Think SMS is dead? Think again!

With the advent of smartphones and messaging apps, such as WhatsApp, becoming the most used text-messaging platform, the common perception is that SMS as a mode of communication is effectively dead.

It’s an understandable assumption for people to make, since we don’t tend to send SMSs very often anymore, but rather than SMSing being obsolete, it’s more that the function has simply changed.

In research done by WebsiteMagazine, it was established that SMS is the number one communication channel that millennials prefer when being contacted by businesses – which is crucial for any company to take note of.

Millennials might be using social media or the likes of WhatsApp to ‘speak’ to one another, but when it comes to notifications from businesses, SMSs are still the preferred method. This points to SMSing not dying out per se, but more that SMS has gone from being a back-and-forth medium of communication between people to a linear channel going from businesses to individuals.

Using SMS for marketing or customer engagement should still very much be at the forefront of mot companies’ communication strategy. If you’ve got a business and need to increase customer engagement, or just want to brainstorm the most effective way of getting your message to a customer, SMS should be near the top of your list.

Millennials are engaging with a mass of information that’s historically unprecedented, so using long-form channels like email will be less successful because people expect large doses of information from email correspondence. Instead, what should be prioritised is short-form notification channels like SMS, because it forces businesses to condense information into smaller, more consumable bits – which is exactly what millennials prefer when it comes to communication.

If you’ve got a small business and would like to establish better communication channels with your customers across various platforms, My Online Presence specialises in creating solutions for businesses, including bulk SMS campaigns through secure networks, to reach their target audience in an easy and effective manner. Get in touch with them and see if they can help you take your business up a gear with their custom solutions!