Sending SMS via the internet to mobile phones is a practical and reliable solution for contacting all or part of your customer database. Mobile messaging solutions are therefore fantastic communication tools for businesses. To prove their usefulness, we will present 5 ways to use SMS in your company.

1) Online SMS to easily build a customer database

A text messaging service is a highly effective way to quickly build a quality customer database. It can easily be used to set up a campaign for collecting phone numbers or email addresses. The principle is to offer a discount or a gift in exchange for the user's contact details and their subscription to your list for future campaigns.

However, be careful: if you wish to collect mobile numbers to then use them for sending SMS, it is mandatory to explicitly inform prospects that their numbers will be used for commercial purposes.

2) An online SMS promotional campaign

Once you have created a database of subscriber mobile numbers, you can set up your first bulk SMS promotional campaign instead of email. This type of campaign is generally used to announce the launch of a new product, introduce new offers, or announce the start of an important event, such as the beginning of a sale.

This type of campaign achieves high response rates because, unlike emails, sending text messages benefits from a much higher open rate. Nearly 98% of text messages received are opened!

3) SMS to ensure your subscribers don't forget their appointments

For many companies—restaurants, hair salons, beauty parlors, and medical centers—cancellations and no-shows create significant inconvenience and often a direct financial loss that is difficult to recover. A mobile message is the perfect tool for appointment reminders and can prevent a large number of missed appointments.

SMS reminders also have the advantage of being fully programmable and therefore automated. Once the appointment has been entered into the system, one or several reminder SMS will be sent to the various patients automatically.

4) Text subscribers to ensure a minimum number of attendees

Mobile SMS allows you to easily set up a "mobile club" system, consisting of subscribers who wish to be notified in advance of important events. This system is particularly interesting as it helps ensure minimum attendance when organizing an important event.

It is even possible to set up an interactive offer that allows subscribers to confirm their attendance and even book their seat or table directly. You will thus be able to accurately forecast your attendance and, above all, guarantee that a portion of the costs invested in organizing the event is covered.

5) Text messages to launch your viral campaigns

Prospects like to give their feedback and appreciate it when companies take their opinions into account. Thanks to their high open rate and their personal, intimate nature, SMS messages are fantastic tools for satisfaction surveys.

It is also possible to create simple interactions with customers and even encourage them to make a new purchase or visit your establishment by sending a targeted message. For example, a restaurant could use a message like: "We've just added new dishes, come and give us your feedback."

You will thus succeed in attracting new contacts while implementing a satisfaction survey that will allow you to improve your services or products.

We have just presented five concrete examples of how to send mobile text messages within your company, but SMS via mobile phones can have hundreds of different uses (via email, etc.). You will find many other ideas on our website to help you set up the campaign best suited to your industry and your business.