Text has officially taken over, SMS and Email marketing is the future. With over 3.8 billion global smartphone users, the total text open rate is 95%, with an average of being opened within 3 minutes!
With regards to emails, they have a rough estimate of 21.33% across all industries. This does not mean that you should forget about email marketing, as there are still a whopping 4 billion email users worldwide. In order to have a successful marketing strategy, you should incorporate both SMS marketing and email marketing, as they both offer various benefits for your business.
Let’s take a closer look at the pros and cons of both SMS and Email Marketing
The Pros of Email Marketing:
- High ROI
Email marketing is considered one of the most affordable marketing channels currently available. - Customers Expect to Receive Emails
These days, it is expected to receive a welcome or thank you mail after making an online purchase. Research shows that 8 out of every 10 people willingly open emails, and that they expect their favourite brands to send them the occasional promotional email. Receiving these branded emails is one of the most popular ways people learn about new sales or offerings. - Automation
When it comes to email marketing, the automation options are endless! You have the freedom and the tools to automate entire campaigns, while you can also personalise them with the help of templates. You can auto-populate these templates to easily have the email system input the customer’s name or the specific product they purchased.
The Cons of Email Marketing:
- Low click-through and open rates
With the average email open rate sitting at only 20%, as a result of most inboxes being filled with spam. This tends to demotivate people from opening their emails, and rather click delete. Your email can also be flagged as spam, even though it is not, and will end up in their spam folder instead of popping up in their inbox
The Pros of SMS Marketing:
- Your SMS will be seen
SMSs have a very high open rate of 98%! There truly is no other marketing channel that can deliver a higher open rate. Having a mobile phone means that you can easily send and receive emails while on the go! Hearing your message notification will immediately make customers aware that they have received a message, which will prompt them to open, and likely respond! - Messaging is preferred
Most people choose messaging as their preferred communication method, while also preferring to communicate with businesses over messaging instead of over a phone call. They find this way of communication less stressful, as they have the freedom of choosing when to open and respond to the messages. It is much more personal compared to emails.
The Cons of SMS Marketing:
- Intrusive
Although SMSs are super effective, they can come across as intrusive. Many people do not appreciate or respond to messages outside of business hours.
- Limits
With emails, there are almost no limits when it comes to length and formatting. Alternatively, SMSs do present issues as there are size and multimedia limits. Some SMS marketing services make use of MMS messages as they can be longer and even divided into several messages and can include various types of multimedia.
Why You Should Use SMS and Email Marketing Together
- You can focus on and improve the metrics that matter
- Cross-channel marketing will have a higher reach and improve brand awareness
- Cart abandonment rate will be significantly lower
Consider using both of these strategies in your next marketing campaign!
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This article was originally published on: https://www.podium.com/article/email-sms-marketing/
