Business Texting 101: What Is It and How You Can Use It To Expand Your Business

Every business needs at least one thing to survive: customers. Maintaining a solid customer base is a prerequisite of doing business in any industry. Communicating effectively with your customers is crucial for any business’s success - big or small.

There are many ways a business can communicate with their customers, including email and phone calls. Another option is texting customers through SMS campaigns. Incorporating business SMS can be a much better option than traditional methods of reaching customers.

People nowadays are always on their phones, with the average American checking their phone 47 times a day! It makes sense to contact them directly, a way that gets them engaged right from the get-go. However, there’s more to business texting than just texting your customers and telling them about your offers.

In this article, we’ll go over what business texting is, why it’s important, and explore how Salesmsg can help you get started with business texting for your company today.

What is Business Texting?

A text messaging service used specifically for business purposes is called business texting. Business texts are sent from company representatives to prospects and customers. Once established, a text messaging service can offer two-way communication between business employees and customers. This direct communication makes it convenient for businesses to reach customers and allow customers to respond to them directly using their phone.

Businesses can leverage the power of SMS by sending reminders, appointments, discounts and alerts through SMS. These SMS are an effective form of marketing as it allows you to send mass texts to your contacts and can be automated or scheduled in advance. Business owners can maintain consistency, always be available and have a more direct relationship with their customers.

A business text is different from standard SMS and usually managed through business text messaging services. Using a professional business texting service is better than sending texts manually or using social media apps as they are much more secure and versatile.

Is Texting Acceptable in Business?

You may be concerned about using text as a form of marketing as it might be too personal and irks potential customers. But, the reality is far from it. Recent data shows that customers want to be contacted by brands and stay updated.

According to Attentive Mobile Consumer Report, 91% of people say they want to sign up for business text messages, with 55.9% already signed up for a brand they like.

Nowadays, with a vast sea of businesses on the market, it’s not surprising to see customers wanting a more personal and direct relationship with select brands. More than 69% of customers would prefer interacting with businesses. Without business texting, you might be missing out on potential leads.

Despite these reports, we’ve all been at the receiving end of getting texts we don’t like. Whether that’s spam messages, brands excessively self-promoting, promoting political agendas, or companies guilt-tripping you for charitable donations. If done wrong, business SMS can have the opposite effect and push your customers further away.

To ensure you make the most out of your SMS marketing campaigns, remember to keep these things in mind:

• Avoid any form of spam, excessive promotions, promoting political agendas, or over asking for donations.
• Make sure your text messages are TCPA compliant. Using a TCPA-compliant business text messaging service like Salesmsg will help keep you in the clear.
• Customers and employees should be willing to be sent texts and have the opportunity to opt out anytime.
• You cannot send messages to customers without their consent. Salesmsg can enable you to gather contacts by setting up text-to-join campaigns.
• If your employees use business SMS for cross-communication, set established boundaries to keep things professional.

Sticking to these best practices will guard your business against issues with customers, employees, or the law.

What is the Importance of Using Business Text Messaging?

Business texting can allow you to streamline your marketing efforts. In this fast-paced business world, people are constantly on the move, which makes a direct marketing channel like texting an ideal way of communication. Here are some benefits of using business text messaging for your brand.

Business Texting is More Effective Than Emails and Phone Calls

If you’ve been sending emails and calling prospects all day with no results, you’re not alone. Traditional marketing methods such as calls and emails are slowly getting crushed by SMS.

Business texts have a 98% open rate compared to only 20% of email. Emails might be sent to the spam, promotions, or social folder, where they probably won’t be read.

It’s no secret that many Millennials would rather run a mile in extreme heat than answer a phone call. Texting is their preferred form of communication, which is why SMS response rates are 295%. Sure, not everyone avoids their phone when it rings. People may be too busy to answer. The beauty of texts is that they can be seen or answered at the receiver's convenience.

