What is text message marketing - the basics?

Text message marketing is an effective way of gaining new customers or communicating with your existing customers directly to their cell phones as if you were sending an SMS. It's relatively new in the world of marketing but carried out correctly can be incredibly effective.

Reportedly, there are about five billion cell phones worldwide. Three times more phones than there are personal computers and this number is expected to increase. Although this figure does not take into account the number of people with multiple phones, the numbers are impressive. Couple that with the fact that most people have their mobile device within arm's reach 24/7, text message marketing gives you a perfect opportunity to reach a potential customer at the right place and the right time.

Text message marketing is a simple premise, your customer texts a keyword to your shortcode and you're instantly connected.

What's a shortcode? A shortcode is a unique string of numbers between 5-6 digits long that someone can send their message to. It acts like a cell phone number that you SMS instead of calling. And what's a mobile keyword? A keyword is a word or a term that someone can use to communicate with you by sending it to your shortcode. The keyword can be set up to have a particular function. For example you could use the term JOIN as a keyword so that when someone texts the word JOIN to your shortcode, they are automatically added to your contact list.

Using text message marketing is simple and straightforward which saves time and money. You type your text messages using a web application so you don't need to install any software. This is also great if you're not at your own computer or if multiple people handle your marketing as you can send texts from any browser. You can also schedule your messages to go out at a predetermined time and date or space your text messages out evenly.

There are so many benefits of text message marketing compared to other forms of advertising as well. Mobile advertising is, to an extent, measurable. If you text a discount to your customers via their cell phones you're able to tell how many people took that discount code to the cash point and used it. You can't identify that information from a TV or magazine campaign. Text message marketing is also cheaper and greener to send an SMS than orchestrate a flyering campaign for example.

Mobile marketing is effective because it's so easy to target and quick to implement. The information is short and sweet as a text message is 160 characters or less and text messages have a 95% read ratio. Compare that to email marketing which may not ever get to the intended recipient because or overzealous spam filters.

SMS marketing is a growing tool to brands and businesses as it's simple and effective. It's quick to set up, easy to use and gets delivered directly to the people who want to receive the information at the right time without having to orchestrate costly campaigns.