Long ago, back before Twitter and Facebook were our primary channels of communication and telephone boxes graced our streets, software programmer from Reading, Neil Papworth, sent the first ever text message. The date was December 3, 1992. Two decades later, there are now around eight trillion text messages sent annually and texting has become the second most popular use of mobile phones only after checking the time.
SMS making a comeback
Whether the consumer has a smartphone or a basic mobile phone, they will all be able to receive text messages. On average, it only takes 5 seconds for a person to read a text message, plus a lot of people always carry their phones with them so they are more likely to respond straight away. Around 98 per cent of all SMS messages are opened compared to just 20 per cent of emails. Thousands of social media posts are published every day, so on average only 12 per cent of Facebook posts and 29 per cent of tweets are read. It is much more difficult for a customer to ignore a text message.
Conversation changers
The way we consume information and how we communicate is changing. We’re more visually-orientated than ever and have shorter attention spans due to most people being time-poor. The humble ‘like’ now suffices as a full response in most scenarios and the emoji is becoming more widely accepted – the term itself even making it onto the approved list in scrabble!
The rise of the messenger app
Messenger apps are arguably the most successful smartphone apps. The 10 biggest collectively boast more than three billion accounts. WhatsApp, the leader, has 700m and the number of WhatsApp messages sent every day now exceeds the number of standard texts. Last year it handled more than seven trillion messages – that’s about 1,000 per person.
The effectiveness of SMS as a marketing strategy
With more than 5 billion now owning a mobile phone, this is a huge market and a great platform for marketers to reach their audiences via SMS marketing. Although apps and geo-targeting messaging platforms have eaten up the majority of industry press in recent years, text messaging should still be the marketing channel of choice.
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