Ignoring the power of mobile will hold your business back. We’ve talked many times about how consumers these days are living their lives with their cellphones in their hands rather than at their ears. They may not want to talk to your business but they do still want to communicate. But in their own way – by using text messaging. These are the tips that marketers, particularly those who work in performance marketing, must use to improve their SMS marketing for eCommerce this year.

It’s estimated that 4.77 billion people will own a smartphone this year. That’s 2/3 of our current population.

One factor is important to keep in mind and that’s the heavy regulations of SMS marketing. You’ll find yourself in big trouble if you abuse your access to a customer’s private mobile number. So, handle with caution.

Offer incentives to sign up

This one goes with the problem mentioned above. Offer an exclusive incentive that’ll make people feel special and want to sign up for your texts. Tempt your customers with special codes that are only sent to SMS subscribers.

Valuable

Sending an irrelevant or unwanted message to a subscriber can make them feel like you’ve just invaded their personal space. And this is a big no-no. Make sure every message you send them is relevant, necessary and can’t be found elsewhere.

Encourage your customers to act fast

Do this by creating a sense of urgency. A simple expiration date included within the message encourages subscribers to sign up or act faster than they would have otherwise. Anyone who works in performance marketing will understand this sense of urgency, after all, without results they won’t get paid.

Use a shortcode for SMS marketing

Do you want to have a number that is always associated with your SMS messages? Of course, you do. And you can with a shortcode. This is one of those numbers like 14 788 which sends messages from specific companies. They help to make your brand easily identifiable and easy to remember. It also assures your customers signing up to be on the receiving end of your messages that your campaign is trustworthy and committed. And in our world of fake news and cyber hacking, it’s important to appear as legitimate as possible.

Personalized texts

People love personalized messages. And because an SMS immediately feels more personal than an email or direct mail, a personalized message will really get your customers’ attention. Customers will always respond better to messages with their names used. When possible, ask what kind of information they’d like to receive and then send them those messages. They’ll appreciate only receiving the type of messages they want to see.

Always include a call to action

Your message must make it very clear what action you would like your customers to take. This means the SMS needs to end with an indication of the action they should take, options include buying a product or signing up to a newsletter. A link to your website and method for communicating, like a phone number or email address, with you should also be included.

Check your statistics

All of this work is fairly pointless if you don’t check your statistics on a regular basis. This means knowing who opened your messages and who didn’t. The reality is, at least some of your list may no longer be using their numbers. And that means you’re wasting money by sending messages to people who aren’t even looking at them. It’s important then to make an effort to connect with these customers through another channel.

So, you know how to improve your SMS marketing campaign. But do you understand why you should be using this method to communicate with your customers? If not, read our recent article about the benefits of using SMS marketing to your business. It talks all about why SMS communication can and should be your greatest marketing weapon.

SMS marketing is far from a ground-breaking new concept. While SMS marketing for eCommerce has been a niche channel for some time, we saw more brands capitalizing on this channel last year than ever before.

In fact during the recent holiday shopping season:

• Ecommerce brands earned a 14% CTR with SMS
• SMS also earned 592% higher order rates than email
• We saw 21% more orders coming from SMS vs email
• 47.7% of omnichannel campaigns involving SMS ended in conversion

5 SMS Best Practices

1. Get Permission

Just like email marketing, it’s important to get explicit permission from your customer for SMS marketing. This is simple enough, as you can add the option of including a phone number with your newsletter subscription field.

Second, don’t abuse the permission granted to you! SMS is intimate, immediate, and overt in getting your customer’s attention. Use your SMS marketing campaigns for time-sensitive and critical information. Overusing this channel is the fastest way to kill it for your customers.

2. Use an SMS Marketing Tool

SMS marketing might get you excited, but before you whip out your phone and start sending manual messages to your customers, know that you should really be using an SMS marketing software for this.

