The new year has just begun. This means you need to make sure you draw customers’ attention to your products and promotions before your competitors do.
For that, you’ll need to plan your SMS marketing campaigns.
Think it requires a lot of effort? Don’t know how to go about it?
We’ll tell you how to and what campaigns you need to set up this year.
The secret sauce you need: TxtCart – it’s the master of getting SMS marketing done right!
SMS marketing campaigns for customer engagement
1. Run monthly promotions
Promotions, discounts, and deals are one of the best ways to engage customers and entice them to buy more from your site.
While you may be having sales and promotions seasonally, say, a sale around Christmas or Winter, etc., but ever thought of running monthly promotions?
Imagine this – you announce you’ll be running monthly promotions. Your loyal customers will definitely feel excited. Every 30 days, they’d be curious to know what your promotion for the coming month is going to be.
It keeps the excitement going. Doesn’t it?
Here’s what a gelato brand did: They introduced a flavor of the month on the first of every month. Not just that, they offered a 90% discount on it on the first day of the month. The result: a huge crowd gathered at their outlets on the first of every month.
The moral of this example in a nutshell – your monthly promotions can generate excitement and can be as creative as you like. For example,
- A percentage off on a specific collection throughout the month
- Buy 1 Get 1 on a specific product category. For example, buy 1 shirt, get 1 shirt free
- Free shipping on orders over a specific amount
- A discount on a collaborative promotion. For example, create a combination of one product from your site and one product of a complementing brand
The above are just some simple ideas for monthly promotions. You can think of more relevant ideas keeping your customers in mind.
And now, here’s how you can keep SMS at the center of your monthly promotional strategy.
- Send announcements via SMS throughout the month
- Build anticipation about the upcoming promotions via SMS
- Offer exclusive access to your SMS subscribers
- Offer a different discount to subscribers on different channels. This means, don’t duplicate offers. For example, only SMS subscribers get 25% off this weekend with a unique code.
- Automate your text messages with the help of an SMS marketing app like TxtCart
- Create a two-way communication strategy by enabling customers to respond to the text messages
Here’s an example:
Shop.com: Hi Jenny, this month’s offer: TWO GOOD. This month, enjoy 20% off when you buy 2 of the same item. Code: TWO20
Here’s another example:
To which segment of your customers should you send monthly promotions: All. Whether they’re new customers, loyal customers or aren’t your customers yet but have subscribed to your SMS list, send your monthly campaigns SMS to your entire list.
2. Educational SMS campaigns
Gone are the days when brands only sent out promotional content and ads to customers. Today, customers expect a wide range of content from eCommerce brands. Think blogs, articles, whitepapers, case studies, how-to guides, product guides, etc.
Here’s a graph that shows customer preference for content type:
While content that entertains will help you get followers, likes and engagement on social media, content that educates will get you more serious customers. And that is why you need to make it a part of your SMS marketing campaigns.
Customers who like your products and brand will appreciate educational content. And content that you specifically create to educate customers can bring the same goals as content that’s created to convert.
Educational content will appeal to customers’ rationality and there’s a higher chance of converting such customers through your content.
Here are the different types of education content that you could share with customers through links shared via SMS:
- Infographics
- Case studies
- Product explanation content. For example, how to use product
- Product videos. For example, product benefits
Pro tip: Make the content easily shareable.
And that’s where SMS can help you out.
People’s reading habits have moved to their handheld devices. 85% of adults in the US read news on their mobile devices. And there lies your opportunity to boost readership of your content.
Send your informative content through SMS. Having an almost instant open rate, it increases its readership.
Here’s an example:
“Hi Peter, you’re making a huge difference to the environment when you buy a product from us. Read our latest blog to know how: (link to blog)”
3. Abandoned cart campaigns
Did you know, the rate of mobile cart abandonments is higher than cart abandonments on the web? Nearly 85% of people abandon carts on their mobile, compared to 69% overall abandonment rate.
But wait… this doesn’t mean you should avoid mobile or not include it in your Shopify store marketing campaigns.
SMS has a 98% open rate – higher than any other channels. And that’s where you can use it to turn around the game. It can actually help you increase Shopify sales.
Customers abandon carts for many reasons – due to lack of product information, high price, a better option on another site, a lack of trust in your brand, etc.
But you won’t know what the reason is unless you ask them. So what should you do?
- Send them an SMS as soon as they abandon their carts
- Ask them if they need any information about the product
- Show them social proof about that product
- Offer them a discount
- Engage them and then nudge them to make a purchase
There are two ways of running abandoned cart campaigns:
- Manually follow up with them
- Automate text messages based on their actions
While the manual method means you or your team of marketers will get busy writing text messages and responding to shoppers’ queries, the automated method means your SMS tool will do the work for you while you focus on other important tasks.
TxtCart – the Shopify SMS marketing app can help you automate your abandoned cart SMS marketing campaigns.
And automation is key to the success of any SMS marketing campaign.
Why is that?
