Posts Tagged ‘text marketing’

You Need a Text Club

November 10th, 2010 No Comments

A text club is an opt-in  group of customers who receive promotional texts, reminder texts, and informational text from you. Text Clubs are a great form of mobile marketing, and it is absolutely a function that should be part of your mobile marketing mix.

 Text Clubs are so great because they’re an opted-in list of customers who want to receive promotional texts from you. Text Clubs also present a great opportunity to build lasting relationships with a loyal customer base.

If your business is a retail store, you can put SMS codes with prompts to join your text club for special sales on signage throughout your establishment. Restaurants can take advantage of table top signage by placing table tents that have short code calls to action. You can also build your text club using social networking sites, like Facebook and Twitter.  Another idea for building your text club is via a text to win contest. In exchange for signing up to receive promotional texts from you, consumers join your text club in order to enter into a contest. Give something away that’s relevant to your business, and you’ll be on your way to building a strong, targeted text club.

Once you have a text club established, the opportunities for marketing and relationship building are endless. SMS Alerts are a great way to keep your customers up to date with product information, such as low inventory, or an exclusive new shipment. If you’re in the service industry, you can use your Text Club to send your customers alerts on when their next service from you is due. This would work well for a Hair Salon, Auto Mechanic, etc.

Another Text Club marketing idea is to hold a poll or survey. This can give you key insights on how your customers feel about your brand and/or industry. A poll can show you what products or services your customers think are key in your market. They can reveal what products/services your customers are happy with, along with things that they would like to see your company doing. Overall, when you use your Text Club to gain customer opinions, you’re engaging in a two way conversation with your audience, and building a strong and loyal customer base.

Visit www.mowbi.com for powerful Text Club tools for every budget. Or call 1-800-985-9277. E-mail Bill@mowbi.com or Jordan@mowbi.com.

Posted in Mobile Commerce Tags: , , , , ,

Mobile Marketing Tips for Retail Stores

September 27th, 2010 No Comments

In today’s economy, there is more competition for consumer interest and dollars than ever before. Retail stores are engaged in particularly tough competition as consumer purses are often closed when it comes to items that are not immediate necessities. With the holiday season almost upon us, it is important for anyone who owns or operates a retail store to develop creative ways to reach out to their customers. Many major players in the retail arena are turning to mobile marketing as a way to help boost awareness and sales. Here are a few creative ideas for integrating mobile marketing and mobile advertising into the marketing mix for your retail store.

SMS/Text Message Marketing-One of the easiest ways for you to incorporate mobile marketing into your mix right now is sms or text message marketing. Some neat ideas for retail using SMS/Texting:

Low inventory alerts- Send a message out to customers when a hot ticket item is almost out of stock in your store. You’ll not only drive sales and clear your stock, but you’ll also drive clicks and foot traffic to your store.

Loyalty Programs- Build your opt-in list and drive sales with text based loyalty programs. Your customers opt-in (sign up) to receive outgoing messages from your store. In exchange, you send them special deals and discounts that are exclusive to SMS Members.

Contests-  You can use mobile technology to create and execute fun contests for your customers. You could hold a contest for your most popular item, a gift package, or anything that will drive customer attention. Contests are easy to organize and keep track of when prompt the audience to text in order to enter. Another way to use mobile is to drive customers to your mobile website to enter. And if you want to give consumers the ultimate convenience, create a contest in print that allows them to simply snap a bar code to enter.

Use Location Based Apps- Why reach out to customers who aren’t ready to purchase immediately, when you can now reach customers who are in your neighborhood, on your street, or in your store? Use location based marketing to market to customers who are the most crucial- the ones who are at or close to the purchase point. Things you can do to participate in location-based marketing:

Be there-Make sure your store is active in the major location-based networks. Here are a couple of big ones: Foursquare, Brightkite, Yelp, Gowalla, and Loopt. Don’t forget social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter.

Get Creative with Events/Promotions- Give customers an incentive for visiting and “checking in” at your store. Run a coffee shop? How about offering a free cup of joe with every 10th check in? Own an electronics shop? Conduct a check-in raffle for a free ipod. The opportunities are only as limited as your imagination!

General Tips- With any mobile campaign you run, you’ll need to make sure that all marketing messages from you are sent to an opted-in list. It can be tempting to blast out texts to as many consumers as possible, but remember, in this end this will only damage your list, and you could end up being blacklisted completely. Another extremely important tip is, make sure whatever you do, it is measurable. One of the greatest aspects of mobile marketing is it’s ability to deliver measurable results. You can know exactly what messaging, markets, even time of day works best for you. Use every mobile marketing campaign as a learning opportunity. Lastly, before you start your campaign, take time to really think about what you want from your mobile marketing efforts. What are your goals and expected outcomes for your campaign? What is your break even? How will you measure success? What metrics will you look at? CPC? CPM? Click-to-Call rate? A large portion of time should be devoted to answering these kinds of important questions.

