80% of consumers agree texting is their primary mobile activity, surpassing other major activities such as social media, emails, news, binge-watching, and music.
Also, SMS marketing’s high open rate (98%), high conversion rate (about 21-30% ), and click-through rate of 10.66% reflect why text messages are an effective way for brands to communicate with customers.
But with 60% of consumers desiring the capability to text businesses back, you need to be quick at responding to them.
This is where the predictive text comes into play.
In this blog, learn more about predictive text messaging, its usage, and best practices to achieve optimal results for your SMS marketing campaigns.
What is a predictive text message?
Predictive text messaging is a device feature that speeds up the writing process by suggesting words and short statements based on the characters entered by the user. It is a very common feature on every smartphone and uses algorithms and dictionaries to predict the words.
Instead of typing each letter individually, the predictive text messaging feature offers the next word, emojis, and other writing suggestions (that are multiple) based on your recent and frequent activities in your preferred languages. These suggestions can be selected with a single tap or click.
What are the benefits of predictive text messages for businesses?
There are times when predictive text messaging helps you give new ideas as sometimes suggestions point to different directions which helps you discover a different approach to your messaging.
Learn four more reasons businesses must use predictive text messages in their SMS marketing:
1. Increased typing speed
Predictive text messaging helps increase the pace of your typing. It instantly picks up on your vocabulary needs via machine learning and instantly offers you suggestions. All you have to do is start writing, and this feature will assist you with predictions, correct vocabulary, and adapting to your personal style.
Recommended read: 50+ Best SMS Opening Lines | Copy-Paste Templates for Improved CTR
2. Improved accuracy
The predictive model also ensures there are no grammatical errors in your messages. It catches on your intended words and instantly offers your correct version suggestions. Sometimes, it fails to catch abbreviations and slang, but once you use them, they get saved in the system, and in the future predictive models also suggest these terms based on context.
3. Convenience
For the accuracy and time-saving capabilities it offers, using the predictive model is as simple as ABC. All users have to do is type the initial characters of the word, and the feature will give you multiple suggestions. Once these multiple suggestions are visible, you have to single tap to select the one you want.
4. Customization
Many predictive text systems allow users to customize the dictionary by adding new words or phrases, adjusting settings, or turning the feature on or off according to their preferences. This will enable you to add a personal touch to the predictive text algorithm and eliminate the words that you ignore in the feedback.
How can businesses use predictive text messages?
Learn 8 ways businesses can use predictive text messaging to simplify the process:
1. Customer service and support
Businesses can use predictive text messaging to respond to customer inquiries and support requests. Customers often come with similar queries, and predictive models with machine learning capabilities learn the pattern. It suggests solutions based on the direction of your writing, enabling faster customer responses.
2. Appointment reminders
Service-based businesses such as healthcare providers, salons, and fitness centers can use predictive text messages to send appointment reminders to customers. With predictive text messaging algorithms, businesses can instantly include personalized elements while crafting the messages.
3. Order confirmations and updates
The order updates messaging format is almost the same except for the specific details. Predictive text messaging feeds this format and immediately suggests the required words and sentences to send order confirmations, shipping updates, and delivery notifications to customers.
Predictive features also capture information such as order numbers, tracking links, and estimated delivery times, helping businesses to include this specific information to keep customers informed throughout the purchase process.
4. Marketing and promotions
The predictive text messaging feature also suggests product recommendations, discount codes, and personalized offers. Businesses can use it to create targeted marketing messages as these suggestions will be based on customer preferences and purchase history.
5. Feedback and surveys
The predictive text model saves all specific details about customers’ purchases and helps businesses suggest the necessary details to include in feedback collection messages. This will enable businesses to speed up the process of feedback and survey campaigns.
6. Employee communication
Businesses can use predictive text messages to streamline internal communication with employees. Predictive text can suggest common phrases or messages related to scheduling, task assignments, and company updates, improving communication efficiency within the organization.
7. Event invitations and RSVPs
Businesses can use the predictive text feature to suggest event details, RSVP options, and follow-up messages, for sending event invitation messages and managing RSVPs from attendees. This helps businesses simplify and speed up the event planning process.
8. Feedback analysis and insights
Businesses can use predictive text analysis tools to analyze customer messages, feedback, and reviews in real time. Predictive text analysis can identify trends, sentiment, and actionable insights, helping businesses make data-driven decisions and improve customer satisfaction.
Recommended read: 20+ SMS Templates for Feedback, Surveys, and Review Requests
Best practices to follow for predictive text messaging
Here are the 10 best practices businesses must follow while using predictive text messaging:
1. Understand your audience
Start by understanding your target audience. Make notes of their communication style and preferred language to set your predictive model. This will help adapt the predictive model to offer your most relevant suggestions.
2. Personalize message
Use customer data and insights to personalize marketing messages with predictive text features. It allows predictive text messages to help businesses include relevant information, such as names, past purchases, and preferences, to make them more engaging and effective.
3. Test and optimize
Businesses must text different types of messages with different formats and timing to know what works best with their customers. When you perform consistent testing and find your best working strategy, make sure to optimize your predictive text model based on the performance.
4. Maintain brand voice
Predictive text messaging suggestions are always consistent with your brand voice. This is because your predictive model has learned this through machine learning. It knows your communication style and most commonly used words. Make sure you are adding all your subjective vocabularies and style into your predictive feature so that it offers consistent writing suggestions every time.
5. Keep messages concise
Text messages come with a character limit. Ensure you include predictive text messaging suggestions that do not exceed the limit. Put your focus on including key information in a crisp manner.
6. Encourage interaction
Prompt recipients to take action or engage with predictive text messages by including clear calls to action (CTAs) such as clicking a link, replying with a keyword, or completing a survey.
7. Monitor responses and feedback
Monitor responses, feedback, and engagement metrics to gauge the effectiveness of predictive text messages. Use this data to refine your messaging strategy and improve future campaigns.
8. Respect privacy and preferences
Respect customer privacy and preferences when using predictive text messages. Obtain explicit consent for messaging, provide opt-out options, and adhere to relevant regulations and guidelines.
9. Integrate with other channels
Integrate predictive text messaging with other communication channels and marketing initiatives to create cohesive and omnichannel customer experiences.
10. Train staff and provide support
Ensure that staff members responsible for composing and sending predictive text messages are adequately trained and supported. Provide guidance, templates, and resources to help maintain message quality and consistency.
Conclusion
TxtCart offers two-way text messaging that makes use of AI, automation, and real humans to make it simpler for businesses to respond to their consumers faster and keep them engaged
It also allows customer segmentation and personalization campaigns with behavioral data like past interactions, previous purchases, spending power, and more.
TxtCart’s intuitive dashboard offers deep analytics to track customer SMS opt-ins, live-agent responses, SMS campaign orders, opt-outs, and one-time SMS campaigns for new product launches, special offers, sales, and more.
Install the TxtCart app today and reach out to our team of experts for better results.