An SMS marketing tool will also afford you important metrics and reporting so you can see exactly how impactful your campaigns are. With that data, you can adjust your campaigns to try different tactics to get the highest ROI possible.

3. Add Value to Your Customer

Before you send your SMS campaign, ask yourself one simple question:

How will this SMS add value to my customer’s life?

If you can’t answer that question, put the phone down. SMS marketing should only be used when you’ve got a good reason.

This is a channel that can burn out very quickly if you don’t know what you’re doing or if you send too many messages too quickly. That’s the quickest way to turn off potential customers.

4. Keep it Short, Sweet, and to the Point

Not only should you keep your SMS campaigns few and far between, but limits on characters and your customers’ attention spans means you need to get to the point, and quickly.

If you have an offer, lead with that. If your message has important information about their order, include it in the message. Always include a link so they can get more detailed information about the offer/update you’ve sent.

5. Personalize Your SMS Marketing Campaigns

While the ultimate goal is to make sure your SMS campaigns are relevant, it’s even better when they’re personalized.

SMS is a more intimate channel, so maintain that closeness with your customer by using their first name, or personalizing your messages. Send offers that are relevant based on location, or previous purchases.

If you’re looking for a quick and easy way to notify your customers about orders or product updates, then you have to check out these SMS Shopify apps.  All of these SMS Marketing apps are designed for sending text messages, and they come with amazing features like triggered messages, reports and analytics, support for international numbers, customizable message templates, and more.

Best SMS Marketing Apps for Shopify

1. SMS + FREE Web Push messages by Firepush

2. SMS + FREE Facebook Messenger by Laralancer

3. SMSBump SMS Marketing by Isense ltd.

Not all SMS marketing campaigns are created equal. There are some companies that fully integrate SMS marketing into their business strategy and others who see it as a side project.

According to a survey by ScanLife, 89% of customers use their mobile phones while shopping, and 64% of Americans own a smartphone as of 2015. Given this, which company do you think will have a more successful marketing campaign?

If you’re already on board with SMS marketing, here are some tips and suggestions on how to maximize your success.

1. Create an SMS Marketing Team

Large SMS marketing campaigns aren’t DIY. You’ll need a variety of skilled professionals in order to get the most out of your marketing strategy. One or a few people may fill several of these roles, but you’ll need: an SMS marketing program expert, a retail expert, coordinators for on-location signage, digital creative designers, social media experts, a promotions specialist, an ROI, and discount budget analyst, and more.

These areas need to be coordinated, and since the timeline for SMS is getting more and more immediate, the marketing team needs to work very closely and communicate frequently about plans, strategies, and execution. The more complete your SMS team, the greater the benefits you’ll reap from effective marketing strategies. 

2. Know Thy Customer

Use a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) app to measure the success of your messages. For more info on the best CRMs available, check out this ultimate guide.

Analyze purchase history and location-based demographics, so you can send the right messages to the right customers. If you’re a cosmetics line, don’t send an anti-wrinkle cream coupon to a twenty-year-old for your store in Houston when she lives in Boston.

Segment your clients for targeted promotions. Send bulk messages for general sales and promotions that anyone anywhere could take advantage of.

3. Write Clear Messages

Get to the point: You have 160 characters to express yourself. Do it in less if you can. Make sure the message is clear and concise, written in plain English. Avoid abbreviations, emoticons, and all caps.

Don’t use open-ended messages. An example of an open-ended message is one that invites clients to a sale but doesn’t say when the sale ends. The client has no idea if it is for a day or a month. By giving a specific date when a sale ends or putting an expiration date on a coupon, clients are more likely to act because you’ve given them enough information and incentive.

4. Use Call-to-Action Buttons

Calls-to-action increase customer engagement with your SMS marketing texts. That’s exactly what you want from them: to be engaged, to value the texts you send, to read them, interact with them, and act on them.

