Insight
5 Steps to Mastering Lead Generation Through Text Messaging
Text messaging leads to more engagement. When used properly, that also means more revenue.
You’re already spending money to drive new leads to your website, social, email, and everywhere else you advertise. We’ll show you the best ways to use texting for lead generation to bring all that together to maximize your marketing ROI.
1. Announce to the world that people can text message you.
If you don’t tell people, how are they going to know?
But we’re not just talking about mentioning texting once in your customer newsletter or social media post. The best rollouts for text message lead generation include regular prompts through all channels with call-to-actions (CTAs) for potential customers to text you, including:
Your website—including banners, landing pages, footer, ect.
Marketing collateral—business cards, flyers, signs, ect.
Digital ads
Social media—LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, ect.
Your CTA should focus on:
Consistently telling people, including both leads and existing customers, they can text you
Giving people a reason why they should text you
What is your company texting for? How does that help customers? How do they take advantage of that communication channel? Tell them these things in your CTA.
Text Request can help by making your current phone number textable, so your CTA can be:
“Call or text our business for [reason]!”
Having the same number for phone calls and texting saves time and confusion.
We’ll cover more examples of CTAs throughout our other business texting strategies below.
2. Increase website conversions with SMS tools.
Your website works day and night to convert leads. Add texting to the mix, and you’ll see your website’s conversion rates go up. Here are the SMS tools we recommend to make that happen.
SMS Chat
SMS Chat is a widget that people use to text you directly from your website. All the messages come directly to your Text Request dashboard, while your replies go to the contact’s mobile phone.
This does three things:
Immediately establishes your business can text
Invites leads to text you
Saves their number for future follow ups
Websites with a chat like this capture more leads than those without, plus SMS Chat tends to be more effective for turning those leads into sales via follow-up texts.
The widget can also be formatted to have a CTA specific for your business, like:
“Text us to book your appointment!”
Or.
“Text us to get an estimate.”
SMS Chat shows new customers what they need to do to get started, and helps you be available to answer their questions before they make a purchase. All of that together keeps leads from moving on to other competitors.
Web Form Text Triggers
Potential customers want an immediate response when they reach out to you—otherwise they’ll move on to a competitor. You’ll convert more leads when you create an automation that shoots confirmation texts to leads who fill out your web forms.
We have integrations with multiple CRMs to set up text triggers, including:
As soon as the potential lead submits the web form to request sales info or schedule a demo, they can get a text like:
“We’ve gotten your request, and [Name] is going to follow up with you ASAP.”
Showing how proactive you are at meeting a lead’s needs is what will convert them into a customer. It’s an ongoing way to bolster your reputation, and in turn your revenue.
After the initial confirmation, you can also follow up with the lead later with a template like:
“Enter your number to subscribe, and get 15% off your next purchase!”
While automation is great, remember your leads will expect you to have a human waiting on the other side to handle their responses to those automated messages. That’s the reason they texted you in the first place. Check out our text message templates for nurturing warm leads beyond their initial reach-out.
3. Advertise keywords to get opt-ins for sales conversations.
Keywords are one of the quickest ways to grab a potential customer’s attention, and they can be displayed across everywhere from:
Brick-and-mortar locations
Social media
Digital ads
Physical marketing collateral
Keywords are words leads can text you to opt in for information or incentives they find relevant to them. The CTA you advertise alongside keyword could be:
Real Estate: “Text HOUSE to schedule a visit.”
HVAC: “Text HEATING to learn more about our seasonal tuneup plan.”
Insurance: “Text QUOTE to learn more about our rates.”
Fitness: “Text LIFT and your first session is free.”
Retail: “Text SALE to get 15% off your next purchase.”
SaaS: “Text DEMO to see our service in action.”
Franchising: “Text JOIN to learn how to open your own location.”
Nonprofit: “Text GIVE to learn how you can contribute to our cause!”
Athletics: “Text TEAM for a chance to win free tickets to our next match!”
Leads who opt in to receive discounts or information are automatically put into Groups you can follow up with later. These follow ups could be as simple as sharing educational content—like a relevant case study or blog—or discounts to drive the lead to take an action.
You’ll start more sales conversations and keep leads moving down your funnel, when you let potential customers come to you using keywords.
4. Spark interest with SMS contests and VIP programs.
A potential customer’s fear of missing out—or FOMO—will win almost every time. There’s no better CTA than advertising the opportunity to opt in for VIP perks and special offers.
Those keywords we just talked about are a great way to advertise these perks:
“Text VIP to learn about our exclusive SMS perks!”
You just need to follow through on giving valuable rewards to leads who take the bite, with things like:
Free swag
Early access to new products and features
Behind the scenes content
Free shipping on products
Exclusive services and events
The point of being a VIP is the special treatment, which means these SMS programs are going to have the largest impact when you continuously foster relationships with your VIP customers. Successful lead nurturing means texting people like you're a human being, providing genuine value through things like educational content and links, and being responsive when they respond to your messages.
Text Request gives you the power to automatically shorten links and track clicks across mass texts, so you can see which of your offers are enticing VIPs the most.
Just remember that two-way conversations are why potential customers want to text you in the first place, and consistently following up is just as important as the initial reach out. We have tons of SMS marketing ideas to help you keep leads invested beyond their initial opt in.
5. Convert your email subscriber list into a SMS subscriber list.
Your email marketing and text message strategies can work together to convert more leads. Especially when you use our integrations to cross pollinate your contact lists:
When those integrations are active, any phone numbers you’ve gathered via email signup will automatically be added to your Text Request account. These contacts will also be put into a corresponding Group that’s updated each night to make sure you continuously collect numbers.
This is powerful for three reasons:
It’s a low effort way to gather contacts for an SMS subscriber list
You can now follow up email announcements with SMS alerts (and vice versa) to make sure your news isn’t missed
You have two sets of data on both your email and Text Request account to better document what entices your leads
Your social media channels can also complement your email and SMS strategies. For example, your email campaign could direct leads to text a keyword, and then that keyword’s autoresponse could direct leads to share one of your social media posts to receive a discount.
The more places a lead sees your CTA, the more likely they are to take an action.
Jump Start Your SMS Lead Generation Strategy
SMS messages have the open rate and speed to capture more qualified leads for your business. You just need an ongoing SMS marketing strategy to nurture those leads once they start coming your way—plus a platform like Text Request to help you manage those texts with tools like Mass Texting, autoresponses, mobile apps, and more.
We even have free resources, including industry playbooks and text message templates, to bring your SMS lead gen strategy to life.
