We recently created a new and extremely helpful 'texting dictionary'. It includes 70 texting terms and definitions which prove to be extraordinarily useful while texting. Every new texter has to read this!
To check it out, click here.
Guides
07/28/2010
07/19/2010
SMS Marketing Campaigns: How To Succeed
TellMyCell empowers anyone -- from Fortune 500 Marketing Directors to small business owners -- to easily and affordably run SMS marketing campaigns. If you don't already have a TellMyCell account, you can open one now (it's totally free to try the service out). We're proud to offer a do-it-yourself service that is powerful, flexible, and dead simple to use. That said, if you're new to SMS marketing the lingo can be discouraging - which is why we've put together our easy-to-read ten minute guide, SMS Marketing With Keywords. Our guide to SMS marketing with Keywords will have you marketing like a pro in ten minutes flat:
- Learn about Keywords
- Learn about Short Codes
- Learn how to integrate Keywords, Short Codes & Text Messaging to quickly and inexpensively launch SMS marketing campaigns using TellMyCell.
04/06/2010
03/09/2010
The Five Minute SMS Marketing Primer
By now you’ve heard about mobile marketing, and if you’re reading this you probably want to know how you can use mobile marketing to benefit your business. Is it difficult? Is it expensive? What exactly is mobile marketing?
We’re going to look at SMS marketing, also known as text message marketing. We’ll explain its place in the world of mobile marketing, its advantages, its costs, and how you can launch your business’ first SMS marketing campaign today – in five minutes flat.
What is Mobile Marketing? Let’s go straight to the source, The Mobile Marketing Association: Mobile Marketing is a set of practices that enables organizations to communicate and engage with their audience in an interactive and relevant manner through any mobile device or network.
Now let’s translate that into plain English: Mobile marketing is a way for you to connect with your customers (and potential ones) on their mobile phones.
How Can I Market To My Customers On Their Mobile Phone? There are a few different forms of mobile marketing. There’s mobile search, which is search advertising on a mobile web browser, ads on the mobile web, Bluetooth ads that communicate with your phone, and apps (think downloadable iPhone or Android programs). And then there is SMS, better known as text messaging.
Why Is SMS Marketing The Best Form Of Mobile Marketing? SMS Marketing has three advantages that dramatically set it apart from all other forms of SMS Marketing:
- Broadest Reach & Familiarity: Nearly every phone in the United States supports text messaging. Americans sent well over 1 trillion text messages last year. They love text messaging. All other forms of mobile marketing are growing rapidly, but they can only reach selected groups of your customers.
- Cost: Hiring an app developer is expensive. Buying mobile display ads is a major commitment. Bluetooth requires the lease or purchase of physical hardware. Contrast that to text messaging. Many SMS Marketing services allow you to get started for free. A successful campaign for a small business can be launched for less than $50. As for consumers, most either have an unlimited texting plan, or at least one that comes with a couple hundred text messages every month. If not, messages only cost a few pennies.
- Ease: Simple yet powerful software like TellMyCell’s SMS Marketing service is easy enough for anyone to use. Signup in 60 seconds. Login. Add some contacts. Type your message. Click send. Want to build a customer list? Rent a keyword on a shared short code.
How Do Keywords & Short Codes Work: A short code is a special 5 or 6 digit phone number. It is a unique number that anyone can send a text messages to. Short codes are at the heart of SMS Marketing.
A Keyword is a unique phrase that a consumer can use to interact with you via a short code. A Keyword is unique to its short code. This means that you might see the same Keyword used on different short codes. Short codes are nearly universal in the United States. So, a short code can power a relatively inexpensive national marketing campaign. Keywords work when they are paired with a short code. A customer will use their mobile phone to send a text message to a short code. The best way to understand how keywords work with short codes is to try it yourself. From your mobile phone, text the word Joes to 88202. In this example, Joes is a Keyword, and 88202 is the shared short code.
How Do I Get Started? Head over to TellMyCell to check out our plans and pricing. Signup is free and takes 60 seconds. Your account comes loaded with ten credits so you can try it for yourself. Got more questions? Get in touch with us.
01/29/2010
SMS Marketing Q&A: What Are Mobile Coupons
TellMyCell has been powering SMS marketing campaigns for over six years
- and over those years we've been asked hundreds of questions. We
recently updated out website with a new set of Frequently Asked
Questions, which is a great resource if you want to learn the basics of
text messaging and mobile marketing. What we're going to do in our new
Q&A series is go a little deeper. So, with that out of the way,
let's get to it.
Question: What Are Mobile Coupons?
A mobile coupon is exactly what you'd expect - a coupon that's stored on a mobile phone, rather than being printed on a piece of paper. So what can a consumer do with a mobile coupon? The same things that they've been use printed coupons for – to receive discounts, rebates, etc. on products and services. So, as you can see, the concept of a mobile coupon is pretty straightforward.
There are two ways to send out mobile coupons. They each have their pros and cons.
Mobile Barcodes - Create a barcode, using a standard format, and then get that barcode in your customers' hands. Mobile barcodes offer deep tracking. Unfortanately there are many standards for barcodes, and even more standards for barcodes on mobile phones. As if that wasn't complicated enough, most phones don't support any (let alone many) of these formats out of the box. Offering your customers a mobile coupon is a great way to build brand loyalty and spur sales; requiring them to download an iPhone/BlackBerry/Android app (assuming they have one of those phones) to receive your coupon is not so great.
Mobile Coupons As Text Messages - Text messaging based mobile-coupons offer nearly universal reach. Americans send 4 billion text messages every day. They love text messages, they're familiar with text messages, and most importantly, there's no learning curve/software hassles if your mobile coupon arrives in the form of a text message.
What's the catch? You can’t track text message coupons with the same depth as you can track barcode images. Text messaging certainly offers tracking, just not with the same depth, automation, and precision of a mobile barcodes. Of course all the data in the world isn't useful if the majority of your customers can't receive your coupon. The decision between barcodes and text messages is one that every business has to weigh. In the future we expect barcodes to standardize and spread, but for now, the downsides are far greater than the upsides.
So how does a consumer redeem a mobile coupon sent as a text message? Sticking to our theme of exactly what you would expect, the consumer pulls out their phone, opens the text message, and shows it to the retailer.
Want to get started with mobile coupons? Check out the SMS Marketing page @ TellMyCell or click here to view pricing and signup in seconds.
