Customer expectations are changing: Why you need to pay attention to SMS with Brad Roldan
The shift of SMS to focus on customer engagement in 2018 has been exciting. So exciting, in fact, that our own Director of Product Strategy, Brad Roldan, took some time to look at why businesses need to incorporate SMS.
“Everyone is experienced in texting. We text our family, we text our friends, it’s something that we do on a daily basis. So the natural question would be, well I already know how to text with my family, why can’t I engage with the brands I do business with at the same level on my time?”
Brad raises a key point about the shifting change for customers. Texting is simple and easy to use for us, and it’s how we prefer to be contacted in our daily lives (71% of that all-important millennial demographic prefer to be contacted via SMS), so why don’t we talk to businesses that way?
The main reason, Brad says, is that we’re used to brands talking at us, but they haven’t traditionally shown a desire to engage. They share information, but there’s no conversation, and a lot of that is about educating both the business and the consumer that you can engage over SMS.
“Do a quick Google search,” Brad said “for the Westin Times Square…you’re used to seeing a number associated with an ad that we can click on from our mobile phone and it completes that call. But in this case, they actually did something else. The said ‘text us’. Got questions Send us a text.
Now, when doing searches on AdWords, there are legitimate brands using tools offered by Google to drive customer engagements through text messaging.”
Brands like Hilton, DoubleTree, Hampton Inn, Embassy Suites, all of them are pushing customers to engage with them via text instead of calling or downloading an app that, frankly, you’ll never use again.
The key, Brad says, is that you have to encourage people to text you much in the way you already to for voice calling.
One final takeaway he had was about SMS versus systems like Facebook Messenger for communicating.
“What you need to understand is that all of those social media channels are closed ecosystems. So Facebook Messenger gets you access to a very broad audience, but not everybody. Same thing with WhatsApp, WeChat, Apple Business Messaging. The great thing about SMS is that it’s ubiquitous and can reach every customer, regardless of what operating system they’re on for their handset.”
Seems like a good reason to start using SMS for your business.
Learn more
Want to know more about how SMS can be used for business (including the difference between P2P and A2P messaging)? Want to hear more from Brad Roldan? Then download the webinar (link below!) and hear it from the man himself.