5. Get Your Timing Right

SMS is all about immediacy. It takes people an average of three minutes to open messages. Clients’ responses to sales, promotions, and events promoted on SMS are most effective when they’re last-minute impulses. If you have a store opening event on Friday night, send the message Friday afternoon. If you have a dinner promotion at your restaurant, send it at the end of the workday, not in the morning.

SMS marketing is already a big deal, but in 2020, it’s going to be even bigger. According to Mobile Xco, 48.7 million people will choose to receive business SMS messages by next year, an increase of 23 percent from 2016.

That’s a lot of customers, and if your business taps into the power of SMS marketing, you can get in on a share of that revenue.

Not quite sure where to start? Here are 5 SMS marketing examples from worldwide corporations and local businesses alike to inspire your jump into the world of SMS marketing.

Best SMS Marketing Examples

Jack in the Box

Fast-food chain Jack in the Box has a text club where it sends “top-secret stuff” to recipients. Using SMS messaging to share coupons, discounts, and sneak peeks at new products is a great way to draw people in; everyone wants to be part of an exclusive club. Like Jack in the Box, work to make your SMS messages sound exciting and alluring.

Another thing to note is that Jack in the Box tells people right up front what to expect (five messages each month). As you get your text message marketing off the ground, make sure people know what they’re getting into when they sign up.

Subway

Subway does two successful marketing practices in its SMS campaign. The first is tailoring their messages to a specific area. Does your business have multiple on-the-ground locations? If so, ask for subscribers’ zip codes so you can figure out what discounts and news will be most relevant to them. The second practice is offering a one-time discount to hook people into signing up. Since consumers redeem coupons delivered by SMS 10 times more than other types of coupons, this is an effective way to make sales.

IKEA

IKEA is a powerful SMS marketing example: After obtaining your zip code and promising you great deals to come in four messages a month, they ask for your email address. Similarly, you can kill two birds with one stone and get email addresses via text if you don’t have them already. That way, you can get your business in front of people as much as possible. SMS marketing and email marketing aren’t mutually exclusive — they both should be integral parts of your marketing strategy. So why not let them work together?

Local Therapist

Your SMS messages don’t have to be purely promotional. Many local businesses such as doctor’s offices and therapists (pictured here) have started using SMS messages to send appointment confirmations and reminders. Since most people tend to check their text messages more frequently than their email inbox (90 percent of SMS messages are read within three minutes), this is an effective tactic.

If you send an SMS confirmation or reminder message, make sure to include both the recipient’s and company’s name, the date and time of the appointment, the office location, and a phone number where the recipient can cancel or reschedule if needed. Sending this text 24 hours in advance is ideal.

Stellar Media Marketing

Get creative about the way you use SMS marketing. Text messaging is a great channel to promote a course you’re selling, keep people updated on company news, or send them to your most recent blog post. You can even use SMS messages to send people to Messenger. That’s what one company did here: Recipients of this message are invited to open Facebook Messenger and receive details on a good discount.

Conclusion

Consumers want to be contacted via SMS by their favorite brands: 75 percent of consumers are open to receiving text messages from brands, and six in 10 consumers have a positive impression of brands that send them SMS messages. In 2020, don’t be left behind. Roll out an SMS marketing strategy and start texting your customers.

For product marketers and eCommerce managers, SMS is an increasingly essential part of multi-channel marketing —,, especially with a mobile-first online retail market.

In this article, we’ll summarize 5 benefits you may not know about SMS marketing for Shopify. We’ll also outline how to use SMS effectively for better lead acquisition, closing rates, and customer loyalty for your Shopify or Shopify Plus store.

By the end, we hope you’re ready to integrate SMS marketing right away!

5 Things Shopify Merchants need to know about SMS Marketing

1) SMS is one of the most immediate channels available

SMS (a.k.a. text message marketing) is perhaps the most direct route to customers when it comes to D2C marketing. With a 98% open rate and a 5x click rate compared to other channels (such as email marketing), SMS is a more casual and less threatening channel for customers.

