How Bulk SMS Can Improve Your Business Process

How Bulk SMS Can Improve Your Business Process

What is SMS Marketing?

In SMS marketing, bulk messages are targeted at large numbers of people, and they are sent to mobile phone terminals. A bulk SMS for business marketing idea can be an effective way for your brand to drive more sales opportunities, generate leads, engage with customers, and increase revenue.

Benefits of Using Bulk SMS for Business

Isn’t it great that there are so many ways to reach your target customers as a business? Marketing has evolved from door-to-door marketing to printed ads, and then other forms due to technological advancement. Now, with a bulk SMS business marketing idea, you can enjoy some benefits that other marketing strategies may not offer.

For example, let’s take a look at the disadvantage of email marketing. You wouldn’t be sure that your bulk emails were received by all your intended recipients. It could have gone into the spam folders of some targets. However, with SMS marketing, you can take advantage of a modern era where people rely on their mobile phones for many things as they go through each day.

About 5 billion people across the world send and receive SMS messages. In a survey, it was discovered that smartphone users spend an average of almost 3 hours on their mobile devices. Feedback is given by 45% of the recipients of branded bulk SMS.

The above statistics are enough to see SMS marketing as a good prospect. You may want to overlook the SMS cost when thinking of what your business stands to gain. The benefits cannot be overemphasized. Ten of them have been discussed below.

1. Speedy dissemination
2. Quick responses
3. Optimal scheduling
4. Targeted messaging to a great number of recipients
5. Cost-effective setup and maintenance
6. Ease of integration
7. Short and simple messages

Speedy Dissemination

Based on how fast an SMS can get to its recipient, you should have an idea of how fast bulk SMS can be. In other words, you will be sending a single message to many people at once—in a matter of seconds. The speed of such broadcasts is one very important merit that should encourage you to try SMS marketing.

Quick Responses

Apart from sending bulk SMS at a fast rate, you will also get to receive fast replies. The speed goes both ways—dissemination and feedback. Many of your recipients can decide to send a reply at the moment they got the text blast. If your campaign requires a better strategy for quick response, then you may want to choose bulk SMS messaging over email marketing.

Optimal Scheduling

Senders can time the messages to be disseminated at specific times. You can do this to ensure that the broadcasts will get to your target audience during a period where there will be high open rates. In doing this, you will be able to have time for other duties, especially if you are the business owner.

• Targeted Messaging to a Great Number of Recipients

With a bulk SMS gateway and a bulk SMS API (application programming interface), your business will be able to perform text blasts that are targeted at a diverse audience scattered all over the world. It works just like targeted emails, but with a better chance at reaching each recipient. Just like how people subscribe to receive newsletter emails, your target audience can opt to receive your broadcasts.

• Cost-Effective Setup and Maintenance

If you are thinking about the SMS cost, then rest assured that you don’t need to. A bulk SMS business marketing strategy is cheap to execute compared to other forms of digital marketing. Also, you can continue to run it for as long as you want without spending much on maintenance. You will learn how to send bulk SMS for free later in this guide.

• Ease of Integration

You can incorporate as many strategies as possible into your overall marketing campaign. This will be based on your budget, business size, and other factors. A bulk SMS business marketing strategy is one of the approaches that can be implemented with other types of digital marketing simultaneously. For example, you can utilize a bulk SMS API on your website as part of your content marketing campaign.

• Short and Simple Messages

The SMS that is sent will contain short and simple messages that recipients can easily read and understand in a matter of seconds. When the receiver sees that the message is just a few lines of text, he or she may be encouraged to read it.

There will be a high chance of getting immediate feedback if the message is simple to comprehend and brief. In SMS marketing, you will not only be managing time for yourself, you will also be doing so for your target audience.

Important Elements to Consider when Choosing an SMS Provider

The process of choosing a bulk SMS provider can be difficult because there are so many services out there. Some of them promise potential buyers advantages like affordability, which can make decision-making overwhelming. It’s a fact that some will let you send bulk SMS for free. SMS cost is an important factor to consider, but there are other elements that come into play. See 5 of them below.

1. Ease of Use
2. Message delivery
3. Reliability
4. Scalability
5. Integration

Ease of Use

It’s advisable to select a provider that will give you a free trial version of their service. This is to enable you to test their software’s interface. Your experience with each functionality should be simple and smooth. With a free trial version, you will be able to choose whether to move on to a paid version or try another platform.

Message Delivery

User experience will be great when a service is hassle-free. You should prefer a platform that sends high-quality bulk SMS without delays. Read about the options available to you in order to ensure that they work with reputable carriers locally and internationally. Don’t take this aspect for granted. Quality carriers ensure that your messages are received by a high percentage of your intended recipients.

• Reliability

Ensure that you patronize a provider that you can trust. The platform should be advanced, secure, and versatile enough to fulfill all your SMS automation needs. In the aspect of site downtime, it should only happen (at most) 0.1% of the time.

• Scalability

You would want a platform that can let you adjust your preferences in terms of quantity, SMS type, and the size of your business. This implies that you should be able to determine how many messages you can send. Also, the number of recipients to be targeted.

• Integration

It would be wise to go for a provider that makes it easy to integrate with other platforms. You need one that will give you no hassles when it comes to integrating with other services (sites and/or applications). For example; customer relationship management (CRM) platforms, email services, etc.

Other elements that can be put into consideration. Include customer service quality (e.g. a 24-hour online support service), experience in the industry, reviews, ratings, etc. It’s up to you to know what else is important to your marketing plan.

How to Send Bulk SMS

It’s very easy to send bulk SMS for free. The first step will be to ensure that you choose a platform that enables its users to do so with a quality bulk SMS gateway. When you are on the site, sign up for an account, and then ensure that you read the terms and conditions (e.g. usage, payment, and privacy policy) of the provider before subscribing to a plan. Other steps include the following:

1. Create messaging groups by uploading contacts
2. Set up a bulk SMS campaign
3. Manage your SMS logs
4. Enable and manage your API account

To learn about these steps with a practical guide, watch this YouTube video:

Types of Bulk SMS

There are mainly two bulk SMS types. See them below.

1. Promotional bulk SMS
2. Transactional bulk SMS

1. Promotional bulk SMS

This involves sending non-critical messages that will be delivered to a great number of non-DND (do not disturb) registered recipients. A percentage of the recipients may have set up partial DND options for specific types of promotional messages, so there is a possibility that your broadcast will get to them.

What you are trying to achieve with promotional bulk SMS messages is to get feedback in the form of specific answers or subscriptions to your service (e.g. future broadcasts). From then, you will be able to refocus the campaign on your responsive audiences only.

• Transactional bulk SMS

Transactional bulk SMS messages are directed, at specific kinds of responsive audiences. (e.g. service subscribers/potential customers and paying customers). It may involve welcome bulk SMS and confirmation bulk SMS.

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Conclusion

By now, you would have understood this question to a large extent: What is SMS marketing? An effective bulk SMS business strategy may be what you need to take your business to the next level. It’s always a great idea to implement this type of digital marketing strategy depending on your budget.