In the mobile-happy world of 2020, it is more important than ever to meet customers where they are- on their cellphones. For businesses that make all or most of their sales online, text message marketing is a must-have tool for increasing traffic to your website and therefore, entering more customers into your sales funnel.
Sales from mobile shopping, also known as m-commerce, in 2020 are expected to account for 49.2% of ecommerce sales in the United States. By 2021, that number is predicted to rise to 53.9% with no expectation of slowing down any time soon.
Now you might be thinking, “I already have an established email marketing strategy, and people check their emails from their phones all the time.” In a way, you’d be right. However, studies show that text message marketing campaigns perform seven times better than email marketing campaigns.
The reason for this is simply that too many email inboxes are stuffed to the brim with spam! Even the most expertly laid out email campaign will struggle to cut through all that noise. On the other hand, only 10% of text messages are spam, making it far easier to get the attention of your target audience.
Ideally, your business can find a way to use email and text message marketing together. Nevertheless, it is time for your business to begin focusing on text message marketing to drive traffic to your website.
Read on to find out how to do just that.
How To Use Text Message Marketing to Increase Website Traffic?
Optimize your website for mobile.
If you haven’t already taken this step, what are you waiting for? Whether or not you choose to adopt text message marketing, your business needs a mobile-friendly site, especially if you rely on that site to make sales.
Today’s consumers are used to lightning-fast internet speed and responsive web design. Chances are if they have to wait too long for your site to load on their cell phone, they will move on, potentially to your competitor’s site.
Not only do you need your site to be fast, but you also need it to be well-designed. Before launching or finalizing any web design, you need to test it on a variety of devices: iPhones, Androids, iPads and tablets, laptops, desktops and any other internet-capable device you can think of.
Optimizing your website will not only make it more accessible to mobile-shoppers, but it may actually get rewarded by Google. You have probably already heard about the importance of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) for getting your website to move up the Google ranks and discovered by more people. Well, responsiveness is an important aspect of that process- not just for mobile browsers, but for Google users on all devices.
Internet browsing and shopping is no longer exclusive to a computer. If your business hopes to keep up, it would be wise to ensure that customers can access your website from any device, especially their cell phones.
Include web links in all text message marketing.
This might sound like a no-brainer, but you would be surprised to hear how often the simplest details can get overlooked!
If you hope to increase website traffic for your business with business texting marketing, you need to let the people know where to go! It is rather unlikely that someone will take the time to open their mobile browser, find your website and browse for the item that was promoted in a text. Make sure that the product or service that you hope to sell is never more than one click away.
This can become a challenge for many businesses utilizing text message marketing. After all, you only have about 160 characters to make your point, and many URLs will eat away at your character limit rather quickly.
Luckily, there are a number of free link shortening tools online, like bitly, which can transform your long, messy link into one that is more compact, giving your message a cleaner look. Most importantly, it will leave you with more characters to actually make a sale!
Integrate your text message marketing platform with ecommerce tools.
To really build up the strength of your text message marketing efforts, you need to enable it to work seamlessly with ecommerce tools. Not only will this allow you to increase website traffic, but it will also help to increase overall productivity.
Many business owners feel hesitant about adopting new systems or tools merely because of the amount of time and energy it can take to weave the new way into the old. However, with API access, your business can create a happy union between text message marketing systems and ecommerce tools.
After your systems have been integrated, you will have easy access to data, processes, and automation across platforms. You know what they say- “work smarter, not harder.”
Use text message marketing to send product updates.
Whether you are launching a new product, restocking on a fan favorite or offering a limited-time sale, you need to alert text message marketing subscribers. And of course, don’t forget the web link!
We also usually recommend that businesses offer exclusive deals to text message marketing subscribers. This is a great way to not only build your list, but to ensure that you are continuously providing value with this medium.
To that end, plan some exclusive deals or flash sales for text message marketing subscribers. Send out a bulk text encouraging customers to take advantage of the deals before time runs out, and watch the website traffic surge!
Write compelling CTAs in every text.
If there is some action that you want customers to complete, then you need to tell them! This is what’s called a call to action, or CTA. If you are still reading this article, then you obviously want to tell customers to visit your site in the CTA of your texts. However, there are a few key elements of a well-written CTA that can make all the difference in meeting that goal.
Each and every CTA should be concise, urgent and valuable. In other words, you need to quickly tell the customer what you want him or her to do, when they need to do it and what they will get out of it!
For example, if you are sending a promotional text for a flash sale, it might look something like this:
“Shop the sale today only to receive 15% OFF select items!”
In just a few words, you will have hit all the key elements of your CTA! If you don’t yet feel confident in writing effective CTAs, try running some A/B tests. Write out two different versions of the CTA for messages that are otherwise identical. Then, send them out and see what happens! If one version performs remarkably better than the other, try to replicate those results for the next time.
When it comes to increasing website traffic, text message marketing can make all the difference. Try out some of these tips in your next campaign for the best results.
If you’re ready to increase your business’ website traffic, check out some of our features to find out how we can help!
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