Not only do standalone SMS marketing campaigns have a high success rate and proven ROI for Shopify merchants, but they also enhance and support other marketing channels like email and social marketing.

2) SMS can help you recover lost sales

Merchants not utilizing SMS as part of a mobile marketing strategy are missing out on building direct relationships with customers. As a result, this could mean sacrificing sales.

Littledata found that, on average, nearly 60% of mobile shoppers abandon their carts before completing checkout.

3) SMS helps you better understand your customers

You can learn more about the purchasing behavior of your customers by studying back-and-forth conversations.

For example, SaveMySales is a performance SMS marketing app that offers a dashboard showing customer conversions from which merchants can track trends, like commonly asked questions or concerns preventing them from purchasing.

4) SMS will increase customer engagement

SMS marketing can help you directly build 1:1 relationships and trust with your customers.

Shoppers appreciate messages that make them feel valued or special, especially when messages include personalized responses from real humans that solves their barrier to purchase.

5) Full-service SMS marketing for Shopify merchants

SaveMySales is the only human SMS marketing solution that acquires subscribers, sends messages, and replies back to shoppers.

By combining AI with the world’s best live agents, the company has created the most personal marketing channel ever. The platform drives up to 20% increases sales for Shopify stores by answering questions, providing suggestions, offering deals, and up-selling.

SMS (short message service) marketing is the process of sending promotional, transactional, and other marketing-related messages to customers via SMSs on mobile phones.

SMS marketing is just another marketing channel for your company to reach your customers. For example, you can combine SMS marketing and email marketing for more targeted drip campaigns.

However, unlike most other marketing channels, SMS marketing tends to be extremely precise due to its 160 character limit.

In spite of that, SMS marketing remains one of the most commonly used marketing tactics today. It’s reliable, accessible and will help you reach your customers in no time.

Who Can Benefit From SMS Marketing?

The real question should be – who can’t benefit from SMS marketing?
As the SMS platform is so versatile, pretty much anyone – in any industry –  can benefit from it.

Here’s a deeper look at how SMS platform marketing can help:

A. Retailers

Retail SMS marketing, it’s the perfect marketing platform to inform their customers about deals, new store additions, and other promos to encourage purchasing. It’s no surprise that SMS advertising is on the rise!

Here’s a text message example –
Hey Roger, thanks for shopping at ShirtsandShoes! Lots of exciting deals coming up so visit your nearest SnS store today or log into www.shirtsandshoes.com today!

B. Service Providers

Service providers can also use text marketing to communicate promos; however, that isn’t all they can use it for. Most service providers also use SMS marketing to send reminders to their customers about appointments/services they’ve booked.

Here’s a text message example –
You have a 16:00 appointment at Dr. Smith’s Dental Clinic today. Pls, reach 15 mins early. If you can’t make it, click here to reschedule. 

C. Travel Companies

As service providers, travel companies can use text marketing to promote offers and inform their customers about their upcoming bookings.

Here’s a text message example –
Your PNR is JA1111 for flight AA1111 on Sunday, 10th Nov from LAX to JFK at 18:30. Have a nice flight, American Airlines.

3 Ways To Use SMS Marketing for eCommerce

What is SMS marketing good for?

You could use SMS marketing services for:

• SMS advertising.
• Updating customers.
• Sending surveys.

And that’s just scratching the surface of what a text marketing tool can be used for!
However, most people use text marketing for one of these three reasons:

A. Promotional Messages

Tons of companies use SMS marketing services for SMS advertising. They use it to promote offers and coupons to their customers. This encourages the customer to make a purchase which increases your sales revenue.

Here’s a mass text messaging example:
Show this SMS to your waiter to receive a complimentary entree on your next 2 meals at Sal’s Pizzeria. The offer is valid till 12/12/19.

B. Transactional Messages

Companies also use SMS marketing services to send personalized messages that are triggered by certain customer actions, such as making a purchase. Most credit card companies use these messages to keep their customers informed about their purchases.

