Get Mobile Numbers for SMS Marketing

May 19, 2011 — By Justin
The following is a guest post from Gary Bury, Managing Director at Mediaburst Limited — A UK based mobile marketing provider.

The problem exists for many.  You fancy getting into SMS marketing but you haven’t got any mobile numbers, you’ve got nobody to send a message to.  So where do you start.

Ultimately you want a list of followers who are genuinely interested in your product or service.  People who are happy to receive your message and are likely to buy your goods.

It’s called permission marketing, loads of books have been written on the subject, if you want one try “Permission Marketing by Seth Godin”.

Don’t buy them.

First and foremost; never, ever part with money for a list of mobile numbers.  Purchasing a list of mobile numbers and then firing out messages is regarded as spam.

You won’t win many friends this way and you will upset a lot of people.  Expect to receive responses containing a range of four letter swear words; and don’t expect to get any new customers.

I’ll give you an example, we know a charity who bought 40,000 numbers.

With a modest 1% response rate you might expect 400 new donors.  But, no, they got ONE.  That’s right ONE.

And complaints, they got thousands.  Messages like, “Where did you get my mobile number?” and “Do not send me anymore SMS, ever!”

They also got complaints via phone as well, some of the recipients rang their network providers and complained, who in turn spoke to the charity.  Dealing with the fall out was messy; don’t fall into the same trap.

The short and long is this: no one wants a text message from someone they don’t know.  No matter whom you are or how cool your offer is, they don’t want it.  End of story.

Put a notice up.

This is simple method number one.

Signup for some SMS marketing software and get what we call a “long number” (it’s just a mobile number), then put a sign up — nothing fancy, just print something on a sheet of A4 asking people to subscribe to get free stuff, offers, promotions, or whatever it is you are going to send them via SMS.  Something like:

To receive great offers from us just send a text to:
07712 345 678

Stick the notice somewhere nice and prominent.  On a wall behind a counter, in front of the till, on card on the table, on the menu, on the receipt, on your website, just somewhere it can be read by as many people as possible.

Everyone who texts in will be recorded in your SMS software, and presto, you have a database.

And people will text in, put that notice somewhere prominent, you’ll be surprised.

Ask people.

Next on the list is asking people.  Seems obvious really but you’ll be surprised at how many either forget this or don’t have the confidence to ask.

If you own a restaurant, ask your diners.  If you own a shop, ask everyone who comes in.  If you own a hotel, ask everyone who stays over.

You could make it part of the sales patter,

“Thanks for visiting, did you know we send out offers occasionally by SMS….would you like to receive them?”

If you are uncomfortable with this idea try this: don’t think of it like you’re asking for their mobile number, consider you’re doing them a favour, letting them know there are discounts and offers to be had.  No one will be upset with you if you are informing them of possible discounts.

If you want more proof then look no further than this case study: Hotel gets a 5,000% return on investment with SMS Marketing.  They got all their numbers by asking guests.

Keywords & Shortcodes

Finally, it’s worth mentioning shortcodes and keywords.

We discussed long numbers above.  Shortcodes and keywords are easier to remember and hence easier for your customers to text, use a shortcode instead of a long number and you should get more subscribers.

An example would be:  ’Text “SHOP” to 84433′

The same principles apply, you need to draw people’s attention to the keyword and shortcode.  You can do this by asking or advertising.

Shortcodes and keywords are commonly used on large billboard advertisements, on radio and TV.  But don’t let that put you off; they aren’t expensive if you’re serious about building a database.

The Top 10 Internet & Search Marketing Trends for 2011

The Top 10 Internet & Search Marketing Trends for 2011

(3 votes, average: 3.67 out of 5)

Posted by dimitriszotos on 27th of December, 2010 at 12:03 to Marketing, SEO, Social Media

“As the year comes to a close, we share with you our insights related to the Internet & Online Marketing trends of 2011. We examine closely the most important trends from the SEO industry to Social Media & Location Based Marketing and from Mobile Marketing to Email Marketing and Budget Allocation. Of course there is no magic behind these predictions, just our insights as web professionals and as members of the growing online marketing community. Our advice to all internet professionals, from webmasters to online marketers, is to take into account all the trends, filter them and fit the selected ones to their strategies.”

1.  SEO

Content might still be the king but there are also tons of factors that also need to be taken into account in search engine optimization. No matter if search engines are changing their algorithms, SEO and search marketing will be a key component for successful online strategies in 2011. The core philosophy of acquiring “quality links” is still valid and those anchors can either be quality hyperlinks from websites with unique and relevant content or references from high authority users of social media.

2. Budget Allocation

Online spend by all means, including search engine optimization, search marketing, display ads, social media and mobile marketing will be increased against conventional media. This is not just a prediction but the most “hot topic” advertisers and agencies are currently discussing during their budget and media planning.

3. New Jobs & New Roles

In 2011 we will see an increase on the demand for jobs related to social media and mobile marketing. Some of these roles already exist, nevertheless it is certain that we will see more like community managers, new media coordinators and directors, mobile strategists etc in the near future.

4. E-mail Marketing

For some people, e-mail marketing sounds old fashioned or even not effective. Nevertheless the truth is that e-mail marketing is still a very important tool for Marketers, online professionals & brands and thus it should continue being used wisely.

5. Social Media Marketing

More and more brands will adopt the social media philosophy by using in house assets and by being oriented on community engagement strategies. In 2011, successful social media campaigns will be only the ones that have been executed under a specific strategy and policy.

6. Social Media Analytics and KPIs

The large number of social media websites will increase the need of tracking the performance of online campaigns and their effects on SEO. Moreover, KPIs need to be re-defined in order to deliver success metrics instead of plain numbers of fans or followers.

7. Social Commerce

Social commerce is a wave that will transform most e-commerce sites to social-commerce networks. In other words, the social experience of shopping is getting digital using social features and integration with platforms and mobile applications.  Furthermore the successful deal-of-the-day model of Groupon, which is an integration of social commerce, location and sales strategy, is spreading across various industries and it seems that it came to stay.

8. Location Based Marketing

As more and more people start checking into places and online businesses networks, in 2011 we will see an important growth on this new market. Foursquare, Gowalla and Facebook Places are some of the key players that are showing an impressive success at the moment. This trend is expected to continue in 2011 and as a result more brands will allocate additional resources on these channels.

9. Tablets & Smartphones

With more Smartphone and tablet devices, better operating systems and lower prices the mobility communication will shine in 2011. Moreover the release of 4G mobiles (as Verizon announced few days ago) will lead to faster and more reliable communications that will enable many new services to be launched and, as a consequence, a larger user reach.

10. Search Engines

People will still use search engines to find relevant content and Google will continue dominate the market. Nevertheless with the launch of Bing’s new features, with the various search features that are developed by social media websites and with the release of new innovative search engines such as Blekko, it is highly probable to see Google start gradually loosing market share.

Images by SearchEngineWatch & OurMobileRevolution