SMS Marketing has become an incredibly powerful marketing channel for retailers and it is precisely what it sounds like – a way to connect with customers at every stage of their purchasing journey using text messages.

Retailers can use texting to send customers special promotions, mobile coupons, announce a special or event or simply encourage them to come back to your store. 

In our previous blog, Conjure Sales & Build Trust – The Magic of Mobile Marketing, we addressed some benefits and best practices of SMS marketing for retailers, including how to stay compliant. As a follow-up to that article, we will outline how to run a successful campaign and provide some examples of customer texting done well in this blog.

How to run a successful SMS campaign

Starting an SMS marketing campaign is not just a matter of deciding you want to get into this type of marketing. These campaigns require thought and attention to yield amazing results. Follow these best practices to get the most out of your next SMS marketing campaign to boost sales.

• Get permission: Encourage people to sign up for your campaign with reminder prompts, just ensure you ask for permission separately from email marketing requests.
• Keep it to the point: All of your SMS messages should stay under 160 characters as additional characters will be automatically cut off. Try AB testing to find the right mix of messaging and see what works best for your audience, but be concise. For example, do your customers like emojis, or do they find them annoying? Do they respond well when you include their first name? If so, try pairing personalization with a unique offer linked to a landing page and see if your conversion rates increase. If on the other hand, you do not see conversion rates increase, try another format until you get it right.
• Start a drip campaign: Drip campaigns are a form of marketing automation where pre-made messages are fired at specific customers when they meet your defined parameters. For example, if a customer has been subscribed to you for six months, an automated message with a special deal could be used to reward them. These types of campaigns are simple to set up and require almost no ongoing maintenance, so it’s a great way to bring automation into your business and a first step at creating a good customer experience for your customers.
• Get a short code for mass text messaging campaigns.
• Stay professional, respectful, clear, and on-brand.
• Make it clear exactly how your shoppers can benefit from your offer.

How to stay compliant

Once you tackle getting your SMS marketing automation in place and building up your list of subscribers you can start to focus on the type of campaigns you want to run. Below are a few common SMS campaigns to get you started.

Welcome your newest shoppers with a quick text. Typically, these should also include a promotion or coupon intended to encourage the shopper to return soon.

Customer service follow-up: this might be the safest and most direct way to integrate SMS marketing into your plans. It gives you the chance to check in on a recent experience or purchase to see how the customer is doing while also providing them the space to address any issues that they may have with a purchase before they take it to a review site or simply abandon shopping with you altogether. It also gives your customers the chance to select if they would like to receive SMS updates on their order once completed. When customers opt-in to receive fulfillment text messages, you can continue to upsell to boost conversions and bring in more sales, just keep it consistent and do not overdo it.

Product updates: Send shoppers updates about your most popular products or new items you have in stock. Add some urgency and combine these with promotions.

Loyalty notifications: Merge your SMS marketing with your loyalty program. This gives you the ability to notify shoppers when they earn points, redeem points, or provide exclusive benefits like flash sales, member-only events, and special offers. It also creates a sense of belonging and special treatment which means subscribers are more likely to come back to your store and make a purchase.

Personalized notes: Your SMS marketing campaign can also nurture existing client relationships by offering your shoppers personalized notes about birthdays, anniversaries, etc.

Bringing it all together

If you are looking to expand your market share while also offering your customers a faster and more secure way to receive updates about your products and events immediately, SMS marketing could be the answer you are looking for.

Keeping up-to-date with this trend will help you to adapt your eCommerce strategy quickly and get ahead of the competition. Ready to take the next step to grow your business efficiently and cost-effectively? Connect with one of our experts today to discuss your needs!

Why do people get married? Love is the obvious answer, but a number of other pragmatic factors play into it, as well. You just realize it is the best fit for you in so many ways going forward, and you choose to formalize the long-term arrangement.

Long-term relationships driven by the same dynamics can similarly blossom between eCommerce vendors and their best customers. Those “marriages” come in the form of a  Subscription Sales Model.

Almost everyone recognizes this model, even if you don’t know it by name. Dollar Shave Club enjoys huge sales as a Subscription Sales business. So do dozens of other brands like BarkBox and Blue Apron.

