Growing your email marketing list with SMS is probably easier than you think and could be the secret weapon to growth you’ve been looking for!
As a marketer, it’s your job to continuously search for new ways and new channels to fill your all-important opt-in email list for your brand.
Sometimes adding new opt-in email contacts to your marketing list feels like a zero-sum game because email marketing databases degrade by about 22% EVERY YEAR.
Previously, we’ve talked about the benefits of using SMS marketing instead of Email marketing
I’m here to let you in on a little secret: SMS and Email don’t have to compete with one another. SMS can be your #1 tool to growing your email marketing list.
SMS Is Great for Customer Acquisition
By this point, you’ve probably tried many, many different ways to grow your opt-in email marketing list: giveaways, online contests, website forms, display ads, collecting email addresses at the cash. And the list goes on… and on… and on..
Have you tried using SMS to grow your email marketing list?
SMS is an increasingly popular way of collecting highly-accurate customer data. Essential information like email addresses, mobile numbers, postal codes, sex, age, and others can be obtained via SMS.
But why is SMS a popular channel?
Using SMS to automate subscriber acquisition can help you remove manual inputs like sales associates typing in information and reduce fake contact information.
Benefits of SMS we’ve listed in the past
We’ve gone through the Top 10 SMS Marketing stats that will shock you in the past, so we picked a few of our favourites:
1) SMS open rates beat email fivefold
You don’t have to search in the spam folder for an SMS. Yes, people open their emails much less often than they read their SMS messages. Research suggests that over 90% of SMS messages opened within the first five minutes, whereas only 25% of all emails are opened at all.
2) Millennials love it!
Three-quarters of surveyed millennials prefer communicating via SMS for deliveries, promotions, and surveys.
3) Customers want text promotions!
If you’re not sure if you should ask your customers to opt into your SMS newsletters — go for it! Studies suggest that over half of the customers that have chosen to provide their phone numbers to businesses did it to receive notifications from the brand. SMS is an excellent medium if the communication brings them actual value.
4) We check our phones first thing in the morning
If you feel that you’re the only one doing it — no need to feel guilty. Nearly 80% of the participants in a recent study have stated that the first thing they do when they wake up is check their phone. Which is suggestive of the reason why SMS is such an effective medium.
SMS, or text messages, is a channel that people love to use, so it’s a great way to connect with your audience and ask them for that all-important opt-in email contact.
How does SMS work for Email Acquisition?
Using text-in keywords and mobile forms, you can easily get your customers to pull out their mobile phone and text-in to sign up for:
- VIP Alerts
- eNewsletters
- Promotions
- Coupons
and more….
The key is to connect the incentive with an email opt-in for your marketing list.
ProTip: Interactive Signs – like the one you see above – is the best way to grow your email and mobile marketing lists for brick and mortar brands.
SMS Tactics to Grow Your Email Marketing List
Now that you have a better idea as to how it works, what are some ways that companies are using SMS to build their email lists?
1) Radio and Podcasts:
Radio promotions and podcasts especially are really popular forms of advertising as you have the listener’s attention. Normally, brands simply use a 10s spot to promote a product and then provide a confusing coupon code that can only be redeemed at an equally confusing web url. Instead, brands are cleaning up their voice ads to include promotions like “text ‘JOIN’ to ‘55055’ to get 5% off your next purchase.”
2) Brick and Mortar (In Store):
Instead of asking people for their email addresses at the cash, brands are asking customers to subscribe to eNewsletters or activate a promotion by texting and registering to receive marketing promotions. As you can see in the image above, in-store Interactive Signage is the best way to display these promotions. Plus these promotions can be placed anywhere in the store.
3) Direct to Consumer Flyers:
When you receive a flyer in the mail not many people like to pull out their phone, open a browser and start typing in a confusing 30 character URL to get a promotion. It’s a lot easier to have people text-in a keyword to short code to get started.
In Conclusion
SMS is a fantastic tool to help you grow your email marketing lists faster. Combined with a great CTA or promotion, you can easily set up a campaign and let it run on autopilot.
Taking these tactics and working with partner like Raange, you will have a winning combination.
Now that you have a better understanding of how to email and SMS work together, we have some more resources to show you what success can look like with Raange. Our Customer Success eGuide provides a few examples of how we’ve helped our customers achieve success and 30X ROI.
If you have any questions whatsoever, our team is here to help so please feel free to reach out anytime.
