SMS Marketing for Retailers: Keep Your Customers Coming Back
Updated 11/4/2022
Retail is back and better than ever. If you want to compete in this rebounding market, you need to overhaul your marketing strategy with SMS marketing.
Here’s everything you need to know to get started:
Ways to use SMS marketing in retail
- Sales and promotions
- Discounts and coupons
- Events and notifications
- Surveys and reviews
- SMS customer reviews
SMS marketing is an extremely versatile tool that’s perfect for retail. Here are just a few of the ways that you can use SMS marketing in retail:
Sales and promotions
Use SMS marketing to promote sales and other offers. For example, if you’re having a flash sale, you can send out a mass text saying, “FLASH SALE! For the next two hours only, get an extra 25% off. Hurry to a store now before it’s too late!”
Discounts and coupons
Use SMS marketing to provide customers with discounts and coupons that they can use on future purchases. For example, you can text your loyal customers, “We give our best deals to our best customers. As a special thank you, here’s a coupon for 15% off your next purchase. Expires 06/01/22.”
Events and notifications
Use SMS marketing to provide customers notifications about events and other updates. For example, you can send out a text to contacts on your waiting list, “It’s finally here! Our new [product] has arrived and is now in stores. Click here to find your nearest store and check it out for yourself.”
Surveys and reviews
Use SMS marketing to send out surveys and collect customer reviews. For example, text a customer a day or two after purchasing with a link to a survey saying, “Did you enjoy your experience with us? We want to learn more. Click here to fill out a quick survey.”
SMS customer service
Use SMS marketing to provide better customer service through features like text message chatbots. Chatbots are a great way to provide your customers with quick answers to their most frequently asked questions and give them the information they need to move forward with making a purchase.
How to use SMS marketing in retail with TextSanity
- Text message keyword campaigns
- Text message opt-in webforms
- Mass text messaging
- Text message drip campaigns
- Text message payments
TextSanity is an SMS marketing tool that helps retailers take advantage of everything SMS marketing offers. Here are some different ways to use TextSanity as a part of your SMS marketing strategy:
Text message keyword campaigns
TextSanity offers text message keyword campaigns where customers can text a specific keyword to a chosen phone number to opt-in and receive promotional materials from the company.
Text message keyword campaigns provide retailers with a lot of room for creativity. For example, if your retail business focuses on selling custom jewelry, you can set up a text message keyword campaign using the keyword “DIAMONDS.”
You can promote your keyword and phone number in your store, on your social media, and on your website.
Opt-in webforms for SMS marketing
TextSanity also offers opt-in webforms for SMS marketing where customers can input their contact information into an online webform to opt-in to receive content from the company in the future.
Once you create your opt-in webform with a header, subheader, URL, visuals, and contact form, you can promote this link in other locations like your email newsletter, social media, or website homepage to encourage people to join your text marketing list.
Mass text messaging
Once your contacts have opted-in either through a text message keyword campaign or an opt-in webform, you can launch a mass text messaging campaign using TextSanity. In a mass text messaging campaign, you can send a message to an unlimited number of chosen contacts.
Dealing with an extensive text marketing list can be challenging, but TextSanity makes it easy with built-in segmentation and tagging capabilities.
Text message drip campaigns
You can also use TextSanity to create text message drip campaigns. In a text message drip campaign, you draft a set of different messages, each building on the last.
TextSanity makes it easy to schedule these messages in advance so that you don’t have to worry about appropriately timing each message.
Instead, all you have to do is draft compelling texts, easily accomplished with customizable text message templates. Then, select your contacts, and set your schedule.
Text message payments
Contactless payment is all the rage these days, and you can put your spin on it by using TextSanity to collect text message payments. This feature will help your retail store stand out from the competition that still only accepts traditional payment methods that aren’t convenient or efficient.
SMS marketing best practices for retailers
- Follow SMS marketing rules and regulations
- Send the right messages at the right times
- Make it personal
- Keep it simple
While TextSanity provides you with all the SMS marketing tools you need, it’s still necessary to familiarize yourself with SMS marketing best practices for a comprehensive and effective strategy:
Follow SMS marketing rules and regulations
Before you launch your first SMS marketing campaign, you need to be aware of the rules and regulations that govern SMS marketing. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is the federal government entity regulating interstate communications — including texting.
The main legislation concerning SMS marketing is the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, also known as the TCPA. The purpose of this legislation is to protect consumers from unsolicited and unwanted contact from companies.
According to the TCPA, companies must receive prior express consent from people before contacting them through text message keyword campaigns and online opt-in webforms.
Additionally, the TCPA restricts SMS marketing to the hours between 8:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m.
Send the right messages at the right times
As tempting as it is to jump right into SMS marketing by sending a barrage of texts to your contacts, it’s best to take a more strategic and measured approach.
Sending too many messages will quickly annoy your contacts and drive them to opt-out of your list. Sending irrelevant messages that don’t value your contacts will also lead to opt-outs.
Finally, sending messages early in the morning or in the middle of the night violates federal regulations and can result in opt-outs and fines.
Make it personal
Texting is a very personal method of communication that people use to communicate with close friends and family members. As a result, your messages need to be as personal as possible to fit with the overall theme of SMS.
You can do this by including the contact’s name in the message as a retailer. You can also tailor your SMS campaigns by segmenting your text marketing list and sending only relevant information to specific contacts based on their engagement and purchase histories.
Keep it simple
Texting is also a very simple method of communication that only consists of 160 characters and an emoji here and there.
To save your message credits, keep your messages within that 160 character limit. Be very clear and include a strong call to action in your messages to get better conversion rates.
Conclusion
No matter what type of retail store you have, TextSanity can help you promote your products and grow your business. Text the word DEMO to 50505 to see how it works in a live, customized demo.