- SMS has an instantaneous nature
- A person opens an SMS within three minutes of receiving it
- This means that if your subscribers respond to your SMS, they might be expecting an instant response. If you snooze, you might lose the customers
- Automated text messages can improve your customer experience, engagement and increase ROI
See this SMS example:
“Hi John, we see you added product X to your cart but did not complete the purchase. We have an exclusive 10% off on the cart total and free shipping for the next 24 hours. Complete the purchase now! shop.link/cart.”
4. Request reviews
Customers like to read reviews before they buy products. But as a marketer, you know how difficult it is to get them to write reviews. Moreover, customers who have a bad experience are more likely to share a review compared to customers who have a good experience. This means getting positive reviews is extremely difficult.
And this is where the instantaneous nature of SMS can help you. Here’s how to make review requests a part of your SMS marketing campaigns:
- Ask customers to share a review within a day or two after they receive their order delivery. This way, their experience of the products is fresh in their mind and they’d be ready to share reviews
- As most people have their mobile devices on them 24/7, it will enable them to write a review on the go
- 53% of customers expect brands to reply to their online reviews within a week. So, make sure you respond to your customers with a thank you message or even an incentive, such as store credits
- 21% of customers who’ve left a negative review, expect you to respond to them within 24 hours. So, make sure you reach out to such customers as soon as they share a bad review
Here’s an example of a text message to request for a review:
“Hey Jane, you bought product ABC from us last month. We’d love to know if you like the product! Would you like to give us a review? shop.link/review”
5. Ask for testimonials
Testimonials are one of the content types that help brands sell! But when was the last time you updated customer testimonials on your Shopify website? Probably the day you launched your website. Right?
But did you know – your website visitors actually read customer testimonials. It’s a great way to show authentic reviews in the words of your customers.
Moreover, search engines promote websites with regular updates. Publishing new testimonials is also one way to improve your ranking on search engines.
Here are some strategies you can use in your text messages:
- Make a list of your most loyal customers
- Send a simple request for a testimonial
- Offer an incentive in return of a testimonial
- Collect testimonials on a regular basis
- Keep updating your website with new testimonials
- Optimize your product pages with testimonials where customers speak about products – this can also help increase Shopify sales
- Share video testimonials
- Create exciting SMS campaigns to collect testimonials
- Automate the process of sending testimonial requests
- Make testimonials a key part of your SMS marketing in 2022
6. Collect feedback
Just as reviews and testimonials, collecting feedback from your customers helps your brand. Feedbacks are mostly quicker and require less time. Most brands ask customers to rate their experiences.
And when it comes to collecting feedback, SMS is one of your strongest channels. It is instant, quick, short, and would take just a few seconds for customers to read and respond to your text message.
Here’s how you can leverage the power of SMS to collect feedback:
- Send an SMS for feedback at every touchpoint in the customer’s journey
- Ask customers about their site experience, shopping experience, ask them to rate the product, your customer service, etc.
- Once customers share feedback, respond to them with a thank you and let them know that you’ll address their feedback to make their experience better
- When customers share poor feedback, reach out to them right away to make amends. 70% of customers change their perceptions about brands when they receive a response to their feedback. In a nutshell, you can reverse a negative feedback situation with a little promptness
Here is an example of a text message requesting feedback:
“Thank you for choosing to buy from us. We truly care about your opinion and want to hear all about your experience. So, how did you feel shopping with us? Anything that comes to your mind to help us become better, let us know: shop.link/feedback-form.”
7. Offer support and assistance via SMS
The lines between brands’ products and services and the customer experience they offer are blurring. For example, think about why you prefer to buy products from a specific brand only.
Today, customers have multiple brand options to buy one product. But most people prefer to make purchases from some brands only. Why? It’s because of the experience the brand offers.
Customer support and assistance is a key part of offering a good brand experience. And when you extend it via SMS – it’s even better. Because it’s instant, fast, short, to the point, and conversational.
Here are a few ways in which you can use SMS to offer customer support:
- When customers abandon their cart, send automated messages with the help of a Shopify SMS marketing app
- When items are restocked on your site, inform restock subscribers via SMS
- When you publish new informative content, such as blogs, on your site, share a link via SMS
- If a customer has a grievance, address it via SMS – it makes resolution faster
8. Enable two-way communication
One of the biggest advantages of SMS – it’s personal, and hence, enhances two-way conversations.
But wait… are you a brand that only sends SMSes and doesn’t allow customers’ replies? If yes, you’re hurting your brand experience more than you could imagine. Moreover, it’s affecting how you approach personalization.
Here’s how you can use SMS to ditch your monologue approach:
- Enable two-way communication for all your Shopify marketing campaigns
- Respond to customers immediately – use a Shopify SMS marketing app for automation
- Bring a human touch to your campaigns by having live agents respond to customers
- Use two-way communication to engage customers and build a rapport with them
- You can even nudge customers to make purchases by subtly helping them make decisions and increase Shopify sales
Making SMS marketing work for your Shopify store
SMS marketing campaigns are a must in 2022. And to get started with your strategies, consider using TxtCart – it’s one of the best SMS marketing apps that make the set up and automation of campaigns a breeze.
