Introduction:

Today’s article is about Automatescale SMS Marketing. This time you’ll learn one of the most useful CRM features of Automatescale. Here we’ll discuss what an SMS marketing is and how you can use its features to automate and scale your business like never before. 

What is SMS Marketing

If you have already gone through our email marketing tutorial, then you can easily deal with SMS marketing. SMS marketing is a short message service marketing tool designed to send promotions to customers via text messages. It’s actually the same as text marketing.

With the help of Automatescale’s SMS marketing you can automate SMS conversations, opt-in campaigns, and appointment booking. You can also set up an SMS after-hour service not to miss a single  opportunity.

SMS Marketing in Automatescale

Now as you briefly got what SMS marketing is, let’s dive into the main topic. At this step we’ll learn what SMS marketing is within Automatescale, how it works and how you can use it for your online business. Follow this step-by-step guide to find out everything related to SMS marketing. 

Note: Switch to LC Phone System 

In order to send SMS messages to leads, you should  first purchase phone numbers. Then you use them with each of your client’s accounts. You can use Automatescale in-house phone provider LC (LeadConnector) Phone to use this feature. 

• It’s easy to switch.

• It’s easier to setup and manage than Twilio.

• It’s 10% cheaper than Twilio  

• It allows for re-billing for SaaS companies. 

How to Get Started with Automatescale SMS Marketing

Starting with Automatescale SMS marketing has never been as easy as now. Follow the below guide to learn the basics of using SMS marketing tools and features. 

1. Go to your Automatescale account. 

2. Go to 'Contacts'.

3. Click on ‘Add number’. Here you can add phone numbers.

Enable Trusted Calling

Trusted Calling is another good feature at Automatescale to use in your SMS marketing. 

• When making calls, this eliminates ‘Scam Likely’. You can put your first name or your company name.

• When you call your contacts, you can customize what they see. 

• It doesn’t have to be your LC phone number. You can use a separate business number and use this feature for that number. 

To activate this feature

1. Click on ‘Trust Center’ on the top of the ‘Phone Numbers’ page. 

2. Here you can submit for review and check whether your profile is complete. 

3. To avoid any issues, make sure the information in your business profile is accurate.

4. Then scroll down the same page and you’ll see the ‘Enable Trusted Calling’ feature. Now, you can activate it.  

Verifying all Phone Numbers

You can use Automatescale phone verification service. 

• Go to Settings on the left side in your Automatescale sub-account. 

• Click on ‘Business profile’.

• Here you see general settings.Turn on the ‘Validate Phone numbers when first SMS is sent to a new contact’. (Contact the support to learn whether it’s a free service or paid before turning it on). 

• At this stage, you can turn on some other features as well according to your choice. 

Note: 

• When texting, make sure they are mobile phones. Otherwise be sure to segment them. 

• Send texts in drip mode. This automatically sends the SMS to batches of contacts at a time.

• Instead of sending SMSs to thousands of numbers at once, break up the list of phone numbers into hundreds. This will help you protect your account from being disabled. 

SMS Error DND Automation

DND automatically gets turned on for SMS and text messages within Automatescale. 

• This prevents continued sending to bad phone numbers.

• This helps to keep the error rate/bounce rate below 3%.

Personalize the Message

Personalizing messages and emails is important for several reasons. First, the text looks neater and more accurate. Second, users like to see their first names in the message. 

Third, it makes the user read the text and therefore, it’s engaging. Our Automatescale SMS tools and codes allow you to make personalized messages. 

For instance, if you add {{contact.first_name}} to all your selected contacts it will automatically personalize the text. 

Create and Save SMS Templates

Using SMS features you can create your own SMS templates. When you save them inside the platform you can use them repeatedly. Each time you create a template you can check how it looks on the preview page. If it doesn’t look the way you want, you can make the necessary changes and then save it. 

Set Up Automatic Texts for Missed Calls

This feature comes for help when your marketing team and tools are busy by replying to calls and you sometimes have missed calls. The system automatically sends text messages. You can set up automatic texts inside the actions of the workflow page. 

Build SMS Opt-In Campaigns

Another feature to use inside the SMS workflow is the SMS opt-in campaigns which is useful especially in case you have advertisements and flyers with your text. In order to set this up you need to make a trigger that automatically creates replies customizable to your messages. It will send a prewritten message related to the subject. 

The same way works the one-word SMS trigger automation when the user writes a single word and gets a response. Based on the client’s responses, this feature can automate an entire conversation. The best part about those features is that you can even set them to send a booking link. 

SMS Automation at Automatescale

At this step, you can activate the automation of your SMS marketing. 

1. Click on ‘Automation’ on the left of the homepage of your Automatescale account. 

2. Go to ‘Workflows’ on the top of the page. 

3. Go to ‘Workflow Triggers’. Choose a workflow trigger. It can be ‘Twilio Validation Error’. 

4. Next to ‘Error is’,  put the tags ‘SMS incapable' or ‘not valid’. 

5. You can also add filters and then click on ‘Save. Your SMS trigger is ready. 

6. Next, go to DND contact. Add ‘Call’ and SMS’ in the Chanells field. 

7. Save the action and activate ‘Publish’ on the top right of the page to let it work.
   

Your SMS Marketing Strategy

Don’t forget to follow these steps to strengthen your SMS marketing. 

• Database reactivation. 

• Confirm receipt for lead magnets and appointments.

• Use if/else actions to send text periodically.

• Ask a simple question to get engagement. 

FAQs 

What can I use Automatescale texting and SMS for?

You can use Automatescale texting and SMS to book appointments, nurture leads, and contact leads when no one is available to respond to calls/messages. You can also use SMS marketing tools for multi-channel communication and campaigns. 

Does it cost extra to use Automatescale texting and SMS?

You need to know that the cost is $1 per phone number to use with each of your Automatescale sub-accounts. As for SMS costs, they are charged according to the carrier’s tariffs.