Five Signs That It’s Time To Add SMS Marketing to Your Store

SMS Marketing is a standout this year due to its speed, cost-efficiency, and ability to keep the conversation going with customers.

It’s surprising that SMS marketing is still so underutilized, given its low margin of error and the ease it works with other eCommerce channels. But it won’t be long.

Why? Because word is spreading quickly. SMS marketing has quicklybecome a top option for brands who want to stand out from the crowd and reach customers.

There is no better way to communicate your message and get immediate action.

Mobile commerce is expected to account for 54% eCommerce sales in the year. This means that you can reach your customers wherever they shop.

Before we get into the 5 signs that your store could be benefiting from SMS’s instant benefits, let’s first look at what it does for you.

SMS Marketing for Your Shopify Store: The Benefits

SMS marketing can make Shopify a success story by 2021. But only if you do it correctly. It’s more important than ever to be different in online retail.

SMS Marketing is rapidly becoming one of the most effective marketing tools you have. Let’s not forget about email marketing and other paid channels. Instead, let us first look at the highlights of SMS.

SMS marketing is more open and click-through than email.

Although we don’t want to be too boastful, the open SMS rates guarantee that almost all of your text messages will be read by your customers.

SMS open rates clock at 98%, compared to email at 20%.

Emails can be left unopened for up to 90 minutes in a customer’s mailbox, but text messages are usually opened within 90 seconds. This is a great idea, so we have created a graphic to summarize it.

Source Cartloop

At 19%, SMS is the clear winner when it comes to click-through rates. This is better than email and the 22% average CTR for PPC ads.

Learn more:

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Get better relationships with instant engagement

An SMS channel is a great way to increase your chances of your messages being viewed by your customers. This will help you close the sale and build stronger relationships.

98% in open rates – nearly all text messages that you send will get opened by the recipient.

High open rates can have a compounding effect on deliverability, making sure that your marketing messages reach your customers. But does it actually provoke a response?

You bet. You can bet. SMS has a 45% average reply rate and a 209% greater response rate than emails or phone calls.

You’re probably asking yourself, “What should I choose between SMS and email?”

It doesn’t matter if you don’t. You don’t have to. Both channels can complement each other perfectly, crafting a highly effective 2-punch marketing message that your customers won’t forget.

Five Signs That Your Shopify Store Needs SMS Advertising

Let’s take a look at five common problems that can be solved with the right SMS marketing strategy, now that we have seen the benefits.

#1 Stubborn cart abandonment rates

70% eCommerce shopping carts are abandoned. In 2020, cart abandonment was at an alarming 88%. Wow!

Surprisingly, the top three reasons for abandoning carts out of 500k text conversation were: payment issues, unexpected charges, and technical issues.

These are 8 steps you can use to take a conversational approach to cart retrieval texts.

1. Send a text message to automate cart recovery for 30 minutes after a customer abandons a cart
2. You can personalize your message by introducing you. This will set you apart from bulk SMS messages
3. Remind them of the location you are texting from
4. For further assistance, establish yourself as a point-of-contact
5. You can help them by listening to their problems and offering to help.
6. Offer an incentive to make it difficult for them not to say yes. A discount, free shipping or other payment options are all possible.
7. You can send them a shorter branded link to the checkout pages
8. Again guide them through the checkout process

It doesn’t need to be transactional. Cart recovery texts can also have great results. LEVO initiated real-time conversations with their customers after they abandoned their carts to drive 28x ROI in just one Month

Sms Marketing Bonus for Optimized Cart Recovery

If you are reeling from the revenueyou have lost in the last 30 days because of unrecovered abandoned shopping cartes, send your abandoned shoppers a message instead.

Here is a conversational and optimized template for a cart recovery SMS you can use

#2 Poor email marketing performance and low ROI

Low click-through and conversion rates are all indicators of poor email marketing performance. This means that you are not achieving the 4400% email ROI promised.

Shopify’s seamless integrations and the power of SMS marketing channels make it easy to create a two-pronged strategy that combines email and SMS.

This is the best thing about SMS. It doesn’t compete with or cannibalize your email campaigns’ efficacy, but it packs on the urgency to get your customers to take action.

Here are some examples of great omnichannel marketing campaigns that include SMS and email.

1. Day 1 – Send an email campaign to announce a product launch or a limited sitewide sale
2. 48 hours later: Customers receive a text message reminding them about the ongoing discount and driving urgency
3. 4-5 days after: Shoppers will receive a text reminder message informing them of a step-up discount, and to further encourage FOMO (fear or missing out),
4. Day 7 – Send an email campaign to let them know that the sale is over

It is a cross-channel strategy to increase urgency and boost conversions.

You will know your customers best whether you send an HTML or text-based email. You can either conduct AB testing to find out or reach out directly using two-way SMS campaigns.

Shopify’s platform allows you to have two channels working together to reach customers wherever you are. It also makes it easy to unify customer data. Shopify offers a fully managed SMS marketing application that you can use to optimize and measure your ROI.

