Is Text Messaging One of Your Channels?

One of the best practices for any 1:1 printing program is integrating multiple channels, communicating with people when they want to be communicated with, how they want to be communicated with, and using the channels they prefer. Increasingly, that means text messaging. Consider the following data:

• According to ZNet Research, text messages sent to and from mobile phones will more than double over the next five years to 2.3 trillion messages by 2010. Compare this to the “mere” 936 billion messages sent in 2005, according to Gartner.
• A new Verisign report puts SMS traffic even higher. It predicts that SMS traffic will reach 5.5 trillion over the next four years. It also reports that messaging from businesses increased by 115 percent last year.
• According to Neilsen Wire, during the second quarter of 2008, a typical U.S. mobile subscriber placed or received 204 phone calls each month. In comparison, this same customer sent or received 357 text messages, a 450 percent increase over the number circulated monthly during the same period in 2006.
• Not only are text messages ubiquitous and growing, but they are read more quickly than other media. MobileStorm reports that, on average, text messages are read within four minutes.

Of course, the importance of SMS to your 1:1 campaign will depend on your target audience. In the 13-17 age group, the Neilsen data indicates, the number of texts more than quadruples. It’s why, on college campuses, critical information alerts are often sent by SMS, not by e-mail, so that they will reach the largest number of students possible. Particularly if your clients are marketing to this demographic, SMS channels is a must.

But even among other age groups, texting is an important, even critical, component of business and marketing communication. According to InfoTrends, on average, consumers between the ages of 18-64 are sending anywhere from 200 to 400 text messages per month.

That’s a medium that marketers cannot afford to ignore, and they aren’t. In some cases, in fact, SMS is expected to carry the marketing burden. When Fitch Ratings, a credit research firm, reported that casino revenue has dropped 2.5 percent with no recovery in sight for several years, mobileStorm, which offers a multichannel marketing platform that includes text messaging, fought back. It promoted its own research that casinos that implement mobile programs are seeing returns on their investment up to nearly 30 percent. Earlier this year, it began offering a white paper on how casinos can “cash in” on SMS text messaging in their own marketing.

Is SMS in Your Future?

SMS has become big business. If you aren’t considering it as one of the channel options for your next 1:1 print campaign, you are overlooking an elephant in the room. How can you use SMS text messaging? In its 2008 study “Multi-Channel Communications Measurement & Benchmarking,” InfoTrends cites a number of good examples of current uses of SMS text messaging as part of a multichannel marketing or customer loyalty program:

• Account activity alerts
• Appointment reminders
• Bidding updates
• Confirmation
• Daily news headlines
• Event alerts
• Fraud alert
• Inventory updates
• Sweepstakes
• Travel updates
• VIP access

Earlier this year, organizers for the New York City Tea Party put these concepts into action. Working with JFM Concepts, they created a campaign to generate a usable database of grass roots supporters and volunteers and provide a simple registration platform. The campaign used radio ads to drive traffic to a custom-designed landing page that provided information and links about the program. These radio spots then generated hundreds of opt-ins for both the event and e-mail, phone, SMS-text alerts regarding this event and upcoming efforts. The data became immediately available to organizers for follow-up contact.

One of my favorite examples comes from vROAM, an Australian communications company that “hires out” cell phone SIM cards for overseas travelers who need temporary mobile phone service while traveling in other countries. I wrote about vROAM in this column last year (“vRoam Pairs 1:1 Print With SMS Text Messaging,” Printing News, Nov. 10, 2008). vROAM used a terrific combination of 1:1 marketing collateral and usage instructions, combined with SMS text alerts to customers, to let customers know when the information package would arrive and when to return the SIM card. Since implementing the program, vRoam Global has seen a 90 percent drop in customer inquiries and a “marked increase” in the return of SIM cards.

When planning your next multi-channel marketing program, don’t forget SMS. We now live in a culture in which teenagers consider texting a right, and millions of people—adults and teenagers alike—go through withdrawal of they aren’t texting within a matter of minutes. So know your audience, know their texting behaviors, and begin to incorporate those behaviors into your media mix. Send alerts. Exclusive deals. Coupons. Sweepstakes. Notifications. Reminders. There are lots of things you can text as part of a larger 1:1 printing, multi-channel marketing campaign. So by all means, text something!

Heidi Tolliver-Nigro specializes in digital workflow and technologies.

Source: The Nielsen Co. (Jan. 1, 2006 to June 30, 2008)