subject: Text Message Marketing - A Growing Market [print this page] Due to new products such as Text message marketing and twitter the way the marketing world approaches promotions is changing. The most conventional methods are being combined with newcomers to produce a more integrated marketing mix. Television and newspapers are being complemented by marketing via the mobile phone and new strategies are emerging as a result.
Social marketing sites have moved in public prominence and public acceptance and therefore are being used by many companies as a valid marketing tool. The speed these tools are being adopted is exponential and many companies are exploring how they can use the information to their best advantage.
A recent report in the New York Times stated three key market developments that have moved text message marketing out of the shadows and into marketing reality. The first was that there were 3.5 billion texts sent in the United Sates every single day. This is a threefold increase over the number of texts reported in 2007. The second message was that the main usage growth was seen in the over 30 age group. This demographic often has the most disposable income and is a key Market for many companies. The third relates to the fact text messages to date have been relatively spam free. Because of this 97% of text messages are opened by the recipients which is a far higher opening rate than is experienced with email Messages.
A story seen recently in the New York Times suggested there are three major areas where the text (or sms as it is called in some parts of the world) market is changing fundamentally. Firstly the quantum of the number of texts being sent in the USA alone is over three billion a day. This level has increased three times since 2007. The 2nd area of interest is that the biggest growth market was the thirty plus age group. A favourable demographic often with good earning and spending forecasts. The third interesting point made in this report was that the text message channel was seen to be relatively untainted by spam and other connotations associated with email. Because of this freshness text messages tend to be opened whereas it is easy to ignore emails or filter them out with spam filters.
An New Zealand company has recently been trialling a voucher programme whereby a voucher is sent to a Mobile Phone as data in a text and the recipient can take this into the store to redeem their voucher or discount.
New ideas are being implemented all the time. A New Zealand company has started offering a voucher system to customers that is done by mobile phone. The beauty of this system is that it is easy to get the vouchers out there and they make a customer take action if they want to redeem the value of the voucher. The real test will be how the consumer adapts to these changes and whether they see them as useful and practical or whether they see them as a gimmick. As phones evolve so will the technology that will be able to be used with them. Brands and market positioning will be done via your mobile phone.
Many companies use text messaging currently to provide real time information to consumers. Texting them their train will be five minutes late is a valuable practical and accepted usage. Airlines have even started to introduce the use of boarding passes sent to mobile phones and read on scanners as the passenger passes through.
For most people their mobile Phone is beside them or at least close at hand most hours of the day. If the marketing world can harness this idea, the potential is limitless. While the path forward may not be entirely clear the challenge is to think outside the box and make text message marketing work for both the business and the consumer.
