By Ridge Yusuf
Is 2022, and is not possible to avoid starting using SMS in your Marketing Strategy, if you’re not sure how or at what point of the customer journey, here you’ll find out how to begin with the segmentation basis of SMS marketing to leverage your overall strategy.
Being part of an e-commerce email marketing agency as an account manager also means to be actively researching new ways to deliver the right message to the right person at the right moment, in that research I found an interesting path to follow with SMS. Along with email, this marketing tool is exceeding expectations from what 2022 is being for, with almost 83.72% of the world’s population owning a smartphone and this channel being the fastest and easiest way to get to a younger converting audience. So where to start when it comes to segmentation?
Understanding the key objective of segmentation of engaging subscribers with relevant and personalized content should help to address the strategy you want to follow. Normally for email you will go with last 60 days profiles that open or click, however for SMS is a bit different as most of the sends imply a higher open rate due to the fact text messages are more of instant action and so on opening them, so here the first step to improve is to create a segment for you highly engaged profiles. This segment could be defined as customers who make more than 3 purchases overall time, so treating them as a VIP segment with rewards for their loyalty and constant involvement with SMS is a must.
Then we have medium to lower engagement customers, more based on their purchasing behavior and not with the SMS engagement. For customers who have made at least a purchase in the past but not very recently, you can use a timeframe of 90 days. In these cases, a win-back offer is needed to re-engage and convert, like free shipping. The last group is what I could call the existent profiles but less engaged and never made a purchase, this requires the most aggressive discounting strategy, here you can try to give a bonus a higher discount, or a freebie using social proof.
A very insightful note here for you to take into account when it comes to the SMS segments we talked about above is to not generalize between tools, what can be working for a customer via email could not be the same in SMS. Make sure to not set profiles apart and just developed a different strategy for each one according to the level of engagement, and how much more this can be personalized.
Segmentation for SMS in 2022 shouldn’t be a worrying part of your overall strategy, as easiest as implementing the key of having the audience receive a text message relevant and personalized within their preference, demographics, actions, and any other info you have and can be used. For example, if you’re launching a new line of hair care for blonde hair, anyone who has browsed or purchased a shampoo with that characteristic should receive a text message about the launch based on their previous interest. Even better, you can give them early access to shop first, or include a travel size product with their purchase. This will make them feel listened and their engagement will increase.
Achieving your brand’s goals will ultimately be the decision-maker in implementing segmentation strategies based on your list of SMS subscribers and the data you’ve had collected. However, if you’re not sure how to analyze this information our SMS Marketing Agency can help you and leverage your overall strategy.
