(This is part 1 in the SimpleTexting 101 Beginners Guide to SMS Marketing.)
It’s all about the keywords 🔑
Let’s kick things off by talking about a ridiculously easy way to get new subscribers for your text message campaign: keyword opt-ins.
Say you’ve got a rock ‘n’ roll band. You’re really rockin’ around, really knockin’ ’em dead, but your concerts aren’t selling out. A friend recently put text message marketing on your radar, and it looks pretty interesting.
So you sign up for an SMS service—let’s say SimpleTexting, for no particular reason—and you see that you get to choose your very own keyword to use in advertising. You select “PurplePeopleEater”—the name of your horns guy, who your fans absolutely adore. But how to use this mysterious keyword thing?
Like this:
Text “PurplePeopleEater” to 555888 for discounted tickets!
The example above is a call to action inviting people to text your keyword (PurplePeopleEater) to 555888, which happens to be SimpleTexting’s short code. It’s like a phone number, just shorter and easier to remember.
Anyone who texts PurplePeopleEater to 555888 is automatically added to your subscriber list, and then you can start sending them great deals on tickets to your novelty rockin’ concerts.
Can’t I just use email?
Sure, if you like low open rates. 😉
Email open rates are typically around 30%. Compare that to SMS, which is over 90%!
Redbox once advertised the keyword “Deals” during their “10 Days of Deals” campaign. As a result, 1.3 million people texted the keyword and were added to Redbox’s subscriber list.
Think Redbox would’ve gotten that kind of response with email? No way.
All SimpleTexting plans offer unlimited keywords, so you never have to worry about paying more.