SMS Marketing and Text Messaging Tips for Small Business

Make Sure Every Slot is Filled with SMS Text Marketing

It's great when your business is busy, and text marketing can help make sure those times are profitable, too. Here’s how to use text marketing’s unique, abbreviated format to send pre-booking and re-booking notifications to customers. Likewise, text marketing has a higher open rate which provides you an effective way to use that momentum to “roll over” into periods where you’re less busy (like the January slowdown after the holidays.) With text marketing, you’ve got a highly receptive audience who’s “opted in”—meaning they’re interested in hearing from your brand.

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Add Automated SMS Marketing to Your Marketing Strategy

Automated reminders are one of the most popular commercial applications for text marketing, providing an easy, direct means of communication for customers and business owners alike. With Vagaro’s fully integrated SMS text marketing plan, your automated opt-in messages are included as part of your onboarding package and don’t count towards the text balance of your plan. That means you can get started hassle-free and start texting customers to make sure every available appointment is booked.

Using Text Message Marketing to Pre-Book and Re-Book

SMS Text Marketing Brings in More Bookings

Did you know text marketing yields response times 60x faster than email, or that the average text marketing campaign has a 45% conversion rate? Texting’s higher open rates, ease of action, brevity of messaging, and the built-in customer relationship building potential all contribute to the success of text marketing campaigns. That makes the holiday season the perfect time to test out how much more business you can bring in with text marketing.

Give Any Holiday Season a Boost with SMS Text Marketing

Everyone knows how important it is to touch base with customers during the winter holiday rush. But text marketing campaigns can help you maximize bookings and earnings during any high-volume season and keep your business top-of-mind. Whether you’re in beauty, fitness, or wellness, you can use text marketing to stay fresh in the minds of your customers! Here are some “hot spots” to mark on your calendar where a text marketing campaign can give your business a boost!

• Winter holiday season (November-December)

• Graduations (winter, spring and summer)

• Wedding season (spring and summer)

• High-volume holidays (Mother’s Day, Valentine’s Day, Father’s Day)

• Seasonal fluctuations (January fitness bump, “beach body” season)

YouTube Link: How to Add Text Marketing

SMS Text Marketing Sample Script Templates

For text marketing, messages of around 160 characters (including spaces and punctuation) are considered the “sweet spot” that appeals to subscribers in a single communication. Vagaro’s text marketing allows you to use up to 304 characters in a single text. However, the general rule of thumb with text marketing is to keep it short and sweet. Here are four SMS text marketing templates for pre-booking and re-booking that use under 200 characters!

• Our holiday season is missing just one thing—YOU! Use personalized code “ABBIE” to pre-book your Nov/Dec appointment and save 15% off your service. See you soon! [Booking link]

• Winter appointments are filling up fast—don’t get left in the cold! Pre-book Nov/Dec appointments or get waitlisted at 15% off with code PREBOOK15. Book now: [Booking link]
• Cross this off your resolutions list & start 2020 off right! Re-book your January appointment by Dec 31 & save 15% with code REBOOK15.  Re-book now: [Booking link]
• Should old haircuts be forgot & never brought to mind—Auld Lang Syne into New Year with 15% off your Jan appointment. Use code REBOOK15 to re-book by Dec 31: [Booking link]

Header Image: Giorgio Trovato via Vagaro