Mass Texting Services: What They Are and How to Leverage Them
Leverage these innovative opportunities and strategies for a mass texting service to increase ROI and your business’s bottom line.
If you’re reading this, you’re probably already texting your customers. And that means you also know there are some steps you need to take as you get ramped up. Getting the required consent (“opt-in”) from your customers can sometimes be a challenge, and mass text systems can be complicated. Not to mention, if your mass texting campaigns aren’t handled delicately, your scheduled text promotions can frustrate customers when done the wrong way.
Sometimes, it can feel so overwhelming that it may tempt you to pull the plug on text messaging services altogether. However, when SMS marketing is used effectively, a bulk SMS or mass texting service can strengthen relationships with customers by inviting engagement (responses to your mass text).
The key?
Knowing how to use a bulk text messaging service effectively to send messages that get results.
75% of consumers want to receive offers via SMS marketing—but they need to have the autonomy to opt in first. By giving you the right tools, mass text messaging can help you tap into the power of text message marketing by initiating hundreds of impactful interactions. Text marketing can also significantly enhance the promotional and drip campaigns you currently run.
What is a Bulk Texting Service?
A mass texting service is a platform of SMS marketing tools that empower businesses to mass text message their customers at scale. Strategically executed SMS marketing helps you reach your customer base all at once or connect with select groups within that base via group messaging features.
An effective mass texting service powers multiple conversation threads simultaneously, encouraging continued engagement. Additionally, implementing an intuitive bulk SMS and scheduled text message marketing platform makes it easy by bringing all of the interactions into one easy-to-use inbox.
Is Bulk Texting Legal?
In short, yes, as long as you’re complying with the laws, rules, and regulations (see more about some of those rules and regulations here) that apply to your situation, including where your business and our customers are located. You should always be aware of what rules apply to your business to make sure you send SMS messages compliantly.
Something else to keep in mind is that texting—whether it’s bulk SMS, group messaging, or mass texting—is a more intimate form of communication. This can sometimes feel more invasive than other forms of communication. Text messages appear directly on a person’s phone, whether they are at home, at work, asleep, awake, on a date with friends, or sharing a personal moment with family. Because of this, as well as the various laws that apply to texting messaging, local businesses should always use SMS text marking thoughtfully, and ethically.
To use SMS marketing in a compliant and thoughtful way, you should always be transparent with those you’re contacting with mass text messaging and only send text blasts to people who have “opted-in” (that is, provided prior express consent) to receive text message marketing from you. If you’re in the United States, this involves abiding by the rules set out by the Telephone Consumer Protection Act and other similar regulations, including those that apply at the state and local levels. Other countries and locations have their own mass text marketing laws that may apply and which you should be aware of when mass texting.
For example, spamming customers is a poor text marketing practice and carries repercussions. Not only can it severely damage customer relationships and trust, but spamming them with mass texts can also result in hefty fines or other penalties. It’s, therefore, crucial that you only send texts to contacts who have opted-in to receive promotional SMS messages from your business.
SMS marketing in a compliant way doesn’t have to be complicated—you just need to know what to watch out for, put your customers first, and use the right texting app or text messaging service.
Bulk Texting Starts With Segmentation
A key aspect of using a bulk SMS text messaging service is the ability to send the kind of text messaging that converts well every time. This starts with segmenting your customer base into the appropriate customer profiles, so you can group text the most relevant promotions. Proper customer segmentation can increase customer loyalty, identify new opportunities for products and support, and significantly enhance your customer service, customer experience, and mass text blasts.
There are several different customer segmentation models you can use in your text message marketing, including:
- Demographic segmentation (age, gender, income)
- Geographic segmentation (country, state, city)
- Psychographic segmentation (personality, values, interests)
- Technographic segmentation (mobile vs desktop use, apps)
- Behavioral segmentation (tendencies and frequent actions, feature/product use)
To segment your customers, first determine your customer segmentation goals—what you hope to achieve and accomplish. Next, segment your customers. After targeting and reaching them, analyze your segments and make adjustments to ensure your text marketing has the best impact.
Dividing your customers into buckets for bulk SMS promotions and mass text messaging takes time and research, but it’s well worth the effort. As you adjust and analyze accordingly, you’ll be able to send the right text blast every time.
How to Not Sound Like a Bot
A key component of using a mass texting system is to sound humanlike instead of sounding like a bot. Today’s consumers crave personalization in their brand interactions. They want to feel like a real person at your business is contacting them and only them. If you want your threads to feel like individual interactions, it’s critical to make your SMS marketing messages as personal as possible.
You can do this by including personal details in your SMS text messages, and marketing, according to those details. For example, Ryan wants to be sent a promo message with a special discount relevant to her last purchase, made on her birthday, addressed specifically to her.
When sending mass messages, you should anticipate customer wants and needs by considering the following:
To make this easier, tie your batch text SMS messaging software in with your CRM database. With the right templates, you can send text messages that sound, and feel, personalized with very little effort on your part.
Collecting Opt-ins Efficiently
Many businesses find maximizing their marketable SMS messages list to be the hardest part of SMS marketing. But it doesn’t have to be. If you’re already mass texting your customers, there are a number of touchpoints along your customer journey where collecting an SMS text opt-in is natural–and even expected. If you take advantage of them, your contact list can build itself.
