Since there are many SMS marketing providers out there to choose from, there are just as many pricing options and variations for businesses to sift through and evaluate, though the price ranges here are from $24-35 per month on a fixed number of SMS messages.
For your convenience, this article will compare the pricing and features of the 5 most highly rated SMS marketing providers so that you can make the best decision for the marketing needs of your business.
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Slick Text
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EZ Texting
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Simple Texting
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Text Magic
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SalesMSG
Each of these platforms has a slightly different pricing method as well as variations within the SMS capabilities themselves.
Let’s take a deep dive into the SMS marketing realm and find out which providers will work best for you in both pricing and functionality.
What is SMS Marketing?
Before we delve into the pricing of these SMS providers, let’s first take a moment to review exactly what SMS marketing is and what it does for your business.
SMS marketing, also known as text message marketing, is a software used to create and send marketing campaigns via text messages from your business to your SMS contact list, which will be made up of your customers.
This SMS marketing software allows you to send the same text message simultaneously to as many clients as you wish through a process known as SMS mass texting.
As a text message marketing service, your SMS program will allow you to complete the following functions:
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Send marketing text messages to any client who subscribes to your SMS
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Gather customer feedback through your text messaging service
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Allows you to send content directly to a client’s cell phone through a free mobile app
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You can create marketing channels to connect your customers with one another to gather customer data
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Use calendar management and customer engagement features to sync data and create mobile keywords for your messages
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Use automation tools to write short code to build customer loyalty
Though the SMS marketing cost will vary based on the service provider you choose, each text message marketing software will provide you with the opportunity to engage in each of these functions.
Text message marketing is a great way to reach your customers and foster important relationships with them.
The text message in itself is indicative of a friendly and informal mode of communication, making text message marketing services an attractive option for most businesses to utilize.
What are SMS Messages Used For?
SMS messages can be used for a variety of reasons, especially for your business.
What makes text message marketing effective is its ability to send a given message to clients quickly and directly from a business landline phone number.
With your text message marketing campaigns, you can:
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Create a text message marketing campaign that is solely promotional or meant to aid in sales efforts
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Send free incoming text messages to clients
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Send bulk text messages with provided message templates
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Link social media pages and website pages to your text message content
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Use your text message marketing provider to craft MMS messages and contact management support
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Send SMS marketing messages with specific actions included, such as a survey, clickable link, or coupon inclusion
The cool part about text message marketing is that it is a truly customizable service.
Text message marketing platforms are designed to help encourage a multifaceted approach to text messaging, allowing you a lot of flexibility in your SMS marketing campaigns.
Before you begin your SMS campaign and begin to send messages, be sure to take a moment to figure out exactly what you want your marketing campaigns to accomplish.
Find some gaps in your current marketing strategy, and use the many benefits of a text message marketing service to begin to fill in the holes.
What are the Pricing Options for SMS Services?
Each SMS marketing cost will vary a bit based on the provider and the features they offer within their text message marketing service.
Many text message marketing services operate on a cost system that depends on how many messages you will be sending within your marketing campaigns.
Slick Text:
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$29 per month
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500-500,000 text messages per month
EZ Texting:
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$19 per month
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200 texts per month included, a small fee for additional messages
Simple Texting:
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$29 per month
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500-50,000 text messages per month
Sales MSG:
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$25 per month
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500-10,000 texts per month
For SMS marketing platforms that utilize this cost system, you will generally see a price range of $25-35 per month, with potential fees added on for additional messaging.
When you are set to begin text marketing, you may want to take some time to think about how many messages you will be sending out through your SMS campaigns and weigh your options.
Take into account the marketing cost, MMS message costs, and if you want your marketing channel to be able to handle “too many messages” if needed.
You may have noticed that there is one SMS marketing provider that we haven’t outlined the prices for yet, and that is because Text Magic is a pay-as-you-go SMS campaign service provider.
What this means is that Text Magic has a set rate of $0.03 per text with unlimited multimedia messaging capabilities.
The text to landline features, communication channels, and drip campaigns will all function the same way regardless of what type of pricing your chosen SMS marketing provider features.
Let’s look into what the real differences are in these text message marketing services and see which one works best for the needs of your business.
Which Pricing Plan Should I Choose?
As previously stated, there are two main pricing modes when it comes to text message marketing: a fixed rate with a given amount of text messages included and a pay-as-you-go method that has unlimited messaging features.
Each text message marketing service has its pros and cons, and this is true for the pricing methods as well.
Pros for Fixed Rate:
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Easy to budget
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Gives you a cap for text messages and MMS messages
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Allows you to record a fixed marketing cost
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Uses short code to reach toll free numbers and mobile devices alike
The biggest pro for this fixed cost text message marketing service is that you will know exactly how much you are spending on your SMS marketing campaigns every month.
