What’s in a Keyword? Three Rules to Using Keywords in SMS Marketing

You’ve probably seen keywords used in marketing text messages you’ve received. They’re short, easy to remember words you can type into a text message reply. A common example you’ll see is something like “reply STOP to unsubscribe” at the end of marketing text messages. STOP is the keyword.
But they really could be any words right?
Technically yes, but some are better than others.
Just think about what you want to use a keyword for. They are a mechanism you provide your customers, clients, or members to reply to your text message. Now consider that your customer is typing their reply on a small keyboard on their mobile phone. Even those who excel at texting (almost anyone under the age of 18) don’t want to have to type in a long word. So keeping it a short word is the first rule of keyword choice.
Beyond using simple, short keywords to instruct your customers (like “STOP”), you can use keywords to help track marketing campaigns. Whether you are running a contest, promoting a sale, or looking for feedback, choose a unique keyword for each campaign. This will let you determine which campaigns are the most effective. The second rule is use as many keywords as needed. Imagine you are an electrical retailer running a discount campaign using SMS messaging. You could have a single keyword such as “BARGAINS” for the customer to access a list of prices for all items but wouldn’t it be better to break the list down? How about “TV” for televisions, “HIFI” for music systems and “CAMERA” for photographic. Response rates and conversion rates will benefit by sending prospects straight to their area of interest.
Many of the text messages I get use different keywords. For example, a music venue frequently sends me texts asking me to reply in order to win tickets to a show. They could simply ask me to send the keyword “Enter” or “Yes” in order to enter the contest. But they don’t. For each musical act, they use a keyword related to the artist: their name, portion of the name, or a song title. This helps me know, or realise in the moment I’m texting, what exactly it is I’m agreeing to in my reply. And that’s the third rule, make the keywords make sense. For brands this might mean using a product name, or the brand name itself.
Bear in mind also that you can use keywords in conjunction with either SMS shortcodes or VMNs (Virtual Mobile Numbers). For a fuller explanation of these click here.
Following these three rules of keyword choice should help you in creating effective text marketing campaigns. You can always learn too, from the marketers texting you. Have you received any awful keyword choices? Please share with us in the comments.
Related Articles
Top Three Things Retailers Should Do to Keep Customers on Their SMS Opt-In List
You've run a successful SMS opt-in campaign for your retail store. Now that you have your list, do you have a plan to keep them from opting out? Wait, you mean there's more to this than just sending out coupon codes? There is if you want to keep your customers from opting out.
6 Psychological Tips for SMS Marketing Success
Getting to grips with the underlying psychology of how audiences react both consciously and subconsciously to your message is key to achieving the maximum effect in any type of marketing. All kinds of things come into play with different media, from colours and shapes to images and videos. Even the way things move can have a powerful effect on a viewer. Unlike many other forms of marketing, however, SMS marketing is unique in that the only tool you have is words - and not many of them. But armed with a basic knowledge of consumer psychology, 456 characters is more than enough to get the desired effect. In this article, we present our six top tips to take advantage of the psychology of SMS messaging.
It was a great 2015 at fastsms : Review and highlights
Building an SMS Inbound Marketing Campaign for Your Hotel Business
SMS flies under many marketers radars when it comes to building an inbound marketing strategy. But if Buzzfeed's news app is to be believed, there are days when SMS generates the greatest percentage of shares on that channel, beating out Twitter, Facebook, WhatsApp and email. SMS share buttons are reported to have been used 4 times more than Twitter buttons. When you consider Twitter has 317 million active users, then SMS marketing has huge potential for a hotel business.
SMS Marketing – How to Succeed with a SMART Approach
SMS Voting Ideal for Creative Communities to Engage Followers
Twitter is a great place to quickly scan and see what is going on in the world, or in a particular niche topic. I was looking around at SMS related topics the other day and found many good (and some not so good) articles. But I also found many more pleas for votes from musicians, bands, and even illustrators.
An SMS Service Built Around You
SMS Opt-In: Why You Want It and How To Get It
The first thing to remember is that legally, you must give the customer the chance to both opt-in and opt-out of your SMS campaign - but the good news is people are happy to opt-in - 49% of them according to a 2014 survey. So all you need to do is stay compliant and follow some basic guidelines to grow your list.
Using Keywords with VMNs and Shortcodes (Part 1)
Keywords are important in SMS marketing. In order to use them, you have to have two-way messaging. But does it matter if you have a VMN or shortcode? Yes, and no. In principle, they are the same. But practically there are differences. Find out all about them in this blog.
The Second Most Important Rule of SMS Marketing
Text message marketing works because it is short, quick, personal, and immediate. You don't want to annoy the people you're reaching out to. If you're running an opt-in campaign, or a contest, keep the process to as few steps as possible.