It’s important to receive mass text opt-ins at multiple entry points so you are consistently growing your contact list and your ability to nurture those contacts into transactions.
7 Best Mass Texting Service Tools
To help you optimize your text messaging drip campaigns, we’ve compiled seven of the best text messaging services–in no particular order—that can help make mass texting easier, more efficient, and more effective.
SimpleTexting
A great option for small businesses, SimpleText is a text messaging app that makes text message marketing more accessible with a great price point and flexibility.
TextMagic
Offering international compatibility, the ability to use text-to-speech, and flexible pay-as-you-go price plans, this SMS service helps businesses send messages to their customers across the globe (200 countries and counting)–at an affordable rate.
Sakari
This mass texting service is ideal for those mainly in need of outbound mass texting services at a cost-effective price point. It also offers automated workflows and integration with tools like Zapier, Hubspot, and Slack.
SlickText
SlickText helps service-based businesses win over their contact list with loyalty programs, text messaging automation technology, MMS messaging, and beyond.
Podium
For those focusing on generating local business—like car dealerships, for example—Podium’s mass texting services make sending messages to your customers easy and efficient. Known for its remarkable AI Employee technology, user-friendly UI, and audience segmentation capabilities, it’s great for growing businesses.
Twilio
Offering no-code options, Twilio is a mass texting service for sending texts and creating an ideal text messaging user experience for business owners without developers or dev expertise.
Salesmsg
While minimal in its design, Salesmsg offers integrations with major CRMs and a free trial. It’s only available in the U.S. and Canada, but it’s a great option for smaller budgets.
EZ Texting
A solid group messaging and individual texting app, EZ Texting is a mass texting service ideal for small businesses that aren’t as comfortable with tech. It offers an attentive, pleasant customer service team and even a free trial.
Once you select a mass texting service, it’s essential to understand and follow mass text tips and best practices that apply to any SMS or MMS marketing strategy.
Some Bulk Texting Best Practices
Once you build your opt-in list within your CRM and text messaging service, it’s time to send compelling SMS and MMS messages. But using mass text messaging in a compelling way takes work.
In order to successfully mass text message your customers, there are a few mass texting best practices you should keep in mind.
Do:
✅ Use conversational language. To appeal to your customers, keep messages light-hearted, short, and conversational—just like you’re talking to a friend. And yes, you can include emojis to keep the conversation personal and informal! 😎😘🙌
✅ Take advantage of last-minute impulses. Keep in mind that sales and events promotions are most effective when they’re last-minute impulses. If you have an event on Wednesday night, consider sending the message as late as Wednesday afternoon.
✅ Send during business hours. If your customer receives a promo at 4:00 am, they won’t be happy. Send texts during the hours people are regularly working to respect your customers’ privacy and increase a human-like feel.
✅ Make messages multimedia. Multimedia messages are engaging. Include images, gifs, and links to keep customers interested!
✅ Respond in real-time. A seven-hour delay in response time doesn’t feel like a real conversation—it feels like a bot. Try to respond as quickly as possible to avoid disengagement and increase connectivity.
Don’t:
❌ Send too frequently. Inundating your customers with messages leads to frustration and “STOP!” replies.
❌ Ignore opt-in and opt-out rules. Failure to comply with applicable laws and rules undermines trust and damages your reputation. Only message customers who have opted in, and make sure to respect their decisions. 61% of customers say they would unsubscribe from promotional messaging if they received messages they didn’t recall signing up for.
❌ Forget to identify yourself. Try to do this creatively with each successive message so it doesn’t get old. You might try, “This is Katie and Bean & Bon!” “We’re so excited you love your Bean & Bon stroller!” “Katie, Bean & Bon: (message)”
How to Track and Improve Your Mass Texting
It’s crucial to keep an eye on how your text campaigns are performing and monitor how your audience is responding to your messages. Are your customers engaging more or less? What is your open and response rate?
Consider the following scenarios:
- Low engagement? Try multimedia messaging and promotions (MMS).
- Frequent unsubscribes? Increase value by personalizing each message further, only sending content that is relevant, and possibly reducing your frequency.
- Low sales? Send a personalized promotion to past customers for products related to the season or something they’ve purchased recently.
- High engagement? Beef up your website offerings (blog sections, etc) and include more text links to increase your website traffic.
- High sales? Run a referral campaign to multiply the mass amounts of business you’re getting! (And well done, you! 😉)
An important part of monitoring is using a platform that will track and deliver the valuable data that you need. With small tweaks and consistent feedback on what you’re doing well and what isn’t working, you can find the sweet spot that will maximize the potential of your bulk text marketing.
Get Started Free with Podium
Using a mass texting service can be the key to your next-level marketing. And now, with Podium’s suite of free messaging tools—and our intuitive AI Employee—there’s no reason not to try it. See rapid success by installing a free Webchat on your website, texting your customers, and sending your first promotion to up to fifty subscribers free. Additionally, when you integrate our AI Employee, your business acquires a 24/7 expert who responds immediately to customers and feels like speaking with a real person.
Schedule a demo today to see what your new AI Employee can do.
