What Is a Transactional SMS and Why You Should Use Them
Transactional text messages are the cornerstone of any SMS business’s digital marketing strategy.
Transactional SMS text messages are less about marketing and more about providing information about products or order statuses, welcoming customers who opt in for SMS campaigns, appointment confirmations, delivery notifications, and many others.
Customers don’t want you constantly selling them a product, so the rhythm of your bulk SMS marketing must not be overbearing.
Transactional SMS text messages offer an opportunity to connect and communicate with customers, generating authentic customer engagement without trying to make a sale.
What are transactional SMS messages?
As we just mentioned, transactional SMS text messages are more about providing information and less about marketing. For instance, if a customer purchases on your website, you can use a transactional SMS text to give them order fulfillment and shipping updates.
Marketing SMS text messages are designed to pique interest in a product or service and then get the customer to engage with the message, whether by clicking a link that delivers them to your eCommerce site or providing a response on how interested they are in a product.
Transactional SMS messages are designed to communicate relevant information to the customer and can be as simple as saying “Welcome to our messaging thread” after a customer opts in.
Other examples of transactional SMS could be a text message letting a customer know their table is ready at the restaurant or real-time delivery updates on a time-sensitive package.
The goal of transactional SMS text messages is simply to provide valuable information, not make a sale. Of course, marketing messages are an essential aspect of SMS business texting, but transactional SMS text messages are equally important.
The most crucial element for both transactional and marketing SMS is that they allow you to remain engaged with your customers and build brand loyalty.
How are transactional and promotional messages different?
Although it may seem that transactional and promotional messages are very similar, they have very significant differences.
The intended goal of transactional SMS text messages is to relay relevant and vital information. The intended purpose of promotional text messages is to encourage engagement that results in a sale.
At the end of the day, whether you’re relaying information or promoting a new service or product, communicating with your customers is always a good thing.
It keeps them engaged with your company. It keeps your company’s name at the forefront of their minds. It also shows that you value their loyalty and communication preferences.
Why are transactional SMS messages important?
Transactional SMS messages are essential for various reasons. The least is that they provide customers with meaningful and relevant information about your products and services.
An additional benefit of transactional SMS services is that it allows companies to have quick communication that’s not aimed at making a sale for use cases such as status updates, no-show reminders, or other purposes.
You’ll read this several times in this article, but customers don’t want to be sold on something constantly. Applying too much pressure to buy can lead them to take their business elsewhere.
Marketing campaigns are a delicate dance, as you know, and it’s no different when it comes to SMS business texting.
Offering a simple welcome message to your customers, a happy birthday message on their birthday, or a customer anniversary thank you note can boost your marketing efforts just as well as any promotional SMS message.
The reason for this is simple. Customer’s like doing business with companies that care about them and show appreciation for their loyalty.
This culminates in what’s known as the customer experience. The greater the customer support at all communication channels and the better the customer experience you provide, the higher your customer retention will likely be.
What’s more, customers are willing to spend more money for the same product if their customer experience is exceptional versus the competition.
What kinds of transactional messages can you send?
You can send various types of transactional text messages with the TextSanity platform.
For instance, sending receipts or confirmations, order and fulfillment updates, and login information are three core fundamental transactional text messages.
Let’s take a closer look at how you can utilize TextSanity for each of them.
Receipts and confirmations
From Fortune 500 companies to small Main Street businesses, more and more companies are moving away from traditional printed receipts to digital receipts that can be texted or emailed to customers.
Most companies give customers the option to receive a receipt via text, print, or both.
Let’s face it, all of us hate putting printed receipts in our pockets, forgetting they’re there, then washing and drying our jeans only to find that the receipt has crumbled and gotten all over all the clean clothes in the dryer.
Most customers opt to receive a text message because storing it on their mobile device is more convenient.
Additionally, customers carry their phones with them everywhere. Seriously. Research shows that 83% of Americans become anxious when leaving their mobile phones behind.
By offering your customers the option to have their receipts delivered to their phone number, you give them the ability to ensure they always have quick access to their receipts if needed.
Another great byproduct of the above-mentioned research is that marketing via SMS text messages is more likely to reach your targeted audience than with any other communication medium, such as transactional emails (which have much lower open rates than SMS).
Order confirmations are an additional transactional SMS text message that offers your customers convenience while providing you the ability to gather further data.
Using text message keywords, you can gather data, assign tags, create groups and defined audiences, and engage with a tailored audience of customers quickly and efficiently.
Order updates
Customers have become increasingly impatient over the years, largely thanks to the on-demand nature of our society. Think Amazon Prime and Netflix. This impatience leads to acute anxiety about receiving services and products that they’ve purchased.
With order updates, you can utilize the power of transactional SMS text messages to ease your customer’s anxiety about when their newly purchased product will arrive at their doorstep.
Today’s customers can grab their phone, open an app, make a few swipes, and purchase nearly any product on the planet.
The power of this on-demand economy presents opportunities for you to remain engaged with the customer throughout their entire customer journey with your business.
This transactional SMS text message function can also be used to set up and receive payments via the TextSanity platform.
We can say this until we’re blue in the face, but it’s an important fact to remember — customers prefer texting over any other method of communication. Giving them payment options through text is another way to impact and enhance their customer experience.
Login information
Providing login information is another useful resource that qualifies as a transactional SMS text message. Transactional SMS text messages are an efficient way to help your customers gain access to their accounts on your eCommerce site or mobile application, offering options like:
- Sending a temporary username or one-time password for a first-time customer
- Helping existing customers recover usernames
- Offering a link to reset a password
Losing or forgetting your login information is frustrating, and the easier a business makes recovering this information, the happier customers will be. Customer satisfaction with their customer journey with a company is paramount.
Offering SMS business texting and transactional SMS text messages help improve satisfaction and customer experiences.
The bottom line
As you can see, SMS business texting is a powerful marketing tool to have in your business. Collecting invaluable customer data, improving the customer experience, increasing customer satisfaction, and offering a preferred method of communication are all benefits realized by SMS texting.
Transactional SMS texting allows your business to engage with your customer outside the scope of making a sale. Put another way, transactional SMS text messages are a great way to have a conversation with your customers.
TextSanity’s platform offers various tools to assist you in maximizing your transactional and promotional SMS text communications with your customers. What’s more, we ensure that doing so is simple and efficient.
Contact us today to connect with our team and discuss the various tools at your disposal when you become a partner with TextSanity. The power of SMS business texting is almost limitless. All you need to do is reach out and get started.