They Offer a Direct Way of Communicating with Customers

Using SMS is a way of establishing a close relationship with your clients. As people are on their phones most of the day, you can guarantee to reach your customers directly. Since 70% of people with a phone use SMS, you can ensure your text will be received by customers.

With business texting you can talk directly to your customers and respond to them in real-time. This feature will enable you to have more natural conversations with your customers and improve your overall image.

They Are Sent and Responded to Quicker

SMS marketing is preferred over other channels to convey information, and for a good reason. 90% of all SMS are opened within 5 minutes of receiving them, which makes them ideal for conveying important or sensitive info such as OTPs and 2FAs.

Compare this with calls that go unanswered and emails that get lost under piles of other emails. Since business SMS is a more direct approach to marketing, the chances that your messages are opened, read, and responded to are higher.

Customers Want to be Updated About Their Favorite Brands

Let’s face it, people nowadays have a lot of choices which is why it takes them forever to make a decision. What to eat, where to go, and how to get there, are never-ending questions.

People would appreciate being messaged by brands to get an idea of the options available to them. Business texting is growing as 75% of millennials prefer being sent SMS from their favorite brands and businesses. If you’re looking to grow your customer base you should be meeting the needs of your customers and offering an SMS subscription to stay updated on your brand.

SMS Marketing Saves Time and Money

If you wish to make the most from running SMS campaigns, you’ll need to send a lot of messages to a lot of clients. Manually sending hundreds of messages every day can be exhausting, time-consuming, and tedious. Using alternative marketing methods, such as running PPC campaigns and Social Media Advertising, can be costly and harder to maintain. Using a tool like Salesmsg will help you scale your marketing as you can send mass texts to multiple customers in seconds. Using an automation software like Salesmsg beats manually sending texts and makes it easy to send and receive bulk messages.

Better Communication Between Customers and Businesses

Using Automated business texts ensures your business is always available. Even when your business is closed, you can set up auto-replies to respond to customer queries, which ensures your customers get the best experience.

You can go beyond setting auto-replies and can even set up answers to common queries helping your customers get the information they need.

How Businesses Use Business Texting

We’ve covered business texting and its usefulness, but how does it all look when implemented? Business texting is used in multiple ways and adapted to each unique business.

For example, if a retail store ships items to consumers, it would benefit from setting up delivery and tracking messages. The same can’t be said about a service-based business, such as a mechanic, since they do not use shipping to run their business.

Below are some ways businesses use business texting to make the most of their marketing.

Customer Support

Customer support is perhaps the most crucial aspect of any business’s success. Without good customer support, the likelihood of losing customers is higher, putting your business at risk. In today’s business world, leveraging good customer support is essential to staying above your competitors.

Setting up business texting to auto-reply to user queries can help your customers get their answers fast. Using SMS to reach users can leave a positive impact and help you build better relationships.

Customer Surveys and Feedback

Customer surveys and feedback can help you get first-hand data to improve your products and customer experience. Conducting customer surveys and collecting feedback can be costly and extremely time-consuming.

Business texting allows you to reach a greater audience in seconds through mass texts and automatic text scheduling. Using SMS is ideal for conducting research through customer surveys and feedback. You will have higher participation giving you more data.

Setting Up Reminders

Reminders are one of the most appreciated types of text messages that customers receive from businesses. Since most SMS are read within 5 minutes, setting up reminders or alerts will help inform your customers with important information. Conveying this information automatically is time-efficient for your business and helps you avoid customer complaints, issues, and disputes in the future.

Set Up Automated Responses

Automated responses are the most successfully utilized features of text messaging services for businesses. Setting up automated responses has a bundle of benefits for businesses to keep them on top of every query or complaint.

Having automated responses enabled for your business will reduce the work burden on the customer support and sales team. As most people are usually satisfied talking to a chatbot, only specific queries will reach the customer support team. With less traffic, your customer support teams have more time to focus on more pressing issues, increasing efficiency and leading to more happy customers.

