the information they receive is clear, concise, and relevant to their interests. We live in an era of spam messages, so peoples&#; tolerance for irrelevant marketing material is low. Using innovative survey tools to collect information about your subscribers and segment your list is a great way to make sure they only receive the information that they want to receive and, therefore, remain subscribers for as long as possible.
These opt-in best practices can help you grow your lists, maintain the subscribers you already have, and keep your recipients happy. However, just following these best practices is not always enough. You need the right SMS marketing platform to help you easily implement them into your text marketing campaign(s).
Implementing SMS Opt-In Best Practices with an Innovative SMS Marketing Platform
SMS opt-in best practices, when implemented through the right SMS delivery platform, can help you grow and maintain your subscriber list(s). An innovative SMS marketing platform will be built with these best practices in mind, which means that properly implementing them is more about choosing the right tool and less about you having to do more work. Here are some essential features you will definitely want to look for:
- Unlimited keywords: Unlimited keywords give you the flexibility to respond to a large variety of customer requests with relevant responses, immediately. This flexibility can let automated features like auto-responders provide helpful and relevant information to any customers that use your supplied keywords.
- Auto-responders: Targeted keywords are most effective when combined with real-time responses. An auto-response feature can help you connect instantly with your subscribers, allowing you to quickly capitalize on the short attention spans of most customers.
- Increased character limit: Creating marketing messages with relevant information about your business requires optimal usage of the standard, but oftentimes limited, 160 characters. A platform offering an increased limit of up to 240 characters can help you create better and more effective marketing messages.
- Audit trail: When it comes to SMS marketing, your platform should maintain a full audit trail of messages sent and received to protect you from legal liability. There are a lot of laws around marketing, making this feature a must-have.
The right SMS delivery platform will offer all of these features and at an affordable cost. Collecting new subscribers with the help of these SMS opt-in best practices will not be a struggle when you&#;re supported by an intuitive and innovative SMS marketing platform with great, prompt customer service.
NorthText easy-to-use platform implements these SMS opt-in best practices, allowing you to maintain and grow your opt-in subscriber list with ease and peace of mind. To learn more about how our affordable platform can benefit your business, contact us by or text at (312) 869- and we can get you started in minutes.
21 Push Notification Best Practices You Should Follow in ...
Push notifications are an essential part of an omnichannel marketing strategy. When effectively used on mobile devices, laptops, and desktop browsers, they can boost CTR by up to 30%, ROI by up to %, and website traffic by up to 25%.
Moreover, 70% of customers feel that push notifications are helpful. 52% look for relevant information and offers. 40% interact with push notifications within an hour of receiving them.
How do you use this powerful tool for the best results? Noah Weiss, Head of Search, Learning, and Intelligence at Slack, has some advice: &#;A great push notification is three things: timely, personal, and actionable.&#;
Here, then, are 21 best practices for using push notifications for browsers and apps. They&#;re divided into three broad categories: Promptness, Personalisation, and Action-oriented Cues. After you go through them, see these five examples of push notifications done right.
Promptness
1. Leverage the right moments
You could have customers all over the world. That&#;s why it&#;s&#; important to do a time zone check before sending out notifications. The time and day of the week matter, too.
Business and finance-related communications can be in the morning at the beginning of the week. Gaming and entertainment can be in the evenings and weekends. With automation, this can be planned and scheduled in advance.
2. Create urgency
Messages that are urgent capture attention. There should be a genuine reason for this, and it should not be simply a gimmick. For example, they could announce the last day or hour of a sale. For those in retail, a reminder that some items will be out of stock can work.
3. Promote updates and new content
Consumers love to discover unique and tailored content. They also like to be among the first to do this. Such behavior can be leveraged with notifications announcing app updates and new features. The words &#;new&#; and &#; be the first&#; can be powerful hooks.
4. Use locations
With location-tracking technology, apps can send triggered notifications to customers based on where they are at specific points in time. For instance, if they&#;re near a store or restaurant, a tailored message could invite them to drop in. Such notifications could also be sent when the customer travels to a new town. According to a survey, 49% of consumers said they&#;d use an app more if it sent them push notifications triggered by their selected hometown.
5. Don&#;t&#; overdo it
One of the reasons consumers don&#;t&#; opt-in for push notifications is the fear that they will receive too many. Reassure them from the start that this will not happen. Use timing and frequency judiciously. The optimal frequency will depend on the nature of the sector and the need to deliver updates. Engagement and click-through rates over time are one metric to determine the right frequency.