#3 Having a hard time keeping up with customer support tickets

96% consumers have stated that customer service is the most important factor in deciding whether or not they purchase.

It doesn’t take rocket science to add the human element to personalize your customers shopping experience. It is as simple as starting a conversation.

25 eCommerce experts shared why conversational advertising could be the next big thing in 2021.

Here are the key elements that make a great customer experience different from bad.

• Multiple touchpoints are available for resolution
• Effective solutions in the first contact
• Problem solved quickly
• Customers’ time and feedback are important
• Positive customer service etiquette
• Honesty and accuracy in information
• Personal communication: No automated bots

Below are some great examples of how SMS marketing using a conversational approach to customer service can save your team’s drowning in support tickets.

You’re right if you feel like these responses are from a real person. This brings us to the next point.

#4 High Churn and Customers Disengaged

Visualize the customer journey of your brand. Is it possible to pinpoint the key touchpoints at which your customers are most likely not to follow your sales funnel?

Although we don’t mean for you to be scared, a poor customer experience can cost you and negatively impact your brand. This is what it could look like:

1. High customer turnover: A bad experience could be all it takes to convince a customer to purchase from another company.
2. Low business sustainability: Are you losing your loyal customers? Long-term viability is determined by customer lifetime value (CLTV). Loyalty and brand image are closely linked.
3. Higher customer acquisition cost: When one customer walks away, another walks in right? It’s not so. It can cost up to five times as much to acquire a new customer than to retain an existing customer.

SMS has a high open rate and immediate engagement that is superior to other channels. This makes it a crucial player in closing gaps in customer journeys and humanizing customer-brand interactions.

Two succinct phrases can sum up the situations where customers truly need your attention in customer service: pre-purchase or post-purchase.

Let’s simplify it. These are the three critical moments when customers reach out to your company and the text message that you should send.

1. Pre-Purchase – Product-specific questions or payment issues, choice paralysis, etc. – Send them a cart recover text to guide them back to their checkout to complete their purchase

1. After-purchase: Tracking and shipment updates or cancellation – Customers can message shoppers using to get a dedicated number so they can ask questions in a single conversation.

1. Post-Purchase – If your order arrived late or didn’t meet your expectations, please send a two way SMS campaign. This will re-engage customers who are inactive, verify delivery and remind them that the product is back in stock

Personalizing customer experiences is a great business strategy that will drive more customers to your business and help you keep them coming back. These conversational SMS marketing ideas will give you some inspiration.

#5 Underperforming BFCM/Seasonal campaigns

The best is saved for last. Black Friday and Cyber Monday are the largest eCommerce holidays of the year, apart from Thanksgiving and Boxing Day.

Now is the time to start offering your best discounts or best practices. You only have seven days to take advantage of the trillions in sales revenue from BFCM, so you need to make it count.

Here’s how a great seasonal strategy looks using an omnichannel multi-step approach that includes email and SMS:

• Day 1 – Send out an Sales Announcement email to notify your customers one week before sales begin. You can increase the effectiveness of a sale if you create excitement before it launches.

• Day 3 – Follow up your email with a sales announcement SMS. Here you can create a sense urgency by counting down the days until your sales start

• Day 5 To incite FOMO and drive urgency, send a Pre Sales Countdown SMS to inform them that they are available for the sales in two days. Then add items to your cart.

If your brand is interested, you could launch an early-bird sale here and send an email with a well-written email accompanying it to encourage people to buy now rather than waiting for the main sales day.

• Day 7 –Send a Start Of Sales Email and SMS, to announce the start to the sales and direct them to your website

• Day 8 – To thank them for their support, send a Closing SMS to say thanks. This opens up a communication channel that allows shoppers to message back with any questions

This strategy is not limited to the BFCM holiday. Feel free to try it during any upcoming sales to see how SMS works in your Shopify store.

Wrap up: How to use SMS for your Shopify Store

Have you decided if your Shopify shop needs an SMS marketing channel? Let’s look at 5 signs to watch out for.

1. Stubborn cart abandonment rates
2. Poor email marketing performance results in low ROI
3. It is difficult to keep up with the increasing number of customer support tickets
4. High churn rates and disengaged customers
5. Seasonal campaigns and BFCM that are not as strong as they should be

When you are building your SMS mailing list, it is important to consider CTIA and TCPA compliance. We’ve got you covered with a 10-step checklist to ensure SMS compliance.

Get started with SMS marketing today!

Conversational SMS marketing is all about creating lasting experiences out of fleeting transactions. If you haven’t explored SMS marketing’s potential this year, consider a conversational approach.

Here are some ways to make your text messages more human.

Hello, and please mention the name of your customer

Answer their questions

Show your brand’s personality

Let us know if you have any other suggestions to help

Let them understand that you are only a few words away

This is only step 5 in a step-by step guide that we wrote on How you can get SMS marketing right within 2021. Take a look at all five steps to start your SMS marketing campaign for Shopify’s 2020 store.

Article source : https://www.reconvert.io/blog/sms-marketing/