The Big MOBILE MARKETING Dilema !!!!

The business that I currently work with doesn't have them text to subscribe. They have them write down their name and number and then we manually subscribe them. That way they can't say that they will do it later and forget.

Businesses have to push their list. If they don't push it like they would a new item on the menu then they won't get that good of a response.

This is actually a question I was gonna ask here about SMS Marketing. I've read all the stats about more than 80% of text messages being opened within 15 mins of being received compared to 5% of emails. However, I think with most of us, we open text messages straight away as they are most likely from someone we know, whereas we are all bombarded with spam emails each day.

I'm very curious as to how many people here would actually give out their mobile numbers for an SMS marketing scheme. I know I wouldn't. For emails, when I need to enter an email to sign up for something, I always use one that has been created just for being spammed. I never use my private email address.

But for mobile numbers, I don't think many people have a 2nd or 3rd mobile number that they can give out for SMS marketing.

I'm just curious as to what percentage of people do give their mobile numbers for SMS marketing, and for those who do run SMS marketing campaigns, can you give a rough idea on how many sign ups you actually get.

These businesses that you are getting on-board with the sms marketing.. what are you giving that benefits the client on the spot to make them want to join the lilst.

Instant Discounts ? Freebies?

If your giving them a CALL TO ACTION i dont see how it wont work.

You have to lure them in with the bait.

The owners know exactly what custy's want so ask them to make something that is going to be attractive.
Make sure all staff is on board also.
At the POS make sure it comes out their mouth promoting it and the instant benefit.
if the staff isn't doing it maybe a different keyword for each staff member for tracking purposes and maybe even an internal program (Give something who signs the most people up)

Just things I have learnt along the way on building the list.

hahahahaha..... I asked for feedback, not a fight!

Anyway, some good responses, so far! Thanks!

BOYS! Stop fighting! Can we get back to the forum thread that I posted?
What? You forgot? Oh, here it is again:

The restaurants, stores, and salons I've set up ARE NOT BUILDING THEIR CUSTOMER BASE AT ALL!

I mean, it's pathetic

This is one of my biggest issues!!! These businesses I have sold this to, seem to be having a major problem getting people to text in....I've been over and over this with them many times and they only have 10-20 people "opted in".

Except 1 restaurant has about 100 people, which is lame, because they have had it for over 4 months.

A guy I know has a Mobile company who only deals with high end.....they won't touch a place who is not willing to spend 10k a year. But they signed up a local restaurant with 2 locations, and they killed it! They got 5,000 opt ins in 3 months! I guess they "made" their wait-staff kick ass....

I have been in sales for over 30 years and have no problem in telling people what to do and how to have fun with this....plus I know how to show the owners how to increase their revenue with this.

Of course, I may have signed up some owners who just think this is going to happen by "magic" or osmosis, or they may think that just by putting it on their FB Fanpage, they'll make millions!


Anyone one else with this dilemma? Or if you have constructive answers, please respond.


Thanks for your time......Mike

Can we please keep that to the other thread.

As for the OP if they are not taking advantage of sms marketing I don't know what to tell you. Customers love getting deals to their favorite resturants. It drives repeat business. If the companies you are working with don't see this maybe you need to be working with their competitors.

I would put together a video, or find some videos of companies that are successful with their SMS marketing and show that to your clients.

Getting people to opt-in to a list needs to be aggressively suggestively sold just like a drink is when they order, or desert is when they have finished their meal.

It needs to become part of their employees routine when interacting with every customer, every time, without exception.

The use of table tents for opt-in and education of the staff is the way to go, using an immediate discount coupon at the cash register, or when the employee brings the check to the table works very well.

Have your clients offer a $10 or $20 bonus for the employee that obtains the most sign ups per week or day.

You would be surprised how fast employees start suggestively selling opt-ins when the owner writes up an employee or fires an employee or two for failing to work the system.

Both you and your client have a vested interest in seeing this become successful.

At this point you have two choices, spend more time with your current clients and help them educate their staff, or spend more time finding new clients who "get it" as you will start to lose the ones who don't seem to get it.

The reason a business does not get many optins is because they do not push their optin offer OR their optin offer is not good enough. People are no longer willing to give their email address or phone number away to just anyone. Unless you give them a very good reason to do so then it won't happen.

