SMS Integration

WhitePaPer
DECEMBER 2011

Best Practices in email marketing

sms integration

© Mailigen Ltd. All rights reserved 12/2011. Mailigen Email Marketing Solutions

SMS integration 2

Will 2012 Be the time When sms saturation
reaches your target market?
The way we interact and share information is changing rapidly, with mobile technology leading the way. So, the way we
market must also change rapidly with more tools for reaching a mobile audience. It’s no secret traditional advertising has
been undergoing a shift from offline and mobile advertising is quickly becoming the most effective way to reach target
audiences anytime and anywhere. Consequently, the provision of information to mobile devices is one of the most effec-
tive marketing methods currently available.

The rise of mobile marketing means savvy marketers need to be more effective than ever at integrating their marketing
tools. Smartphone market penetration is estimated to be just under 30% today, but SMS can reach both smart and stan-
dard mobile phones. This makes it one of the most effective mobile marketing tools available today. Additionally, SMS
marketing allows companies to reach all consumers at a very low cost. Software company STRATA, a company engaged in
media buying and selling, polled marketing agencies about their customers preferences for the first quarter of 2011. 25%
of agencies polled said they are working with clients who are asking for SMS capabilities and advertising creative. That’s
up from 15% in the fourth quarter of 2010.

With mobile adoption on a rapid rise, nearly every mobile phone user in the U.S. is capable of sending and receiving text
messages and SMS has become increasingly important in developing countries where the number of feature phones far
outnumber smartphones. In September 2010 eMarketer forecast SMS would be the biggest single mobile advertising
format in the most immediate future, with a 38% share of mobile advertising spend in 2011. Will 2012 be the time when
SMS saturation reaches your target market?

Building SMS into your integrated marketing campaigns requires several considerations: Location based marketing, Mo-
bile marketing, Social, CRM and Email marketing. A common misperception of proponents of each of these tools is as
they grow, they replace the other. Not true. These tools work beautifully together to deliver vibrant campaigns and en-
gage customers.

in september 2010 emarketer forecast
sms would be the biggest single
mobile advertising format in the most
immediate future

© Mailigen Ltd. all rights reserved 12/2011. Mailigen email Marketing Solutions Phone: (+1) 718 303 1864

SMS integration 3

sms sms + location BaseD marketing

According to Deloitte, SMS text messaging remains the num- The number of location based mobile marketing cam-
ber one use of mobile devices and in a study by Prosper Mo- paigns being created has doubled since 2010 because
bile Insights on smartphone usage, they found: location marketing tools are an easy way to step into
mobile advertising. Typically location based marketing
• 27.6% text more often than call; tools have low cost to entry and a potential for high ROI.
Combining SMS with location based marketing can help
• 44% say smartphones make communica-
you quickly build an email and SMS list of customers and
tions more impersonal;
extend the reach of your business. Often integrating
• 46.8% use smartphones to receive text mes- location based marketing tools with SMS can help you
sages with offers; generate new sales and profit levels.
• 42.2% use their smartphones as a coupon;
SMS campaigns featuring easily redeemable coupons
• 31% want to receive text message coupons or store location information with a click-to-call option
on their smartphones; are practical and extremely effective. Use them to grow
• 67% find location based coupons on smart- the list of mobile subscribers, maintain engagement, or
phones useful. drive foot traffic and revenue at store locations.

Couple this with data from Microsoft Tag stating over 1 bil-
lion of the world’s more than 4 billion mobile phones are now
smartphones and 3 billion phones are SMS enabled. As con- sms + social marketing
sumers increasingly use their smartphones your brand must The Deloitte study also found 90% of smartphone users
become more fluent in the use of SMS to reach segmented send one or more text messages per day. Compare that
target audiences. Integrating your mobile advertising and to only 40% of smartphone users that use the biggest
working with more marketing media types will provide the social media networks like Twitter and Facebook one or
most timely delivery of your call to action, inspiring the con- more times per day. If you are waiting to start integrat-
version you desire. ing your marketing platforms, the time is now. Develop-
ing your integrated marketing strategy should include
Dunkin Donuts created a mobile interactive ad campaign
integrating platforms and using social media along with
in Italy, resulting in a 9% increase in sales in the first three
SMS to connect with your customers. When comparing
weeks of the campaign. Using SMS marketing, customers
to email, social media or direct mail lists, text messaging
received coupons for Dunkin Donuts by responding to ad-
provides the immediate open and read rates that are cru-
vertisements displayed throughout the country. By sending
cial to successful a marketing campaign.
a short message to the published numbers, users received an
immediate reply with a coupon. During 2012 smartphone use will continue to climb. Even
with social network adoption communicating through
SMS text messaging remains the number one way to
communicate due to the ease and immediate nature of
sending and receiving messages. One way to integrate
the two platforms is to promote your mobile marketing
campaign on social media sites to collect more opt-in
subscribers. Then, since your customers are already en-
gaging with you on these platforms, move them to a SMS
list. This will facilitate communication with them in mul-
tiple ways, ensuring they see your messages and have a
greater chance of responding to your call to action.


