Anyone doing offline marketing via SMS? A question for you...

It would also be hard to build a relationship with your list via sms because of the limit space.

Also, a lot of people including myself will get annoyed after a while when someone markets to them via sms. A little too intrusive I think but then again sms marketing is still very new and very sensitive but I'm sure marketers will figure out how to effectively use it and it will be big.

just my 2 cents, oh and congrats on getting your feet wet with the offline thing. Exciting isn't it?

Cheers

I want to clear a few things up here. First off SMS or Mobile Marketing is Opt-in. You have a marketing method, say for example a table tent at a local eatery. On the table tent it says something like:
"Join our VIP club and get 10% off your next meal with us. Simply text "VIPEATS" to 78569 to receive your Confirmation and Discount Coupon."
So the person sitting there says "Hey that's a good deal and they go ahead and join. Immediatly after texting they receive a response asking them to confirm that they have signed up for the VIPEATS club, he sends a text back to confirm and then another text comes Saying "Congratulations and welcome to the Club. Here is your 10% off coupon. Please show it to your Server"
So that person saw an add with an incentive attached to it to join a list, he took action and double confirmed he wanted to join. On every text he gets there is also removal instructions at the end of the text. Stating simply to text "STOP" to be removed at any time.
So the person uses his coupon get's 10% off and leaves happy. A couple of days later he get's another text letting him now about another discount or special event to entice him to return to the business and be a repeat customer. Again he has the option to be removed from the list with each email.
If done right and not abused i.e. a new text every 10 mins for example. You can build a loyal list of customers or contacts or perspective clients etc... And none of them where spammed and they can all get off the list at anytime. The regulatory laws in the U.S. are very strick and for good reson.
Sms Mobile Marketing has been grwoing every year since it's introduction into the market. The industry projections thru 2012 are for exponential growth. Right now there are more cell phone users than people with computers.
Another added benefit of some Mobile Marketing plans out there is the added bonus of the message scheduler. You can set up text message campaigns in advance of up to 2 years. Every message can be delivered not only on a specific date but at a specific time. In another post a Warrior mentioned how he would not be happy getting a marketing text at 3AM. No worriesd about that anymore.
Go back to the eatery example. Now that business woner can send out a message blast to her list at 4:15Pm on a Friday with a special Happy Hour Discount Coupon for that day. People get the message and The Bar business that Friday sees a considerable increase in business.
Any bsuiness can benefit from Mobile Marketing. In time more people will understand it's capabilities and potential, and more business owners and savy Offline Marketers will use Mobile Marketing as a low cost, cutting edge way of building new customers and clients and retaining existing ones!
Ok I am going to get off the soap box now.

Cheers!
Robert

The limitation of the 160 characters can be problematic in trying to get a lot of info across even if you use short text like "c u latr" etc... The best way to get as much info across as possible is to set up a .mobi site and then have a link in the marketing text. The user clicks on the embedded link and is taken to a website that is optimized for cell phone viewing.
.mobi is the domain extension that is used for mobile sites like .com or .net is used for normal pc sites. The .mobi site can have as much text as you want, you can have audio and or video. Plus there are future expansions and development to make mobile sites more interconnected and social.
I use the original 160 characters as a call to action to click the link and visit the .mobi site. Much easier to do that than to squeeze in an entire offer or program update notice. Users can browse .mobi sites and get directions to locations, contact info, see pictures etc... Even the plumber mentioned above could benefit from Mobile Marketing and having a .mobi site.
Someone is driving down the road and sees the plumbers van. On the side of the van is his company name and phone number then there is a message to text "mypipes" to 89578 for more info. The person sends the text message and gets back an immediate response to there cell phone. It thanks them for their interest and instructs them to click the link for more details. They click away and go to the plumbers .mobi site where they can see more info about his company, maybe testimonials from past clients, pictures of his waerhouse and facilities or of all the parts he stocks in his truck. He can also list estimates for different types of jobs.
There is no single business or market that could not benefit from Mobile Marketing. Hope that helps!

Cheers!
Robert

I spoke to a london marketing company that specializes in sms marketing to businesses. However they charge a substantial fee to set everything up and that plus their smallest test would have run to 5 figures so I decided that I'd too use my marketing budget elsewhere.

Rich

Brilliant! Why reinvent the wheel? AdWords has been studied extensively, so learn form that and send them to a .mobi site.

Thanks for that.

Tim,
In just a few sentences you hit the nail right on the head!

Cheers!
Robert