Are SMS and E-Mail Marketing Still Relevant?

Are SMS and E-Mail Marketing Still Relevant?

SMS & email channels might seem a bit prehistoric with the dawn of social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc. But don’t be so quick to write off these older messaging methods, instead consider mixing the two to have a hybrid marketing strategy. How you can do this is covered in the steps below. 

The goal here is to get uninterrupted access to your customer's attention. A study suggests that by 2025, text message marketing is estimated to become a $12.6 billion industry. So do you really want to miss out on the action?

Through email, you can share long-form content with a lot more than just words. While SMS is a medium for short-form content that also drives urgency, real-time communications that require customer interaction. Some more pointers about SMS & email marketing are listed below. Let’s take a look at these before we look at the marketing mix strategies.

SMS Marketing

Getting your message across in just 160 characters can be quite a challenge. So your SMS marketing has to be clever and concise. Things you need to know about SMS marketing are that it has high open rates, timelines, and delivery to generally receptive audiences. 

SMS marketing’s short-form content can create quick interactions. Examples include appointment reminders, information about flash sales, security alerts, shipping or delivery notifications, and event reminders.

Email Marketing 

Email marketing is great for long-form content with complex messages. It allows you to reach your clientele through newsletters, emailers, customer re-engagement emails, transactional messages, re-engagement campaigns, feedback requests, lead nurturing, stories and information, and abandoned cart summaries. 

Email marketing has an ROI of $36 per Dollar spent. That’s another great reason not to discount this means of communication.

What’s Common Between the Two?

Both are permission-based, therefore implying that the customers have already shown some level of interest in your brand and know something about your brand, to begin with. 

The Differences

One obvious difference between the two mediums is message size. Apart from this, there’s also the not-so-obvious open rate that we see between the two.

Text and email marketing are two district marketing practices. They come with their own set of advantages and disadvantages. But when blended they can work wonders. Don’t believe me? Keep reading. 

Benefits of Marrying SMS & Email Marketing and their Relevance

No matter the industry or your location you need a hybrid customer engagement strategy if you want your brand to survive this highly competitive market. Strategically marrying SMS and email marketing will help you communicate seamlessly with your customers. 

Brands need to engage with their audience to get the results that they need.

Text message marketing has the potential to drive significant ROI. It’s a great way to communicate personalized offers, event updates, or time-sensitive info. SMS marketing makes up an area that email marketing lacks.

In the case of SMS & email marketing channels, their strengths are complementary. Their strategic use can result in more effective campaigns and more engaged customers.

Personalized Advertising

The source of getting these contact numbers/email addresses is generally from the customers themselves, therefore filtering the crowd for you. Social media and search ads must appeal to someone who has no connection to your brand. SMS and email marketing guarantee that your audience already knows what your brand is about

Show your customers what they want to see and what will add value to their lives. This mix of channels allows you a chance to offer personalized solutions to interact with the right audience. 

Your Database is Your Personal Testing Ground

You have the option of testing out what works and what doesn't amongst the list of customers that have signed up to know more about your brand. This means that you have half the advertising battle won. 

Your customers are already interested in you and what you have to say. You now need to figure out what it is you need to say to them and what would be the best form of putting that message across. Tailor the messages to suit the receiver (eg. based on buying habits).

Study Client Preferences

Check to see if your clients are happy with this form of interaction by tracking open and response rates then segmenting your audience by messaging preferences. You don't want to be a bother to them and create a negative bias in their minds. So it pays to do your research. 

A good place to start is to segment customers based on their open rates.  Users who click on links on your SMS messages but hardly open your emails should be sent more texts than emails. The same goes for those individuals who glance at your messages but respond to the CTAs in emails. These individuals should get more of the latter and only the most urgent or important SMS’. 

And, if a customer decides to unsubscribe from one of your marketing channels entirely, you’ll still be able to keep in touch with them via their preferred method. By frequently looking through your data and filtering it you will be able to make your communication channel more effective and efficient and drive better results. 

This, therefore, improves customer satisfaction with your brand’s marketing and reduces the chances you’ll get marked as spam or put on a do-not-call list. 

Quick Response Time

SMS drives immediate interactions and is perfect for timebound email campaigns. However, SMS interactions work well when the message is shorter. In the case of a comprehensive campaign, like the launch of a new product or service you would use the SMS channel as an accompaniment to divert user interaction towards emails or your website. On average a text message is responded to in 90 seconds. 

As long as there’s no need to scroll, people will actually read your message and the best part is that text messages allow you more characters than an email subject. Keep your SMS messages to 160 characters, and you shouldn’t have any problems. 

Improve Your Customer Experience With the Right Medium

To choose the right medium or a mix to drive the highest amount of traffic to your website you will need strategies based on the message and the marketing objective. 

Here’s a good place to start. These are a few guidelines to know what mix works best and when.

If you have a launch or announcement to make, try using both email and SMS. For a newsletter, an email is sufficient. To send your customers and potential customers and event invitations make use of email. To remind them of the event use SMS. To promote an offer you may use both email and SMS and to remind them of the offer you can use SMS alone.

The Bottomline

Even though people refuse to leave their homes without their phones, it doesn't mean that they appreciate getting bombarded by messages from brands at all hours of the day. It’s courteous to limit SMS marketing to regular work hours to avoid interrupting customers from their daily tasks.

A counterintuitive yet good thing to have would be to have an opt-out option so that your customers don't find you to be too spammy. This way you can further filter your clientele. 

Now that you have an insight into just how valuable the SMS & email marketing mix can be, why not give any or all of the suggestions a try? Just bare in mind that it serves brands well to be mindful of what their customers need and not be too intrusive in their personal space. We hope that you too will be able to reap great results from this mighty marketing strategy.

Codanto's digital marketing team will take care of SMS & EMAIL marketing for you.