If you’re in the retail business, and you’re looking for mobile solutions that you can count on to deliver results, visit www.mowbi.com or call 1-800-985-9277. Questions or ideas? E-mail Bill@mowbi.com or Jordan@mowbi.com

Posted in Mobile Commerce Tags: , , , , , ,

Top 5 Text Marketing Tips

May 8th, 2010 No Comments

One of the many excellent options available via Mobile Marketing is Text Marketing, or SMS (short message service). According to the New York Times, 97% of all SMS messages sent to consumers were opened in 2009. 83% of these messages were opened within an hour of being received. Right now is a great time to begin a Text Marketing campaign because the mobile channel is virtually clutter-free and hasn’t be over-run with spammers. Here are the Top 5 tips for running a successful Text Marketing campaign:

1. Choose the right service provider- While Text Marketing is still getting it’s legs, there are industry standards that must be followed. For instance, automated dialers (that hack into national SMS structure and blast messages to thousands of consumers) are to be avoided. Hiring a service that employs this kind of tactic for your business can result in stiff penalties, and could cause you to be blacklisted in the mobile sphere. Text Marketing can be a powerful marketing tool. Put your best foot forward by hiring a reputable company to get your campaign off the ground. Give App Publishing a call at 800-985-9277 or e-mail  jordan@mowbi.com to discuss how we can help you launch a successful mobile marketing campaign.

2. Use Traditional Marketing- You can supplement your Text Marketing campaign using traditional channels such as print, or outdoor signage. Macy’s and drugstore giant CVS both have used print and display ads to drive mobile traffic. When using traditional media to drive texts, be sure to make the call to action extremely clear, with the text displayed prominently. The text number itself should be short, memorable, and one of your mobile keywords.

3. Build Relationships- Don’t use Text Marketing as a one-shot blast and disappear. You’ll miss out on the true opportunities that text marketing presents and you won’t grow your opt in list. Instead, use Text Marketing to build relationships with your customers. Send them valuable coupons, and notices. Armani , a large national retailer was able to effectively intergrate text marketing into their brand identity. Their SMS text information is displayed right next to their name and logo. They send valuable coupons to their opt in list, and they recently had an exclusive sale for their text message customers only. They are using text marketing to build a culture around their brand. This is the kind of relationship building you should be thinking of, when planning your Text Marketing campaign.

4. Always Remain Professional- With  new technology like text marketing and mobile commerce, it can be tempting to tailor messages to a youthful audience. Even if your company’s demo skews younger, do not make the mistake of using slang or teenage texting ”shorthand” (words like, gr8 , 4u, lol, etc). Business’s such as Adidas have found that consumers are wary of text messages that use this kind of language. Your text marketing campaign can be playful and fun (if that messaging works with your audience), but it should always present your company in a professional, legitimate light.

5. Make it Enticing- If you’re using traditional media to drive mobile traffic, or if you’re sending SMS messages out asking for clicks or click-to-calls, it is extremely important to give your audience a compelling reason to take action. The first thing your customer will think when they receive your WXYZ marketing text is WIIFM- What’s In it For Me? The best incentive for most consumers is a free offer. This is often the dance of a successful text marketing campaign- you give the consumer something for free and in exchange, they agree to receive text marketing messages from you (ie, they opt-in). Do not under estimate the power of a free offer. Yes,  joining the opt in list to your favorite local pizza place for sales updates is nice and maybe you’ll get around to doing it next time they text. But if that same pizza place is going to give you  free breadsticks if you opt in NOW and this offer expires at 3pm today- you’re likely to get around to that opt in list a lot more quickly. Just like with any traditional call to action, text marketing messages must have a strong offer. And what do consumers like better than free?

Call us at 800-985-9277 to give your Text Marketing initiatives a strong start. We’d love to discuss your mobile marketing ideas live. Ask how to get your Free Demo- We’ll show you exactly how mobile marketing can increase your company’s bottom line- The demo is absolutely free, so there’s nothing to lose. Call 1-800-985-9277 or e-mail bill@mowbi.com or jordan@mowbi.com.

Posted in Mobile Commerce Tags: , , , , ,
Get Cheap Cell Phones and Wireless Deals. | Thanks to Best Savings Accounts, CD Rates and UK Loan