Did you know that over 98% of text messages are acknowledged within 3 minutes of being received compared to 22%-23% of emails?  SMS marketing isn’t just about sending basic marketing messages. In fact, businesses use this medium to engage their clients, expand loyal customer base, and sending important reminders and notifications.

Knowing all of this, it might look like an extremely straightforward medium to deal with. But, maintaining effective communication to engage customers isn’t as easy as it may sound. Just like any other marketing medium, SMS marketing has its own standards and guidelines.

In this post, we’ve put together some noticeable Do’s and Don’ts of text blast marketing.

Conciseness

Unlike other marketing channels especially emails that allow you to write long messages with attachments, SMS only supports 160-character limit. Text messages are meant to be concise and to-the-point. Make best use of your message by making your purpose or motive clear and comprehensible.

As with any other channel, you can also link your text to your sales page. But, the raw links in messages are often hideous and ugly. To fix this issue, you can use URL shorteners to save space especially when you’re really looking to add a link into your message. The purpose of URL shorteners is to compress long and complex links into brief segments.

Many marketers choose to tighten up their texts by using shorthand message lingo. While it will obviously reduce the length of your text, it may ruin your reputation in the long run. Make sure you use shorthand lingo occasionally and only when it is required. Business messages should look professional and unnecessary use of OMGs and LMAOs can definitely do more harm than good for your brand.

Do

  • Stick to the character count limit
  • Use URL compressors
  • Use common lingos sparingly

Don’t

  • Write long and annoying messages
  • Use long URLs
  • Use informal lingos

Personalization

For your SMS marketing strategy to work, it’s important that you opt for text personalization. If your opt-in members can’t identify the sender, you’ve already lost them. Remember, your subscribers should never question who’s texting them. That’s why it’s crucial that you declare your brand name in every message you send to your subscribers. Your objective is to build a loyal customer base and build familiarity. We suggest using a friendly conversational tone when writing. A personal touch to your texts improves the customer experience and help your customers know and love your brand.

Do

  • Declare your brand name in each outgoing message
  • Add a personal touch to your message
  • Use an informal yet professional tone

Don’t

  • Make your customers guess who the message is from
  • Write ‘one size fits all’ kind of messages
  • Use unfriendly tone

CTA

You must be aware of the significance of powerful CTAs if you’ve been using SMS marketing for quite some time now. Technically, a message CTA asks the subscribers to use a voucher code, requests them to share information with friends, or asks them to respond in ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ to confirm their attendance at your next company event.

Ideally, your CTA should be engaging and concise. Convoluted texts can confuse recipients and may also result in customers opting out of your SMS list.

Do

  • Make your CTA the center of attraction
  • Write a short and relevant CTA
  • Offer clear guidelines about what to do next

Don’t

  • Include irrelevant details into your CTA
  • Include multi-step CTA
  • Leave out steps that can drive desirable action

Opt-Out Route

The more clear and noticeable your opt-out route, the better. Your recipients will encourage this. Make it clear to your recipients that they can unsubscribe at any time. Some SMS service providers have this option already included in their package, while others leave it at your own discretion.

Do

  • Add a clear opt-out option
  • Make your CTA visible by capitalizing it
  • Clearly mention that it’s an opt-out option

Don’t

  • Exclude the opt-out option
  • Try to conceal your opt-out route in the text
  • Use unclear language

Disclaimer

It’s important to understand that not two mobile plans are created alike. Some mobile service providers offer free of cost SMS service while others do charge a flat or per message rate. In order to avoid confusion, it is therefore important that you tack on a disclaimer at the end of each outgoing message. This will simply remind recipients that they will be required to pay a standard rate.

Do

  • Include a disclaimer about service charges
  • Always add a disclaimer in the end
  • Keep the disclaimer text short and clear

Don’t

  • Assume that your recipients are already aware of standard rates and service charges
  • Include the disclaimer text in the middle
  • Drag disclaimer

Have you already implemented the best SMS practices for your business? Share your SMS marketing strategies with us as we’d love to hear back.