Personalization
6. Pat consumers on the back
When customers take action, you can use notifications to tell them how it helped. They can also use behavioral cues, such as pointing to consumers after work that they deserve a treat. The results of the survey customers have participated in can also be sent, with a note that this would not have been possible without them.
7. Arouse interest
Based on customer segmentation, your notifications can engage the customer by hinting at nuggets of information on the app or site. This way, you can draw attention to what they have not yet seen. Demonstrate how they can gain knowledge. Inform them that they will miss out if they don&#;t use the app or visit the site.
8. Keep it light-hearted
Most consumers don&#;t&#; like marketing jargon. This is where a sense of humor comes in handy. Light-hearted and funny notifications make them smile and feel treated as a person, not a consumer. Games or music apps, for instance, could use characters and lyrics to make a vital point.
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9. Use GIFs, photos, videos, and audio
Notifications that support images, videos, and audio are referred to as rich push notifications. These can be highly effective. One study of data from nearly 5 million messages showed that big-picture notifications see a 56 percent higher direct open rate on average. Best practices include segmenting customers so that only those with the supported browsers or operating systems receive them.
10. Start telling stories
Marketers know the power of brand storytelling. This same technique can be put to good use with push notifications. Such messages come across as personal, intriguing, and compelling. For example, you could use the words &#;Find out what happened when&#;&#; or &#;This is the story of how one of our customers benefited&#;.&#; When consumers hear of a relevant story, chances are they will click through to find out how it ends.
11. Be clear and crisp
The main characteristic of push notifications is that they are short. This means that every word is important. The more concise you can keep, the better. Avoid jargon or filler words. For example, a finance app should not say: &#;We are pleased to inform you that you can now easily download your monthly statement by simply clicking here.&#; Instead: &#;Your April statement is ready. Download now.&#;
12. Explain the features
Explaining features is an effective way to use push notifications, especially for new customers.
A series can explain the top features of your mobile app, for example. Highlighting the distinctive elements of your webpage or digital service is another tactic. The focus should be on how such features can benefit or add value to the consumer. Take this case study for Mamikos, which provides services for property owners. Using mobile push notification templates, they achieved 35% more booking confirmations.
13. Leverage social media
Social media is a key growth driver for every business. You can use push notifications to amplify this by including links to your social media channels. The more personal, the better. For example, if a consumer has made a recent purchase, you can ask them to display it on social media. Another example: is if there is a social media post relevant to your category, you can alert the consumer.
14. Promote new content
You must already have planned regular rollouts of new content and upgraded app features as part of a retention and engagement strategy.
Segment consumers and let them know of these updates via push notifications. Mention the benefits and a clear CTA via a link.
Action-oriented Cues
15. Focus on personal goals
This is an excellent tactic for categories and apps that help consumers reach personal milestones. For example, fitness and health apps can send reminders of daily workouts and calories. Fintech companies can also guide consumers toward meeting financial goals through instructive and timely reminders.
16. Send nudges
This can be a constructive engagement booster. You can remind consumers who have not opened your app about what they&#;re missing out on.
Or you could encourage other small, positive actions that add value. Social proof, positive reviews, and product comparisons are other nudges that can drive consumers up the marketing funnel.
17. Send price information
For E-commerce merchants, push notifications can be a valuable way of reminding consumers of price drops, future price increases, or sales.
In general, consumers are always open and receptive to such information. A prominent call to action button further stimulates action.
18. Promote deals
Virtually every digital marketer uses deals to attract interest at one time or another. Push notifications are a powerful way of getting customers to take action. The notification should be crafted to highlight the offer and what steps must be taken to avail of it.
19. Ask for feedback
Yet another effective way to get consumers to engage by taking action is by asking for regular feedback. This could be an online review, filling in a form, or simply providing an app rating.
The type of feedback requested and the means for doing so should be spelled out. It also helps to mention the time the customer will need. For example: &#;Spend five minutes to improve how we work.&#;
20. Send real-time updates
One of the chief merits of push notifications is the ability to send out real-time updates.
This is often used by weather and news apps. Marketers can leverage this by sending sales dates, delivery and dispatch notifications, and payment received messages. Action can be requested by asking for confirmations or sending reminders of other products or services that can be useful.
21. Use action buttons
Your notifications should be clear about the action you want the consumer to take.
You should also provide them with a specific prompt to do so. Using buttons with the words &#;Book Now&#; or &#;Recharge Now&#; is some way of doing this.
Summary
In this way, using the above principles of Promptness, Personalisation, and Action-oriented Cues, you can develop a compelling marketing push notification strategy. Going beyond message delivery to an interactive channel that drives usage, engagement, and retention
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