Here’s a short message service example:
You recently paid $50 to XYZ. Txn ID: 123456789. Updated balance: $1000.

C. Update/Reminder Messages

Companies also use message marketing services to keep customers in-the-loop about important messages.

Here’s a short message service example:
Mr. Adams, your package AWB 29913333 is out for delivery. To track your parcel, visit www.trackmypkg.com.

When it comes to digital marketing, you have a surplus of options for connecting with your audience. Email and social media are popular and effective methods but are not without their flaws. Spam folders and the ability to hide activity on Facebook make it easy for users to ignore your campaigns.

If you’re having trouble reaching leads, you may want to look into WordPress SMS marketing plugins. You can send texts to your subscribers regarding eCommerce orders, appointments, new posts, and more. This provides a direct line to your leads as well as existing customers and clients.

This post will give you a complete guide to sending SMS messages to subscribers via WordPress. We’ll discuss how it works, why you may want to do it, and how to enable this type of notifications with or without a plugin. Let’s get started!

WordPress SMS Marketing Plugins

1. Formidable Forms + Twilio SMS Add-On

Since you’ll need a method for collecting phone numbers from your subscribers, integrating WordPress SMS gateway plugins with form builders makes perfect sense. Formidable Forms can help you do just that with its Twilio SMS add-on.

Twilio is a digital communications platform. Using an Application Programming Interface (API), it can send and receive SMS messages via your WordPress site. In order to use the Formidable Forms Twilio add-on (as well as the other plugins and extensions in this post powered by this platform), you’ll need to create an account and retrieve an API key.

If you choose to combine Twilio and Formidable Forms through this add-on, you’ll be able to:

• Receive texts via your forms (for example, accepting poll votes by SMS)
• Send texts to subscribers whose phone numbers who’ve collected in your forms
• Create conditional notifications and automated responses (such as birthday wishes)

2. Gravity Forms + Twilio Add-On

The Formidable Forms add-on is a handy solution if you’re already using the plugin on your site. However, those who prefer the popular alternative Gravity Forms will be happy to know that this form builder also has a Twilio add-on. Once you have your account, integrating the two platforms in WordPress is fairly intuitive.

It also includes a variety of helpful features for keeping track of form submissions and engaging your customers, such as:

• Automated notifications sent to you via text whenever someone completes or form or makes payment
• Bitly integration for creating short links that won’t eat up your 160 character limit
• Integration with the Gravity Forms PayPal extension to send payment notifications to your customers

3. Appointment Hour Booking + Twilio Add-On

When you’re busy trying to juggle work, keeping up your home, and whatever other commitments you have, it can be easy to let things slip through the cracks. That’s why combining Appointment Hour Booking and its Twilio add-on is a smart move when you’re providing services to clients.

By sending reminders about upcoming reservations, you can minimize the likelihood that your client will end up being a no-show. It also gives them a last-minute chance to cancel or reschedule, helping you avoid wasted time waiting on someone who forgot you were coming to repair their refrigerator.

The combination of Appointment Hour Booking and Twilio provides several helpful features:

• Incorporates a phone number field into your booking form to collect contact information from subscribers
• Sends automated booking and reminder notifications
• Provides easy integration of your booking system and SMS notification process

4. Joy of Text

If a premium form builder isn’t the right fit for your site, never fear. Joy of Text is the most flexible of the WordPress SMS plugins on this list and focuses solely on the task of sending text messages from your site. Like the previous tools we’ve mentioned, this plugin also uses Twilio to fuel its features.

One of the best things about Joy of Text is that it’s highly versatile and can meet the needs of almost any WordPress site. Key features include:

• Integration with many popular plugins such as WooCommerce, BuddyPress, MemberMouse, and Easy Digital Downloads
• WhatsApp integration for international digital communication capabilities
• Scheduler and Notifier extensions so you can set messages to send at a later date and automate SMS notifications

5. Twilio SMS Notifications for WooCommerce

One of the most convenient features you can offer your e-commerce customers is automated text updates regarding their purchases. Fortunately, there are several WordPress SMS plugins that can help you implement this functionality, including Twilio SMS Notifications.