You know how much your text messages are costing your business, and you’ll be able to account for this cost easily as well.
Cons for Fixed Rate:
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Limits how many messages you can send each month
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Prevents growth of your SMS campaigns
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May still have to pay extra fees to send messages after you have surpassed the SMS campaign limit
The main drawback with this form of message marketing is that it does limit you in the number of messages you are able to send out per month.
This also affects the number of messages you are able to receive back from your clients, making it more difficult to receive messages and foster those relationships through your SMS marketing campaigns.
If you know you won’t be surpassing these limits each month, then a fixed rate pricing plan will work great for you.
Pros for Pay-As-You-Go:
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Unlimited messaging capabilities
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You can send and receive messages as frequently as desired
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Utilize drip campaigns, multiple marketing channels, and frequent inbound messages without fear of being capped by your provider limit
It is clear that the biggest attraction to this form of message marketing is that fact that you are truly unlimited in your SMS messages, both for sending them out and for receiving them as well.
This also applies to any MMS messages you are sending too.
With the ability to send unlimited marketing messages, your text marketing capabilities are widespread.
With this software, it does not matter how many subscribers or phone numbers you have listed– you’ll be able to message them freely.
Cons for Pay-As-You-Go:
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It is more difficult to budget on this plan
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Since the marketing cost is not fixed, you’ll have to manually enter your expenses on this service every month
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Increased rates for SMS messages coming in and leaving
As you might have guessed, the biggest drawback to this form of text messaging is that you have to account for the price of each message manually, both for budget and organizational reasons.
Small businesses may prefer to utilize this format because it allows for a lower cost if you are only sending out a few messages, such as sending messages for political campaigns or linking to a related article.
It is important to note that either pricing option will still give you access to a database with phone numbers and other text marketing features to make your SMS marketing experience as easy as possible.
There are also platforms out there that have extremely successful services as well, including Twilio’s customer support feature and the EZ texting customers database, complete with metrics about open and response rates.
The bottom line here is to do your research on what you want your SMS marketing platform to do for your business, and make sure that the functionality and the price point are reasonable for you to purchase!
When Do I Send A Text Message?
Now that we know a bit about text message marketing and how to use the service, you may be wondering when this software is best utilized within your marketing strategy.
Many small businesses rely solely on their email, social media, or even facebook messenger to send messages to their clients in a digital format.
While these marketing messages serve a purpose, these text marketing techniques cannot effectively bring in customers in the same ways that a text message can.
One of the main differences that separates a text message from these other marketing messages is through the SMS compliance rules that have been put in place by the Federal Communications Commission through a rule called the telephone consumer protection act.
This rule serves to protect clients from unwanted SMS messages and requires that express written consent be obtained from each customer through an opt in before they can begin to receive your SMS marketing correspondence.
Small businesses now have to develop an easily recognizable vanity short code, then send a message containing an opt in feature within their first text message.
This SMS marketing feature is two-fold.
It makes sure that your customers have the option to opt in or opt out of your content at any time.
It also helps to make your text marketing campaigns available only to those who truly want to receive it.
Essentially, this feature makes the SMS marketing cost worth it to many businesses, as it bring clients into a more friendly and intimate marketing channel.
Once you have obtained consent, you can now begin to use your text message marketing service as frequently as you wish.
Since the text message gives you more immediate access to your clients, make sure to use SMS marketing responsibly.
Don’t bog down your customers with incessant messages, but rather use your SMS marketing platform to send valuable and important information to their phone numbers.
When Do I Send an Email Message?
You’ll want to send an email message any time there is relevant long form content that you want sent out to your clients.
Since emails don’t use short code, you can send long messages with attachments included as much as you would like.
You could send a link to a related article that boosts your service, or a link to a “free trial today” coupon that would help customers navigate your products and services.
Since you are not limited to the short code format of the SMS marketing campaign, you can use email to send any kind of message to your customers, including using voice service and other features.
Be aware that urgent and important messages are better suited for SMS marketing campaigns, as the open rates on text messages are much higher than those of email threads.
How Kennected Uses SMS Marketing
Here at Kennected, we have seen the power of a well run SMS marketing campaign firsthand.
The idea of implementing a text message marketing service into your marketing strategy is great for a variety of reasons, but mostly because it will open up many doors for your business, especially when it comes to building customer relationships.
We use text message marketing to reach our clients quickly and effectively, and we have seen how important it is for a company to have a channel like the one that SMS marketing provides in order to communicate with ease.
We truly believe that the SMS marketing cost is well worth it, regardless of which pricing plan you decide to implement.
Get started on your free trial today with an SMS marketing campaign– you won’t regret it!
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source https://kennected.org/cost-text-message-marketing/
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