Offer Discounts and Promotions

When customers are prompted to join your SMS subscriptions, they usually expect some benefit in return. The best way to catch your customers’ attention is through offering discounts and promotions. Dollar-off discounts prompt users to eagerly sign-up for your SMS subscription. 

Businesses then use these contacts to promote their services and update their contact lists for upcoming promotions.

Is Business Texting Right for You?

Before diving into using business texting for your brand, you need to assess a few things. Consider whether or not you and your customers will benefit from SMS. SMS marketing might seem perfect, but it’s important to look at the stats and context of your business rather than speculating.

Sending mass texts and running SMS campaigns can be costly. Before spending hundreds and thousands of dollars on your marketing budget, you need to ask yourself a few questions:

• What is your current engagement rate with other marketing methods? If your current marketing methods are ineffective, assess why that’s the case. It may be an underlying issue rather than bad marketing.
• Who is your target audience? Do you focus on B2B or B2C?
• What would be the expected ROI for using business texting for your brand?
• Will your business benefit more from SMS or MMS

Knowing the answers to the above can help you make a calculated decision on using Business texting for your brand. It will also reduce the risk of making a bad decision and save a lot of headaches in the future.

How to Set Up Business Texting for Your Brand

To get started with business texting, you need a professional number. Having a professional number will help you remain TCPA-compliant, help you stand out as a business, and build trust between you and your customers.

When choosing a number for setting up business texting, you have two options:

• Short Code
• Long Code

Short Code

A short code is a unique 4-9 digit phone number for business texting. You can use a business text messaging service like Salesmsg to easily set up a short code for your business. Short codes serve a specific purpose. They are easier to memorize and can handle higher volumes of messages (100 messages per second).

Short codes can handle bursts of mass texts and can contact multiple people at the same time. Short codes are better for more time-sensitive information such as alerts, OTPs, 2FAs, and verification messages.

Long Code

Long codes are your standard 10-digit phone numbers for sending and receiving voice calls and text messages. Long codes allow you to send A2P messages to local and international phone numbers, which helps your customers quickly recognize you, limiting mistaking your message as spam.

Long codes are better for longer messages and two-way communication with your customers. With two-way communication, your customers have the ability to respond directly with your business rather than with an automated service. Some people prefer knowing they’re talking to a human being. This type of direct communication limits the number of customers that can be contacted at a time. An example of this is sitting on hold waiting to talk to a representative. The representative is using a long code phone number and is limited to how many people they can communicate with.

What number you should use for your business depends on how you intend to send and receive business texts. Usually, businesses have both types of numbers so that they have multiple ways for customers to reach and contact them.

What are the Features You Should Look for in a Business Text Messaging Service?

A business text messaging service is crucial to setting up business texting and maximizing your SMS potential. When small business owners and startups don’t invest in a good text messaging service for business, they miss out on opportunities to engage with their customers.

A professional business text messaging service is better than using social media apps such as WhatsApp or Facebook Business. These platforms lack the features you need to scale your business operations and aren’t entirely secure. You need to make sure you have a platform for the long run, something that can integrate with your current workflow.

Choosing a good messaging service for business is vital as it would streamline your SMS marketing efforts. 51% of marketers are guilty of not utilizing the full potential of their SMS marketing campaigns. Effectively implementing business texting can do you a lot of good.

Here are some of the features you should look for in a good business text messaging service:

Keeps Information Safe and Secure

People value their privacy and are susceptible to having their personal information stolen. Messenger apps like Facebook and WhatsApp are already facing issues regarding data privacy after having multiple complaints filed against the social media giants.

You cannot afford to compromise on security. It may be cheaper at first, but you run the risk of getting into a lot of legal problems with your customers. Jeopardizing your customers' privacy could impact your business.

Easy-to-Use and Integrates with Other Platforms

Time is of the essence when it comes to business and shouldn't have to be spent trying to learn a new tool. Using a tool with a steep learning curve or a complicated interface can confuse your employees and cause them to be unproductive due to the difficulty.

