If you pause and consider it, text messaging is a marketer’s dream come true. Here you have an inexpensive, instant means of personally reaching out to a large audience and getting a rapid response. It’s a method of marketing that can be put together quickly, changed spontaneously if need be, and provides an excellent gauge of your clients’ interest level.
Here are some ways to build customer loyalty using text message marketing, as well just a few things to bear in mind along the way.
The Customers Want You To Talk To Them
Whenever you’re considering launching a new text message marketing campaign, bear in mind this one fundamental fact: the customers signed up for this. They WANT to hear from you, otherwise they would have simply not signed up in the first place. It’s a permission-based activity. You already have their attention; now do something with it!
Feature A Clear Call To Action
According to Juniper research, 97% of SMS (Short Message Service) messages are actually read, and 90% percent of those text messages are read within minutes- NINETY PERCENT! That blows other methods such as email or paper fliers completely out of the water!
That’s why it’s imperative that your text message absolutely contains a call to action, whether it’s asking for a Reply, or clicking on the embedded link, you need to keep the momentum going.
Make Mobile Punch Cards
No doubt most of you are familiar with customer loyalty cards. Every time you visit the offering establishment, you get a punch when you meet the conditions, then, after a few months, you are rewarded by having your wallet or purse positively jammed full of dog-eared pieces of card stock.
According to the article “How Text Message Marketing Can Build Customer Loyalty”, you can actually use mobile texting as a cleaner, easier method of doing customer loyalty programs and incentives. Not to mention, your customers will be grateful for helping them de-clutter their wallets and such.
Bring In Email As Well
Over 40% of users access their email over their mobile devices, so make sure that your email and text message marketing campaigns reference each other. Not only does this increase potential visibility (there are actually people out there who don’t text, believe it or not!), it also helps build a consistent brand for your business and products.
Make Customers’ Lives Easier
You can use text messaging to help customers make reservations, provide feedback, confirm an order, remind them of an appointment or delivery, or conduct a pre-order. Mobile usage is all about versatility, convenience, and speed. If you make your customers’ lives a little easier, they will increasingly rely on you to keep providing them with that high level of service.
Turn Customers Into Evangelists
Offer your customers incentives (discounts, freebies, special deals) if they get their friends to join them in opting in. This way, the powerful tool of text messaging is combined with the highly effective tactic of word of mouth.
These are just a few of the ways you can increase customer loyalty. There are a lot more out there, just waiting for you to discover them. Good luck!