It’s impossible to create and execute successful SMS marketing campaigns without measuring key metrics.
SMS marketing involves sending promotional campaigns or transactional messages for marketing purposes using text messages.
About 81 percent of Americans use text messaging. Text message open rates are as high as 98 percent, and about 45 percent of consumers reply to brand text messages they receive.
Clearly, SMS marketing offers you the opportunity to better connect with your potential and existing customers. So, your metrics matter.
The following are seven ways to measure the success of your SMS marketing campaign. These metrics will help you track progress toward your goals and maximize your efforts.
Interaction rate
The interaction rate for an SMS marketing campaign is the measurement of how many text recipients take action after receiving your message.
These actions include clicks, clicks-to-call, app opens and so on. And it’s expressed as a percentage: Total clicks (or another action) divided by delivered text messages times 100.
If your interaction rate is high, it means that your SMS marketing campaign is relevant to your users. If not, there’s room for improvement.
Conversion rate
The conversion rate of an SMS marketing campaign refers to the percentage of recipients who completed the desired action as a direct result of receiving your text message. This could include redeeming a specific coupon or recovering an abandoned online shopping cart.
You can calculate this by taking the number of conversions and dividing it by the total number of messages sent (and times that by 100).
Typically, you can expect higher conversion rates with SMS marketing than with email marketing. This is because SMS subscriber lists are usually highly engaged, considering that the act of providing your phone number to a business means that you’re interested in that business’s products or services.
The conversion rate is different from the interaction rate because you’re measuring actual conversions versus any interaction or engagement because of your text message.
Delivery rate
Your SMS text message delivery rate refers to the number of messages that reached subscribers’ phones divided by the total number of texts sent (times 100).
High deliverability rates indicate that your texts are successfully reaching their intended target. A low deliverability rate could mean a few different things, including:
- Invalid phone numbers
- Low SMS gateway network quality
- Spam filters or other carrier violations
Learn more about carrier violations and how to avoid them in your SMS marketing campaigns.
Tracking your delivery rate gives you a better understanding of the quality of your database. This also could show whether your messages are getting flagged and blocked by carriers.
Unsubscribe rate
You’ll see the percentage of subscribers who unsubscribe during your SMS marketing campaign through your unsubscribe rate.
This is calculated with opt-outs during a campaign being divided by the number of subscribers at the beginning of the campaign period (times 100).
There are many possible reasons why subscribers would opt out of your SMS marketing contact list. It’s possible that you never properly opted them in or are sending too many text messages. Or, your subscribers don’t recognize your business phone number, feel that your texts are misleading or spammy or no longer find your text messages valuable.
If you’re seeing a high unsubscribe rate, it’s important to evaluate the possible reasons why and whether they’re within your control.
List growth rate
Your list growth rate is based on how much your subscriber list has increased during the duration of an SMS marketing campaign.
You can calculate this by subtracting unsubscribers from new subscribers. Then, divide that number by the total number of subscribers during the time of the campaign (times 100).
In general, you do want to continually grow an engaged list of subscribers to extend your reach and stay top of mind, especially since there will always be unsubscribers.
Customer acquisition costs
Your customer acquisition cost is the amount you spend to gain a new customer. You can calculate this by dividing the total cost of your campaign by the number of customers you acquire (times 100).
If you’re seeing high acquisition costs, you might be targeting the wrong audience, segmenting your lists incorrectly or not sending relevant messages to your text recipients.
Return on investment
You always want to measure the return on investment (ROI) in any marketing campaign, including for SMS marketing.
To calculate, you’ll want to subtract your total investment from total sales. Then, divide that number by your total investment (times 100). When calculating, you can select a regular interval for calculations during ongoing campaigns. This can be monthly or annually or at another interval.
Use this metric to compare against your campaigns on other marketing channels. This will help you to better understand where your budget should be spent.
In conclusion
Your SMS marketing campaigns can deliver results for your business. However, you must track these important metrics along the way to best optimize your campaigns and pivot when necessary.
Check out our eight tips to maximize your brand’s SMS marketing strategy.
