Apps vs SMS: Why Your Marketing Messages Work Better via Text Message
![sms messaging vs apps](https://dox4euoyzny9u.cloudfront.net/images/fastsms/Apps-vs-SMS-Why-Your-Marketing-Messages-Work-Better-via-Text-Message.png)
With the rise of the app, some marketers have been quick to sound the death knell for SMS. But reports of SMS’s death have been greatly exaggerated. With over 76% of the UK population now dependent on their smartphones for everything from news to personal communication, SMS remains a great tool to directly engage with your customers.
Gaining Traction
With over a million apps currently available on both the iOS and Android platforms, new apps face a huge struggle to gain traction in a crowded marketplace. Factor in the statistic that 80% of the apps in the Apple web store are never used and you’ll begin to understand the uphill challenge you face if you focus on apps to get your message across. Unless you offer something absolutely unique, it’s difficult to gain traction.
On the other hand, 53% of customers are happy to receive information, particularly with a discount or special offer, via SMS according to research.
Limiting Your Market
Let’s come back to that statistic about smartphones. Figures for all mobile users run much higher, at around 92%. And those users are sending over 175 billion SMS messages a year. Why? Because it’s a user-friendly technology that’s available on all phones, smart or not, and is usually free. If you focus on apps for marketing, you’re eliminating nearly 20% of your potential audience. And with 70% of mobile users stating that a text message is a great way to get their attention, can you afford to miss out?
Simplicity, Trust and Engagement
When Loudhouse conducted global research into SMS use in 2014, they came to some startling conclusions. These were users highly engaged in smartphone use, with 20% checking them every 10 minutes or more frequently.
65% of respondents said that managing their smartphone apps was too time-consuming, and 68% said they had downloaded more apps than they ever used. Most interestingly, 81% said they’d prefer a simple SMS to a more complicated app, even if it didn’t have the same functionality.
The reason? SMS gives an improved experience that puts the consumer in control. Having multiple conversations across different apps becomes complicated and time-consuming, whereas SMS puts all those conversations in one place. That level of simplicity and ease of use from a familiar technology matters.
Opting Out of Push Notifications
How many times do you opt to receive push notifications from an app? If you’re like 60% of smartphone users, according to Kahuna research, you opt out because of privacy concerns. And that opt out kills your in-app marketing opportunities stone dead.
Now think about the 70% of users from the Loudhouse research who said they’d be happy to engage with a company via SMS. And the 39% who prefer communication through SMS for ‘peace of mind’ about their personal data.
Metrics for Engagement
Another bonus for SMS is that you can easily identify whether your message has been received and opened. We won’t bore you with the oft-repeated statistic that 98% of SMS are opened within 3 minutes – though it should always be front and centre in your thinking on SMS marketing – and instead remind you of all those apps that get downloaded, only to languish on a user’s smartphone unused.
Your download numbers may look good, but without opt-in for push notifications, you can’t communicate with your audience. And more than any other medium, SMS gives you accurate and usable data for user engagement. Plus, your messages won’t get lost in social media feeds or overfull inboxes.
Leveraging SMS Messaging for the Smartphone World
We’ve blogged before about just how ideal SMS is for small business marketing, but there are some creative ways you can leverage SMS for the modern marketing landscape.
- By using SMS messaging as part of your cross-platform marketing, you can create coherent campaigns across social media and email
- Use the power of shortcodes to run competitions and other interactive campaigns
- Use scheduled messages for a smart drip campaign that users can opt into through a simple text message
- SMS messaging is ideal for interaction with live events, by outputting the results of polls and text interaction to a big screen
- If you want to use apps, then SMS marketing is a smart way to promote them – simply send a link to the mobile download page via text
Joined Up Thinking
We’re not saying that customers don’t enjoy apps – there wouldn’t be millions out there if they weren’t popular. But they may not be the best way forward for your small business, especially when only 17% of smartphone users say they find SMS intrusive. That figure is a lot lower than many might think, and every SMS interaction gives you brand-building opportunities, but you’ll need to be smart about the way you integrate your marketing strategy with your end user.
There is a real enthusiasm for the use of SMS messaging as a preferred means of mobile communication, but you’ll need to be sensitive to how SMS best fits into your customer’s brand interaction. For financial services, for example, SMS is the preferred tool for establishing security and peace of mind. For your cafe or bookshop, SMS is the smart way to offer discounts on services. If you drive interaction through social media, then SMS can help differentiate you from other social media based brands.
So Why is SMS Marketing Better than an App, again?
- SMS has better traction vs apps
- SMS reaches all mobile users, not just those with smartphones
- SMS offers simplicity and promotes trust
- SMS gets a higher level of engagement through a technology all mobile users are familiar with
- SMS users opt in, app users opt out of push notifications
- SMS offers great metrics for tracking customer engagement
- SMS can integrate across multiple platforms
Now you know that SMS isn’t dead, isn’t it time you used SMS marketing for your business? Contact us to kick start your SMS campaign today.
Related Articles
Getting a Reply: Should You Choose a VMN or Shortcode? Part 2
Part two of a two part article explaining the differences between SMS Shortcodes and Virtual Mobile Numbers. Here we explain in detail the costs and characteristics of Dedicated Shortcodes and Shared Shortcodes. You can also get advice on how to choose between shortcodes and VMNs.
Why SMS Marketing is Like Facebook Marketing, But Better
Facebook is a popular place. According to Statista, they had 1.44 billion active users in the first quarter of 2015. It’s no wonder then that businesses are flocking to advertise there. But big isn’t always better. SMS marketing is similar in many respects to Facebook advertising, and for some uses it is actually better. Let me explain and see if you agree.
5 Phrases for Your Spring SMS Marketing Campaign [Infographic]
Why SMS is the Biggest Missed Opportunity for Marketing to Millennials
With the continued rise of different and more diverse technologies in the social and mobile web, it would be easy to dismiss the potential benefits of SMS marketing - and that’s exactly the reason you shouldn’t. An SMS is the unexpected visit of a familiar friend, and there’s one demographic that embraces an old trusted ally in this new, noisy digital world more than anyone else: the millennials.
Why you want to keep your SMS marketing database clean
Salesforce Finds SMS Messaging a Growing Part of Mobile Marketing Strategy
What do 5,000 marketers from ten different countries say about SMS? It’s great, and we’re going to do more of it. Well, that’s the gist of the results in the Salesforce 2015 State of Marketing Report. Mobile marketing has taken a central place in most company’s strategies, and SMS is a growing part of it. Here are some key statistics from the report.
9 Reasons to use SMS Marketing in 2018 [Infographic]
6 Ways to Get Results, and Not Annoy People, with SMS Marketing
Using SMS marketing is one highly effective way to maintain relationships with mobile users, but there's an incredibly fine line between engaging with someone and annoying them to such an extent that they swiftly delete your marketing messages and never want to hear from you again. Here's 6 things to keep in mind to make sure you don't annoy your subscribers.
3 SMS Marketing Metrics That You Need to Know
SMS marketing is one of the most effective mobile marketing channels available. It’s also one of the easiest to measure your performance for every campaign, even every message. Read the full blog to discover the three of the basic metrics you’ll need to know to evaluate your success.