Over the last year, the worldwide usage of SMS has increased in a very dramatic way. Texting became one of the top channels of communication, this is largely due the pandemic faced around the world, and due many other factors, like new generations preferring texting in lieu of calling.
Many businesses in all kinds of fields, e-shops, and service providers made SMS texting their preferred channel of direct communication with their clients, due its reliability, sense of immediacy, low cost, and amazing return of investment statistics.
But unfortunately, the amazing SMS open rates and worldwide reachability at a low cost has become a very attractive and profitable channel to criminal tricksters. The amount of scams, spam and phishing messages being sent thru SMS has increased during the last year too. As an example, messages allegedly from the most known package courier companies asking for money for delivering a package, have shown an increase of more than 200% in the entire world. Why? Because scammers are well aware that online purchases are seeing a significant growth.
Sadly, all this spam usage increase is slowly causing an impact on the average client trust when receiving promotions and text messages from businesses, and that’s why it is very important to make sure the SMS messages you send on your business’ behalf are well identified by your customers as legitimate and clean.
We’ve gathered some important points to be considered or added in your checklist prior to sending SMS marketing campaigns, along with tips from some of the best SMS marketers out there; for helping your text messages get the appropriate attention, the trust of your clients, and avoiding the audience being targeted and incorrectly categorize your SMS texts as spam:
- Send your SMS text messages with an easily recognizable sender ID.
The best advice is to use your business name, but make sure you have checked and considered the character limit restrictions. Also, in some countries, the Sender IDs need to be pre-registered, precisely to avoid scams, so don’t forget to check first which restrictions apply for Sender IDs over the targeted country.
- Only send messages to clients who have opted in to your SMS texting list.
If you send unwanted SMS messages, your business image might be at risk. Also, you might face legal repercussions if an annoyed client reports your unwanted messages to the authorities.
- Triple check the grammar, spelling, and punctuations in the text messages you send.
Grammatical errors are one of the easiest ways to identify a scam in text messages, so be impeccable and accurate in your writing style. Also, grammatical errors may give the image of an unprofessional company. Keep in mind your text messages are an extension of your company’s public image.
- Personalize the message body to address your client by their name and other personal references.
By addressing your clients by their names and other personal data, you’re making clear that you know them, and that they themselves agreed to receive SMS messages from your business. Also, people are more likely to trust messages that address them by their name, as most spam and phishing scammers do not have access to personal data, just phone number databases.
These are the basic and main tenets to cover while creating an SMS marketing campaign to avoid your SMS text messages being mistakenly taken by spam. Make sure to cover them all before sending text messages to your clients.
If you are not sure about how to start creating your SMS campaigns, or if you’re looking for a trusted bulk SMS provider, you can count on SixFive to help you build your new direct and instant communication channel in no time, and with the lowest prices in the market. Contact us now!
