Yes, You Want to Receive SMS Ads

It just that mobile advertisers s*ck to do it properly

Have you ever got advertising straight to you SMS inbox?

Yes, I know, it’s quite disturbing. It’s like an invasion of marketers, right into your house, or worse: bedroom.

I’m one of those advertisers. Although I don’t send SMS ads anymore. I send useful stuff by SMS that you really want, but didn’t know you wanted. Huge difference.

The Traditional and Unpleasant Ad

We all got that kind of ad, haven’t you?

TODAY! — 10% off anything in-store (if you ever dare to trust us after this incursion in your private life) HATETHISSTORE.COM

The thing is that the advertiser may know who you are. May know what you like and don’t like. May know how many people live with you, if you have kids or not, etc…

But what he doesn’t know at that specific time is if you were really looking for that kind of deal. If you were not, then, that had won’t even bring you to their store. Worse, you may want to unsubscribe or even boycott their company.

By the way, you can always unsubscribe to any SMS campaign simply by replying STOP

Conclusion ? only bad things can happen from this campaign. You get to have 0.1% of the targeted users coming to your store, but 4% unsubscribe rate and one or two hate mail.

Bad.

What You Really Want by SMS

Yes, I was one of those guys. But I tested a few models and I believe I found the right way to do it.

Unless you really know the mood of your clients 24/7, you cannot helpfully push them to go to your store (or website). However, you can up-sell them while giving them useful information.

Before you ask, informing someone about your deals is not and never be helpful information.

So, what is helpful information?

Suppose you are a dry cleaner. Informing your client that their shirts are ready is helpful information.

If you are a travel agency, reminding them about their flight also is helpful information.

If you are a renovation contractor, informing the client of your arrival or departure is useful.

Ok Cool. But That is not Advertising. Or is It?

Yes, if you use that message to push a very targeted offer to your client.

Let’s take back the example of the dry cleaner. Why then not offering the client 50% off if he brings a coat to dry clean while picking up his cleaned shirts?

If you are an insurance broker, why not inform your client weeks before the end of the contrat while taking the opportunity to offer a quote on other insurance products?

Do you get it ?

I had extraordinary results using this strategy. And I’m pretty sure you’ll get the same results.

Questions ? email me david@gregoire.us

Oh, I almost forgot. Please stop sending me stupid ads on my phone.