To date there are over 5.3 billion mobile phones being used worldwide, and every single one of them has text messaging capabilities. Only recently has SMS marketing become a major and effective form of direct marketing, but there are already major shifts on the way.
About half of the mobile phones in the US are “feature phones,” which means their text messaging technology is limited to only sending and receiving text. The other half are smartphones that can send and receive text, images, videos and links.
With close to a million smartphones being activated daily, SMS marketers are realizing that it's time to upgrade their marketing strategy to include more interactive campaigns and really utilize the capabilities of the smartphone.
A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words. . . and the Increased ROI
In a text message there's only room for 160 characters, which includes necessary verbiage about opting out and getting help. When it comes to including an image, a picture is really worth the increased ROI, not just a thousand words. It has been confirmed time and time again that our brains are wired to retain and recall visuals better than written content, making an SMS campaign with images significantly more effective.
Additionally, when a user receives a text ad, they open it but don't necessarily read it. However, with an image included, the user instantly sees the picture and will be more likely to read the text since they are already being engaged. A study recently revealed that mobile users have an attention span of only a few seconds when it comes to mobile ads, proving even further how important a visual aspect is in mobile ads.
Mobile Commercials Direct to Consumers
Another SMS capability smartphone technology provides is the ability to receive videos within a text message. This allows for marketers to deliver commercials directly to each consumer, and even show different ads to groups of consumers based on their targeting. You've probably seen different edits of the same commercial on TV based on what channel you're watching, and that's due to the extremely poor targeting broadcast advertising provides.
Generally people believe that commercials are effective, but advertisers don't get much quantifiable data from their TV ads. When advertisers SMS video ads, however, they would receive real stats about how many users watched the video and even better, how many responded. Additionally, the cost of sending out SMS video ads is immensely lower than broadcast time and doesn't fluctuate based on when you choose to engage the consumer.
A Link to Limitless Possibilities
Going beyond an image and video, marketers now have the ability to include a link inside a text message that can be accessed with a single tap. This technology opens the door to unlimited creativity and the consumer can be redirected to much more interactive and engaging mobile pages. With one SMS, the user can be taking a survey, playing a game, watching videos, providing their contact information, viewing your mobile site, and getting directions to your location. Through one tap of this link, the user can even be taken directly to the advertiser's app download page and download their app.
Many studies have shown that the more interactive the ad experience is for the user, the better the results and follow-through are. Taking advantage of this shift in smartphone availability and usage is key to making an SMS campaign a success. Just the increase in trackable results is enough to better optimize the marketing strategy and target each user with the appropriate ad experience.
"A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words. . . and the Increased ROI" - lol... good one! nicely written and conveyed!