One of the best ways for a restaurant or even a salon to get good optins is to offer a coupon to those who are just about to pay. As you give them the bill you tell them they will get a 10% or 20% coupon code if they text this number or enter their email on this page. You won't find many people who are going to turn down an instant saving. Not only are you going to dramatically increase the number of optins you get you are also getting the best type of optins - paying customers. These are the best people to re-market to.

Some great views and thoughts here. Does anyone have any stats to SMS Marketing worldwide ?? Is SMS Marketing only big in the US ?? Is it slowly gathering steam in Europe ??

One question, why do the low opt ins affect you as the SMS provider? Is it because you charge per SMS the company will send, or per SMS text campaign and they are just taking too long to get a big enough list to do that?

Just looking to see how people run these things as it is something I'm really interested in getting into.

Do SMS text services charge monthly rates to you as well as rates per text sent? I have so far done a little research for UK based SMS services and have come across some figures they charge you per xxx amount of texts you send, but I am still very unsure if you need to pay a monthly fee just for signing up for the services, or if you are just charged for the texts that you send out.

My experience is that with small businesses they simply do not have the resources etc to do a good job that's why I keep away from them for SMS marketing.

They are small and struggling because they are not entrepreneurial at all.

You get a company willing to spend $10,000 a year and they will make it work.

Quentin

Hey Mike

Your clients need a variety of ways to gain the opt ins , we already know people respond to different media and different messages so just having staff occassionally say ' opt in and we'll discount you XX% ' may work for some people (though theyll then have a list of price conscious people) others would respond to a table based invitation to leave some feedback manually on a form (no discount offers required), others would happily scan a QR code and opt in that way whilst others may also like the FB page , leave notice on 4square of their presence at the establishment, Tweet a photo of them and their group having the meal, this is all opting in .

I respectfully suggest you look at the bigger picture with your clients and look at their clients and discover how theyd best like to be communicated with as one shoe doesnt fit every foot .

Some restaurants dont need any of this 'new fangled ' stuff at all, when people eat at their restaurants they ensure they have a memorable and special occassion that they will want to repeat time and again, they attract non price sensitive clientelle because they give them the evening they want (quiet long time no see chat in a peaceful corner table, rowdier regular group of friends meeting in a large table near the speakers, romantic table setting for first daters incl rose and candles (no need to request them the restaurant had already asked why youre dining there, not just taken a booking and responded accordingly )

IMO any restaurant that needs to resort to BOGOF deals to attract regular repeat customers should instead spend more time and money looking at how it deals with the customers in the first place (idealistic I know and perhaps unrealistic in some circumstances but then many places exist like this that charge top prices and are busy)

If you believe in the opportunity and they are as unmotivated as you say.

I guess the only solution is to do it for them.

And I mean everything. And they'll pay you per head that walks in.

If your clients aren't getting opt-ins, then they won't be seeing any ROI on any offers they send out. So it's easy to see why they would want to stop buying your SMS service since it's burning a hole in their pocket.

What I do is tell them to give it 3-4 months to build up a good database first before deciding that this is not working. And as far as getting opt-ins, I would tell them to get more creative. BOGO deals are fine, but not exciting. Free stuff is good (i.e. free appetizer) but not sexy.

One of my restaurant clients is holding a contest. They bought or got donated (not sure) a pair of Bengals vs. Browns tickets (I'm in Cincinnati) and they are giving them away as a prize to a random person on their opt-in list. And this has worked REALLY well for them. People see the tickets as a huge difference in value over a free quesadilla and they are getting good response from this promotion.

We also suggested to them to run a contest between their servers. The server who gets the most opt-ins wins a prize (cash?), so they are happy to tell everyone about the "VIP Club" they can join just by texting the keyword. They haven't done that yet, but I think by having the staff on-board and promoting, it makes a big difference in the number of subscribers.

You gotta train your clients employees to take adcantage of every customer but directly informing them about there txt4 coupons service , advertising ish on cards and flyers isnt enough. come on dude , this isnt no set it and forget you gotta be on your clients doing weekly check ins on what they are doing to capture those leads.

Yup, small business owners think small. We struggled with this for long enough to completely change tracks and only focus on big accounts.

Sounds like they're not promoting it well enough or maybe the opt-in offer isn't all that enticing. I would probably work first on training the staff to push the offer more and then if it still doesn't work out, try a new offer.