SMS integration 4

moBile commerce
Mobile Commerce, or mCommerce, is the ability to conduct commerce using a mobile device, such as a mobile phone, a
Personal Digital Assistant (PDA), a smartphone, or other emerging mobile equipment. According to comScore, 38% of smart-
phone owners used their phone to make a purchase at least once this year.

While purchasing through mobile is relatively new, the personal nature and timeliness of SMS makes it a great tool for making
purchasing recommendations and sharing purchase information. Consumers will likely open a text message with product
information from someone in their personal network. Knowing this, retailers should integrate SMS with their mobile com-
merce sites enabling consumers to share, sign up for mobile loyalty programs or remind users of abandoned shopping carts.

Brands such as Gilt Groupe, Amazon, Best Buy and Target are already embracing this integration by encouraging custom-
ers to share purchase information through their integrated SMS feature within their mobile commerce solution. With Gilt
Groupe, shoppers can click to recommend a product and share the information through social media, SMS or email.

SMS can also integrate with mCommerce to share pre and post purchasing links to a product and drive traffic to mCommerce
sites since the link can be texted back to the consumer by the retailer. Using this type of integration, SMS can be a tool for
signing up for loyalty programs, opting into alerts or pinging the customer who didn’t complete their order.

38% of smartphone owners used their
phone to make a purchase at least
once this year


SMS integration 5

sms + crm + email
With businesses of all shapes and sizes using SMS to grab customers or audiences, not many know how to integrate SMS as
part of a concerted marketing or CRM strategy to grow their business and generate ROI. With the right partner, integrating
CRM and SMS allows you to send SMS to leads, contacts and accounts either manually or through identified workflow. Some
great integrations with CRM trigger SMS reminders for appointments, events, sales prospecting, voting, polling, surveys and
registration.

Many CRM systems are not built with SMS in mind as they tie the system to a landline rather than preference to mobile
devices. Therefore it’s important for you to give your customers a valuable reason to give you their mobile number. A great
example of well executed CRM and SMS integration is airline use of SMS to update customers with flight numbers, gate
changes and checkin/boarding reminders. With SMS marketing, it is important to build a list of your own customers while
using sign up tools and keyword management to cast a wide net and capture potential customers who will use it to visit your
business for the first time. In response to the rapid growth of mobile marketing we created our branded version of opt-in
SMS integrated with email marketing. Leveraging the best technology solutions, our SMS allows customers and prospects to
subscribe to email marketing lists via text message.

Treat your SMS lists just like you would email marketing lists. The more you know about your email subscribers and what
they are interested in the better you will be able to send content appealing to their interests. Use SMS subscriber segmenta-
tion tools to segment new subscribers or allow subscribers to self segment. Segmentation offers you the ability to find out
who your subscribers are and what they are interested in, offering greater personalization to your messages. If you have your
email and SMS solutions integrated, you can use previous email campaign data to create segmented lists. Take a look at how
often your subscribers want to hear from you, what type of information they care about and how they like to receive content
(HTML, SMS, etc.). Once you gather the data, you will be able to customize your messages and frequency to the subscriber’s
interests and behaviors.


SMS integration 6

sms + google analytics
Click through rates are an effective measure of SMS campaign success. The volume of clicks you get is an indicator of how
valuable your message was to the list of subscribers. If you are using SMS to market, then you should integrate this effort
with Google Analytics so you know how your campaigns are performing. With SMS tracking you’re able to learn more about
the subscribers to your texting campaigns. You can view and segment which subscribers did or didn’t click on your links and
then provide more relevant follow-up text messages.

Because you’re driving the subscribers to a mobile site, you can
track even more data about their behavior. Click tracking al-
lows you to further segment your subscriber lists because you
gain insight to the click habits of your audience. Then you can
send content best suited to each person. Integrating SMS and
Google Analytics for site tracking allows you to gain more infor-
mation about which devices your subscribers are using to ac-
cess content so you can optimize the appearance of your offers.
Use this data to follow user behavior from the text message to
purchase and measure the campaign ROI. Use funnel tracking
to improve your conversion process.

Summary
For businesses thinking of starting their first SMS marketing campaign, integration with other marketing
platforms has never been easier. If you are a small business having a hard time reaching your customer
base with traditional marketing methods, SMS may help bridge the gap. SMS text messaging is known as
one of the few marketing channels where you are almost guaranteed your customers will read your offer.
When you send an offer, it is opened and read no matter where your customers are. As the popularity
of SMS grows along side other mobile channels, communicating through SMS with those who do not
respond to email or have a smartphone is a great way to reach a wider audience. Will 2012 be the time
when you invest in SMS to reach your target market?

aBout us
Mailigen is an emerging leader in email marketing. As one of Europe’s leading providers of web-
based email marketing software, the platform works for any size business, organization and indi-
vidual looking to enhance their marketing programs. Mailigen’s mission is to make email market-
ing as easy to use and cost effective as possible. Mailigen provides intuitive and very easy to use
email marketing service to all sizes of businesses with a cost-effective web-based solution. The solu-
tions provided by Mailigen are sophisticated and similar to features that typically cost much more.
For more information, please see www.mailigen.com


SMS Integration

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