9 Ways Every Retailer Should Be Using SMS Marketing

How to boost sales, deepen loyalty & create experiences customers will love

TABLE OF CONTENTSIntro

Benefits

Use Cases

Promotional

Transactional

Cross-Channel Acquistiion

Authentication

What’s Out-of-the-Box with Airship’s SMS

Conclusion

INTROWith massive engagement and open rates — and the fact that just about every phone in the world can receive text messages — SMS is a channel retail marketers can’t afford to ignore.

In this playbook, we’re sharing nine ways retailers can use SMS to create deeper connections with customers — and better integrate text messaging into an overall customer engagement strategy that drives more sales, deeper loyalty, and customer experiences they’ll love.

Whether you’re still considering SMS, just getting started or looking for ways to expand your use of the channel, consider this an inspiration guide for making your SMS marketing even more valuable for your customers and your brand.

BENEFITS OF SMS MARKETINGWhy is SMS such a great channel? Among many other reasons, it’s got astronomical engagement:

90% of text messages are read within 3 minutes

98% open rate for SMS texts

In addition, SMS and retail are a match made in marketing heaven. Consider these stats:

32% of consumers respond to promotional text messages from retailers (1)

6-8x higher engagement for SMS vs. email marketing (2)

35% of consumers prefer to receive coupons and promotional codes from retailers via text message (3)

Plus, SMS is one of only two engagement channels that allow you to communicate directly with your audience on mobile,

without an app. (The other one is mobile wallet, which you should definitely also explore.)

Not convinced you need to take a closer look at your SMS strategy yet? Read on for ideas that will make you think again.

(1) Text Local, The State of SMS, (2) Retail Dive, SMS Has Eight Times the Response Rate of Email: Study, (3) Code Broker, Consumer Mobile Engagement Research Results

USE CASESPromotional: Send Engaging Offers

Transactional: Keep in Touch with Timely Messages

Cross-Channel Acquisition: Entice Customers to Opt-In on More Than One Channel

Authentication: Make Security Simpler

PROMOTIONAL: SEND ENGAGING OFFERS

Sale Alerts:

Drive action with SMS messages alerting your customers to sales or deals.

PROMOTIONALSMS

Ignite Repurchase:

Nudge users to repeat a purchase on the channel they’re most likely to see and respond to.

PROMOTIONALSMS

Save Abandoned Carts:

Rescue abandoned carts (and revenue) by giving customers a compelling reason to come back and finish the transaction they started.

PROMOTIONALSMS

TRANSACTIONAL:KEEP IN TOUCH WITH TIMELY MESSAGES

Order/Transaction Confirmation:

Give customers the reassurance that you’ve received their order — and that you’ll stay in touch and keep them up to date on its progress.

TRANSATIONALSMS

Shipping/Delivery Status:

Build excitement for order delivery — and make it incredibly easy to keep track of.

TRANSATIONALSMS

CROSS-CHANNEL ACQUISITION: ENTICE CUSTOMERS TO OPT-IN ON MORE THAN ONE CHANNEL

Drive App Downloads

Use SMS to drive downloads of your mobile app so you can engage customers more deeply.

CROSS-CHANNELACQUISITIONWITH SMS

Deliver Coupons with Mobile Wallet:

Provide an incentive to expand to two new channels: SMS and Mobile Wallet. It’s a win/win.

CROSS-CHANNELACQUISITIONWITH SMS

Deliver Loyalty Cards with Mobile Wallet:

Make it easier than ever for your customers to sign up for your loyalty program — and keep their card on their phone, with mobile wallet delivery.

CROSS-CHANNELACQUISITIONWITH SMS

AUTHENTICATION: MAKE SECURITY SIMPLER

Account Authentication

Streamline account security — and promote the expanded use of SMS — with messages related to account authentication.

AUTHENTICATEWITH SMS

WHAT’S OUT-OF-THE-BOX WITH AIRSHIP’S SMS

Using SMS through Airship’s Customer Engagement Platform gives you everything you need to connect with your audience on SMS in one convenient package:

• Multi-channel orchestration: Orchestrate SMS messages as part of a multi-channel customer engagement strategy.

• Single interface: One interface supports all channels managed by our Customer Engagement Platform (from push notifications to email to web notifications).

• Scheduling: Schedule messages to be delivered at a specific time.

• Opt-in/out management: Airship-maintained opt-in and opt-out database.

• MMS: Send visuals with your SMS to drive higher engagement.

• Keyword Automation: Automate unique responses and segment customers based on keywords.

• Custom Event Triggered Automation: Send important information in real-time based on customer actions.

• Personalization: Dynamically populate content based on a user’s profile or preferences

• Link Shortening & Tracking: Create shortened URLs and see user-level click data.

• Analytics: See how SMS performs on its own, and against other channels.

• Scale & Throughput: Leverage Airship’s partnership with a Tier 1 Aggregator.

CONCLUSION & RELATED RESOURCESAlow barrier to entry, along with the excellent open and read rates, gives brands incomparable opportunities to not only reach more people but create more loyal customers from an untapped app-less group with SMS.

A great SMS marketing strategy opens up a world of possibilities for creating better, deeper and more valuable connections with your customers. Is your brand maximizing the opportunity from SMS? For more insight, use cases and best practices, check out these related resources.

Blog Articles• SMS: Top Ten FAQs (And Answers)• Winning Customer Loyalty with SMS Marketing• How to Make Your Engagement Strategy Even Smarter with SMS

Webinars:• Getting More ROI from SMS • SMS Power Combos That Create Fantastic CX & Value for Your Brand

Web Resources• SMS Datasheet• Airship’s Customer Engagement Platform for Retailers

ABOUT AIRSHIP

Marketing and digital experience teams at thousands of the world’s most admired companies rely on Airship’s Customer Engagement Platform to create deeper connections with customers by delivering incredibly relevant, orchestrated messages on any channel.

Founded in 2009 as a pioneer in push notifications, Airship, Inc., (formerly known as Airship) now gives brands the user-level data, engagement channels, AI orchestration and services they need to deliver push notifications, emails, SMS, in-app messages, mobile wallet cards and more to exactly the right person in exactly the right moment — building trust, boosting engagement, driving action and growing value.

Learn more about our Customer Engagement Platform, read our blog or follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.

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