Synergizing SMS and Social Media

A recent campaign conducted by Southwest Airlines is a perfect demonstration of mobile marketing meshing with web, social media and real-world engagement. It was devastatingly simple: a cocktail napkin - handed out to thousands of flyers every day - had a short code emblazoned across it, encouraging travellers to text their email address in order to sign up for news updates.

It was a great example of marrying multiple user experiences to maximize engagement. By integrating two channels like this, you can grow your business exponentially, as each channel feeds off the other.

This sort of cross-channel synergy works especially well with SMS and social media, both fundamental parts of any right-thinking marketing plan. They work so well in tandem because they are both frequently used by a large portion of the population. SMS messaging has a particularly long reach, with open rates exceeding 98% (the vast majority of those being read within minutes of receipt).

Social media is growing almost as fast, and is no longer the sole preserve of the young. If you develop innovative ways to synergize your SMS messaging and social media campaigns, you’ll not only reap the rewards, you’ll be able to track which channel is generating the most leads and/or revenue. Here are a few good practices that will help you link up your users across the two channels:

Contests

Contests are a tried and tested method of engaging an audience. People love to get involved and feel like they are part of a process. Come up with an idea for a contest. Run it on Facebook. Promote it via text message to mobile subscribers. It will encourage users who previously engaged purely through mobile to interact with your Facebook page, thus getting a richer experience from your brand. 

Coupons

When you issue coupons to your SMS subscribers, be sure to include a like-gated page URL so they can access the coupons directly from the message. The less they have to do, the more likely they are to take part in the promotion.

Offer Incentives

You may have high hopes of your message going viral – but it doesn’t happen for nothing. Offer an irrefutably attractive deal to encourage viewers to share the message on social media. If you offer no value, nobody will share your message.

Update Subscribers

If you have a social media update of any kind, send it to your mobile subscribers. Tease them by texting a portion of the post or video, inviting them to visit your Facebook page to see the rest.

Getting the most out of mobile marketing means devising a synergistic, cross-channel experience. The more types of audience you can get to, the bigger your overall audience will be.