SMS Lead Generation: How to Get More Leads via Text Marketing
You know the importance of consistently innovating your product or service to bring new clients and customers through your doors. You’ve put in the hard work of building your business from the dream up. Don’t make the mistake of becoming complacent with your marketing.
Your business must stay on the leading edge of marketing strategies to thrive and grow. Propel your success and sales to the next level with SMS lead generation via text marketing.
What is SMS lead generation?
SMS lead generation harnesses the power of mobile text messaging to drive customers to your website or location, engage with them personally, and collect valuable data with tags and keyword campaigns to fine tune and tailor your marketing approach. Texting has become the preferred form of communication for customers versus email.
Consumers engage and read their text messages 98% of the time compared to less than 20% of the time with emails. That big difference alone suggests how effective SMS text marketing is when compared to other traditional methods and why you should immediately begin this mobile marketing strategy to increase lead generation.
Creating an SMS lead generation campaign
Creating an SMS lead generation strategy begins with identifying the type of potential customer you want to engage with and how to connect them to your product or service. We will call that the vision.
Once you have your vision, the next step is to start a text bot, or chatbot, response list which is designed with certain keywords and interactions related to your vision.
Most websites today, such as car dealerships, run chatbots on the landing page. Chatbots are the little chat boxes that pop up on your screen, autoresponders that offer assistance while scrolling through a page.
Love them or hate them, Chatbots are helpful automated tools companies use to engage with and assist prospective customers. Text bots work similarly, but through text messaging instead of web pages.
Determine the keyword for lead generation
Determining the keyword for lead generation in your campaign is dictated by your vision. Once you have identified the keyword you want to use, it’s time to put it into action through a text message keyword campaign.
Let’s say you are a new healthy eats cafe that just opened up in a thriving downtown scene, and you want to attract new customers whose values align with yours. Choosing your keyword is important because whenever a customer engages with your campaign’s phone number or short code, that keyword helps people associate your product with your text marketing.
Examples of suitable keywords for your vision may be “sustainable,” “organic,” or “all-natural” because they relate to your business’s mission and will attract a target audience of customers eager to join that mission.
This level of fine tuning and tailoring ensures that you will have a higher degree of success in attracting like-minded prospects and converting them into customers while also building brand loyalty and repeat business opportunities.
Set up an automated SMS cadence
SMS cadences are an automated tool to create a sequence of events or texts that are automatically executed after a triggering event, such as with an opt-in engagement for one of your keyword campaigns.
There are many ways to accomplish the initial triggering event, from putting up advertisements on store windows featuring your text message keyword to posting the text message keyword on social media.
Webforms are particularly beneficial because they are easy for the customer to complete and efficient at collecting the data you need to have greater chances of converting a lead into a customer.
Additionally, webforms can be placed anywhere you have a digital presence, such as on your social media or your website, and are not limited to a physical location.
Send an opt-in text
Sending an opt-in text is not optional. Suppose you want to utilize text marketing to prospective individuals. In that case, you MUST send an opt-in text FIRST that identifies your business, the number they’re texting from and asks for the customer’s consent to be texted.
Give customers a reasons to join your text marketing list
Giving customers a reason to join your text marketing list could also be called a reward. Customers love rewards for their business and loyalty.
To keep customers engaged, tap into that desire by offering a discount for signing up and following up with future rewards, such as birthday coupons.
Leads are more likely to opt-in to receive text messages from your business if they know there is a reward on the other end for them.
Include a call to action (CTA) in your texts
Inspire people to action with your SMS marketing campaign. Be creative with your calls to action, such as using humor, flash sales, or limited early-bird discounts to get your prospects excited about joining your SMS text campaigns.
Calls to action request the customer to respond with a word or code. The goal is to get the customer to engage and opt-in to receive future texts and drip campaigns.
SMS lead capture tactics: How to generate more leads with texts
- Give customers an exclusive offer
- Offer customers valuable information
- Attach a video or PDF link
Give yourself the tactical advantage over competitors with SMS lead generation. We know that might sound a little like a military operation, but the world of business and competition is a battleground.
People work hard for their money and are intentional about how they spend it. SMS text marketing is a weapon in your marketing arsenal to give you the best chance of earning their trust and business.
Give customers an exclusive offer
Giving your customers exclusive or special offers is a tried and proven tactic for generating new leads and conversion rates. Offering 15% off their first order, for example, may just be the push they need to pull the trigger on purchasing your product.
Loyalty programs are also a great way of building commitment and giving your customers an incentive to continue doing business with you. Large companies such as Subway, McDonald’s, and North Face use rewards to give their customers incentives for repeat business.
Offer customers valuable information
Utilizing SMS text marketing to offer customers valuable information is an excellent way of showing your customers how much you value them and provides them with a customer experience that is both efficient and resourceful.
Attach a video or PDF link
SMS text marketing also provides your customers with marketing videos for new products, teasers for upcoming events, and PDF copies of food and drink menus or instruction manuals.
Utilizing this function available with your TextSanity service creates a user experience that goes above and beyond simply sending out an SMS message that only contains words and makes for a more engaging visual and practical experience. With TextSanity, you can attach a file up to 5MB.
What to do next
If you believe SMS lead generation and SMS text marketing are the right fit for your business, contact us by text, chat, or phone.
Communicate with your customers with their preferred form of communication and build your prospective client list exponentially with TextSanity and our SMS marketing tools. We look forward to partnering with you on your new SMS marketing adventure.
