Make Those Quiet Spells Busy By Getting Smart With Sms Text Messaging

By Author: Salvatore Andrea
Total Articles: 6240
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Most of us happily leave our mobile numbers whenever we arrange appointments, make purchases, register on websites, apply for loans, and arrange deliveries. Smart businesses scoop up that data and store it in databases, but did you know you could put that data to work for you using the latest promotional technique - online SMS marketing?

Following a trip to a new hairdressing salon recently, I received a personalised SMS text message thanking me for visiting and offering a £5 discount on my next visit, if I made my appointment online. Around 4 weeks later, I received another SMS text message reminding me that my hair would need to be cut again soon and a link was provided for me to book an appointment online, via my smart phone. I followed the link and booked the appointment within a couple of minutes. Impressively, I received a reminder the day before the appointment asking me to text back to confirm that I would be attending. I was impressed and I told lots of my friends about it.

With clever online sms services, such as textlocal.com, it is now possible, and comparatively ...
... inexpensive, to send out self-branded promotional SMS text messages to your customers. For example, a Restaurant owner is fed up with always being quiet on Tuesdays, so he quickly registers a textlocal.com account and composes a promotional SMS text message offering a free bottle of house wine with a meal for two, for bookings on Tuesday evenings. With the simple click of a button, the SMS text message is pinged simultaneously to his entire customer database.

97.5% of text messages are read within 5 seconds of receipt, so it isn't long before the Restaurant is fully booked. If the Restaurant owner had been short staffed that day, with another click of a button, it would have been possible to send the SMS text message out over a staggered schedule, to allow time for staff to cope with the inevitable increase in enquiries. Clever!

For online retailers, online sms marketing can be just as effective; there are currently 32 million smart phones in the UK (with that number continually rising) and with the effective use of a call to action, for example "...click on http://www.textlocal.com to use your exclusive discount", new sales can be achieved around the clock.