Instead, you should choose an app with a simple and easy-to-understand interface so all your team members can work effectively. Also, having a text messaging service that integrates with your current workflow makes a big difference.

Salesmsg is perfect for this as it provides users with a simple dashboard and integrates with popular platforms, including; Zappier, HubSpot, Marketo, and many more.

Allows You to Scale Your SMS Marketing

Small to medium-sized businesses use business texting due to its low maintenance and manageable costs. As your business expands, a text messaging tool that helps you scale is vital. You don't want to run the risk of losing your contact list because you reached the max amount of contacts available through your business texting service.

Great tools like Salesmsg offer a large number of features, making it perfect for businesses of all sizes. With unlimited contacts, segmented inboxes, and the ability to send mass texts and automated responses, Salesmsg grows with you.

Why You Should Pick Salesmsg as Your Business Text Messaging Service

Salesmsg is the best business SMS messaging tool of 2022, thanks to its wide range of features, flexibility, and functionality. Many businesses use Salesmsg to integrate their workflow and manage all their contacts in one convenient space.

There are many reasons why businesses choose Salesmsg:

It’s Simple to Use

Salesmsg offers a simple dashboard to manage all your contacts in one place. Switching between different tools and platforms can be time-consuming and leads to mistakes. Salesmsg imports all your contacts, accurately labels your inboxes, and allows your team two-way communication to interact with your clients.

With seamless two-way communication and dedicated inboxes with unlimited contacts to segment people, Salesmsg makes it easy for your employees to use the tool so you can start reaping the benefits of business texting as soon as possible.

Safe and Secure

SMS is growing at an accelerated rate, which means more opportunities for online hackers and scammers to exploit people. By integrating your contacts with Salesmsg, you can use your company name on outgoing calls to avoid getting blocked as a scam and increase customers' trust.

Salesmsg follows TCPA compliance texting standards to keep you safe from lawsuits. 44% of firms using business texting are unaware of TCPA standards which puts them at the risk of illegal operations.

Salesmsg is verified under ISO/IEC 27001, securing data with encryption support. Opt-out management, double opt-in, and many other features ensure a full advantage of your SMS marketing campaigns while keeping your customers information safe.

Private and Shared Inboxes

Having the opportunity of segmenting your inboxes will help effectively manage your contacts and maintain consistent communication. With Salesmsg, you can keep inboxes private or shared depending on your preferences.

Encourage team collaboration with shared inboxes and keep track of individual performances by assigning private inboxes to your employees.

Multiple Phone Number and Short Code Options

Having multiple phone numbers is essential as every business uses business texting for different purposes. Salesmsg gives you multiple phone numbers and short code options. You can:

• Text from your existing business landline allowing you manage your contacts better
• Access to toll-free numbers looks more professional and gives a better perception of your business in the customers minds
• Find a local phone number with the appropriate area code for your business to engage customers on a personal level

Painlessly Automate and Schedule Your Business Messages

The main advantage of using business texting is to automate and schedule your business messages. Having Salesmsg by your side allows you to auto-reply to messages sent during after-work hours, keeping your customers engaged 24/7.

You can schedule messages to contacts at a later date and time and save time by setting up answers to frequently asked questions with accordion response templates.

Interested in skyrocketing your SMS campaigns? Get your 14-day free trial with Salesmsg to get started.

Conclusion

Leveraging SMS marketing helps businesses engage better with their customers and can be simple to utilize. Business texting can be used to schedule messages, mass-text customers, and communicate in real-time.

Nowadays, people are always on their phones and crave a deeper relationship with the brands they love making SMS an ideal mode of communication. Many SMS marketing platforms offer business text messaging services. Salesmsg has tapped into what features assist business owners the most.

With its versatile features, it's no wonder why top brands like HubSpot, ClickFunnels, and Crossfit use Salesmsg

Try Salesmsg for your business for free today.