Recent surveys have shown that the unprecedented spread of the pandemic has caused more customers to turn to digital self-service. Call it survival instincts or a smart way to live comfortably despite uncertain lockdown periods consumers have completely taken to virtual interaction.
More than 61% of the consumer population now feels comfortable interacting with businesses through online forums, like apps, websites, and other channels. So self-sufficient has the world become in the past two years that consumers have been faring quite well without interacting on live phone calls.
They’d rather solve their issues using several online resources. Hence, this proves that the more digitalized your marketing messages are, the greater reach you’ll have. From local setups to even a public relations agency in New York, businesses everywhere will benefit from using highly digitalized marketing techniques.
Here is a guide on how consumers prefer to receive marketing messages to help you drive greater campaigns.
Text Messages
Consumers not only prefer text message advertisements because they’re faster but also prefer real people responding to texts. Among the recent surveys, the results stated that 74% of the people prefer responding to advertisement texts from businesses when they know there’s a real person on the other side.
It’s human nature to feel more responsive towards people who introduce themselves first and show a willingness to engage with you. Hence, businesses can easily figure out how beneficial it would be to maintain an SMS marketing list.
It is also important to note that the success of an SMS marketing campaign depends on the condition that real people handle it for a business. If you opt for automatic or automated responses, you will likely lose contact with the very customers you wish to target.
Text Messages- What types of SMS should a Business Craft for their Marketing Campaign?
Now that we have established that SMS is one of the fastest and most preferred ways of receiving marketing messages, let’s look at the popular types. You must note that while surveys prove SMS is the leading medium of communication these days, not every kind of message is welcome.
Consumers will find certain favor some types of promotional messages over the others. So what are those? As statistical findings prove, customers prefer receiving marketing text messages about local businesses’ promo codes, coupons, and discounts.
You may then follow your marketing messages with loyalty offers and other benefits. Another good ideais to host virtual events and send invitations of your marketing message to consumers. This will further engage them and draw them towards your brand.
How frequently do Consumers Prefer to Receive Marketing Messages?
People spend a larger portion of their day using their phones, tablets, or laptops in current times. But often, businesses mistake this online presence by assuming that customers would love to engage with them daily. Hence, many mistakenly bombard customers’ inboxes with daily promotional messages until consumers ultimately block them.
While text messages are certainly a great way to interact, you must not allow your marketing team to bug them. The best is to avoid overloading your customers with too many messages.
Email- The Next Best Preference
Besides text messages, email is the other most preferred medium of receiving marketing messages. Consumers prefer receiving email communication instead of direct mail and push messages.
Another advantage of email is that the preference runs across different age groups, including genders. Below is a summary of the insights a couple of surveys put together on consumers’ preference for receiving marketing messages.
– Text messages are the highest preferred medium for marketing messages, but the figures are highest among the Millennials. This means that other age groups may not engage as actively.
– Emails that offer discounts and other offers tend to have a greater influence on purchasing decisions. Surveys compare that the popularity of online ads and review websites is not as high as email offers.
Perhaps one of the primary reasons consumers pay attention to brand emails is how businesses are using email technology and data. With the help of these two elements, marketers are now taking email personalization to amazing heights and increasing engagement and open rates. Segmented campaigns are particularly helpful in this regard.
Email List- Segmenting it
First of all, the whole idea of segmenting the email list is to create personalized emails. You can determine the size of your segment as per your wish, meaning it is as small or large as you like. But what truly helps is that the more targeted you make your segment, the more likely it is to resonate with your consumers,
Many businesses, especially the small-scale ones, might mistakenly assume that email segmentation is a daunting task. It isn’t so in reality, and it starts simply with the last time a purchase was made.
However, as a business’s portfolio keeps expanding, its techniques will keep refining and becoming more sophisticated. Another thing to make your email marketing campaign more successful is to realize the necessity of using data to drive it.
Businesses must compile data on each interaction they have with a customer and combine it with a consolidated view. They can then use various segmentation strategies for creating hyper-targeted lists.
Behavioral Trigger Emails are a Smart Approach
Trigger emails are truly real-time connections, especially when brands personalize those using data of what their customer is doing. In this instance, nothing is a more suitable example than trigger emails for cart abandonments.
Emailing your customers who abandoned their cart before waiting for 24 hours is equivalent to making smart use of the window of opportunity. Further personalizing the emails from the insights will drive greater conversion rates and click-through.
Final Thoughts
The majority of the consumers are digital users today. You will find people of most age groups spending the better part of their time online. Hence, delivering your marketing messages through texts and segmented emails is a good option.
Surveys also prove that consumers largely prefer marketing messages through SMS and emails, especially when a live person responds on the other end.