You may already be having substantial eCommerce success. But do you know how to add on to your existing business by embracing this emerging, lucrative channel? With the right eCommerce platform in combination with the right expertise, it can be easier than you think.

Growth Through the Roof

Conceived of and executed properly, adding a Subscription Sales option for your customer base delivers efficiency and satisfaction to both seller and buyer. According to Zuora’s Subscription Economy Index, subscription business revenue has grown 437% over the last nine years. That kind of growth, made possible by improving eCommerce models and technology, only results from an idea whose time has come.

So how can you tap into that model from your current eCommerce efforts?

Build from Strength

The search for answers begins by identifying the core parts of your business where results are strong and opportunities are apparent for regular, recurring sales. Those areas produce proven demand, and they mark the sweet spot of opportunity in the market that you can build from. The fundamentals of the value of your product and what you offer that others can’t match become the foundation for Subscription Sales successes.

Adding a successful Subscription Sales component to your eCommerce menu can feel like a trip to the promised land – it becomes a recurring revenue stream that makes customers happy and, once operational, requires little additional management oversight.

Identifying Key Functions

Settling on a pricing model that works efficiently for you and appeals to your customers may be the biggest decision that will determine your success in this process. There is no “one size fits all” option. The four most-common Subscription Sales pricing models, according to ProfitWell include:

• Fixed/flat-rate model
• Tiered pricing model
• Per unit/user model
• Usage model

What choice you make that fits best with your business operations and the products and services you offer within that selection are your business – literally. You need to make these decisions, though, with an eye to what makes the arrangement easiest for your customers while at the same time not putting you in a position to have to completely reinvent your existing business operations.

Keeping Your House in Order

If you are up and running as an eCommerce merchant already, you have made arrangements to address essential business functions. Ideally, you want the decisions you are making while implementing  your Subscription Sales offering to be compatible with how you handle those functions currently, and also to fit in smoothly with the software platform that is the foundation for your eCommerce site.

Finding the right Subscription Sales model that will integrate with operational areas like inventory control, customer data management, billing and payment options will go a long way in determining just how much benefit this new arrangement will produce for you.As a sampling of the many ways these areas can interact and produce benefits for your business, Quora has identified nine key areas that all impact how you proceed. Reviewing these,  you’ll notice how interrelated they all are as the questions that underpin eCommerce in any form. Offering Subscription Sales gives you a chance to consider the relationships in these areas if they could be in optimal alignment so you could offer your best service levels to your best customers.

Making It eCommerce

Once you commit to pursuing a Subscription Sales offering, you’ll need to look at one final major question: How will this work from the perspective of how you are doing things now?

If your operation currently runs on a platform that is open source or an SAAS offering, you have options for taking that last step to joining the ranks of Subscription Sales providers. In Part Two of this blog, we’ll discuss what those options are and what factors can help you make the best decision for your continuing eCommerce success. 

“Disruption” is a painful and ugly word anywhere in business, but particularly if you are in the world of eCommerce. Often, customers turn to eCommerce brands  because of the perceived convenience factor that comes with shopping online. But as an eCommerce merchant, what position are you in if supply chain trouble is beyond your control and is affecting your ability to fulfill orders?

COVID repercussions, the Colonial pipeline ransomware attack and even an immense cargo ship becoming wedged in the Suez Canal are all recent examples of a world experiencing uncertainty and delays as it seeks to get back to the normal we used to know. The threat of a disruptive crisis won’t ever go away, but there are smart precautions you can take to protect your customer from the worst impacts of the unexpected.

In this blog, we’ll offer tips for you that can keep disruption to your business from unraveling to the point of chaos.

It’s Still True: Forewarned is Forearmed

Most disruptive events usually have some lag time before they reach a supply chain. Being able to take advantage of even a little lead time can be a saving grace for your eCommerce operations.