As an official WooCommerce extension, you can rest assured that this tool will work seamlessly with its parent plugin to deliver accurate and timely notifications to customers. Other key features include:

• Enable customers to opt-in to SMS updates during the checkout process
• Send notifications for various order status updates including processing, completed, canceled, and refunded
• Test your messages before sending them to customers by delivering an example to yourself first

Final Thoughts

Email and social media marketing can sometimes feel like shouting in the void. SMS marketing provides a direct line to your users’ phones so you can capture their attention and build your platform.

WordPress SMS plugins make incorporating text messages into your marketing plan easy. Online retailers can keep customers updated with the WooCommerce Twilio extension. Service providers, however, may prefer using Easy Appointments to create an all-in-one booking and notification system.

Plus, having an impressive support team behind your WordPress site can free up your time to make the most of your marketing efforts.

According to the research, mobile SMS has “98% Open Rate” as compared to email marketing which has only a 22% open rate.

So, why don’t you also adopt the same SMS marketing strategy and create your own successful campaigns with the help of these Woocommerce SMS marketing plugins?

5 WooCommerce SMS Marketing Plugins 2020

1. WordPress SMS Marketing Plugin

WordPress SMS Marketing plugin makes sending messages so easy and convenient to any network whether it is local or international. It enables you to send unlimited SMS without any extra charges.

This plugin is incorporated with all the rich functionalities like Bulk SMS/MMS, campaign scheduling, autoresponders, and so on. With the help of this plugin, you can send automated information about your products. It also allows you to send promotional SMS, offers, and discounts in bulk.

2. WooCommerce SMS Customer Notifications

WooCommerce SMS Customer Notification helps you to send bulk SMS to your customers. For example, if you have an online e-commerce store and you want to send messages about products, offers, and discounts, etc then, this plugin is perfect for that.

It is integrated with four popular SMS gateways APIs such as ClickSend, Nexmo, Twilio, and MessageBird. Before getting started, you have to create an account on the desired SMS gateway and get your API keys and then you are ready to send SMS.

3. Gravity Forms SMS Pro

Gravity Forms SMS Pro is one of the best SMS plugins for WordPress. The plugin is specifically crafted for the Gravity Forms form builder. In this tool, WordPress SMS integration enables you to add subscribers to the groups after filling the form.

This plugin supports numerous SMS gateways some of them are Twilio.com, BulkSMS.com, ClickSend.com, Nexmo.com, OneWaySms.sg and the list goes on.

4. Joy Of Text Lite – Finest in Free WordPress SMS Marketing Plugins

With the help of this plugin, you can connect with your subscribers, customers via SMS. It allows you to send text as well as voice messages to an individual or to a group.

This plugin is totally based on the Twilio platform. So, to access it you’ll need the following things-

• A Twilio account.
• Twilio phone number.
• Unique “Twilio Account SID” and “Twilio Auth Token”.

You’ll have to enter these details in the plugin’s settings.

5. Marketing Automation by AZEXO

It is an all in one marketing plugin. The plugin has three main integrations of Form Builder, Page Builder, Popup Builder by AZEXO. Moreover, it has few add-ons through which your marketing campaign can be boosted such as WooCommerce Dynamic Pricing and Discounts, Facebook Live chat, and so on.

It has the functionality to send SMS notification and an autoresponder to send automatic replies. Consequently, you’ll achieve a successful SMS marketing strategy.

Conclusion

Well, above are the top Woocommerce SMS marketing plugins. We’ve hand-picked freemium as well as premium plugins. So, you can pick the one which offers your required functionalities.

Hopefully, our list helps you in finding the best SMS marketing plugin for your website.