If your sales strategy involves campaigns or specials, that is particularly dangerous terrain if it becomes clear that outside events are going to impact your ability to deliver. Promoting a product heading into a shortage is just throwing the door wide open to creating dissatisfied customers. When it comes to sales strategy, you need to make sure all decision-makers are on the alert for disruptive events. It would also be wise to establish a process, if you don’t already have one, for sharing red-alert information appropriately across all segments of your operation if a sudden supply issue is forming for your near-future. Market giants like Amazon are digging in hard to adapt to this mode . There’s a very good chance your eCommerce operation needs to be considering the same factors.

Be Ready with Alternatives

It’s a slippery slope if a popular mainstay product suddenly comes into short supply because of an outside event. Well-established eCommerce sites can speak from experience that customers expecting a product delivery don’t have much patience for any excuse, no matter how valid the reason may truly be. However, you can minimize this kind of trouble by being the best kind of manager for your site.

If you’ve ever been in a brick-and-mortar hardware store and come in seeking a solution to an urgent problem at home, you may have left that store holding it in even higher regard if a knowledgeable employee took the time to listen to you and then was able to recommend an even more effective alternative you were unaware of that addressed your problem. This mindset applies to digital storefronts as well. If you have developed a flexible and responsive eCommerce platform to operate from, you should have the ability to create messaging to let customers know when they encounter a popular out-of-stock item what alternative options you do have in stock that could work as a substitute. The customer may be unaware of that item or not thinking of it in terms as being a suitable alternative – if you unexpectedly fill that role for them, like the hardware store example above, you have a chance to strengthen that customer’s loyalty to your brand.

Embrace Their Problem By Helping to Own It

If no other product but the one that has been impacted by supply problems will do, strive not to just leave the customer out in the cold. If you have an expectation on when a product is likely to be back in stock, be conservative in how you deliver that information, but also if your site has the flexibility to do so, let the customer know the time frame of when you expect to have the product back in inventory. Out-of-stock events happen even in normal times and it’s estimated that when they do, it costs retailers across all channels up to $1 trillion in lost sales per year.

Even better, if your platform has the capacity on a permanent basis to capture individual customer information and preferences, investigate whether or not you have the capability to set up an alert system for the product. Promise the customer if they leave necessary information such as their name and email address, you will notify them promptly as soon as the product does become available.

The customer wins by feeling like they have at least taken one positive step towards securing a product they have a strong need for, and you win by gaining the information that not only does this customer purchase this item, but that it is a high-priority item for them. You could even turn it into a goodwill opportunity in the future, at a time when the product is back in regular supply, to offer it back to the customer at a discount as a special, acknowledging their previous painful experience. Finally, don’t forget to recognize the universality of the problem – once the supply issue starts to clear up, there will be untold number of potential customers who were missing the product for every one that you know about and can contact. Promote a restoration of product supply on your site and in your email/social media efforts. P % Co. has a great example of this. 

Not All Supply Chain Issues are Created the Same

Once you have your whole operation on alert about the acute issues caused by supply disruptions, you need continued vigilance throughout the operation as to opportunities to mitigate the problem.

Although both are likely based on logistics and transportation, an inbound supply problem can have a different solution than an outbound supply problem. Make sure your back office is looking for opportunities to clear up supply issues through all means possible. Optimally, you would rather not have to dig down into the dirt to alleviate such detail-related issues, but being unable to supply a popular item is not an optimal situation. Other companies already understand they need to do this. If you have your staff on alert for potential work-around solutions and it pays off, you’ve got a chance again to please a customer through demonstrating extraordinary effort.

Shortages for Retailers Can Be Opportunities for Etailers

A final key point is to not lose sight when a widespread product supply issue develops:you  have natural advantages by being engaged in eCommerce. Short-supply products almost always have some availability somewhere. The impacts of the pandemic over the last year have already shifted buying habits in a favorable direction for eCommerce in many sectors.

As an eCommerce brand, you aren’t tied to an operation in a fixed location. Look for opportunities to exploit that edge, and when they are solidified, don’t be shy about promoting that information on your eCommerce platform.

Conclusion

You can’t stop supply-chain disruptions from cropping up. But you can be better prepared for them. Proper planning, dexterity throughout your operations and knowing how to best utilize the flexibility built into your eCommerce platform to help customers navigate these episodes are all important solutions to be aware of as you look to keep your site’s reputation as stellar as possible for your valued customers.