well, hello and welcome to the e-commerce podcast with me.
Speaker:Your host, Matt Edmundson, this podcast, this show is all about
Speaker:helping you deliver e-commerce.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Yes, it is.
Speaker:And to do that, I'm super excited to chat to today's guest today.
Speaker:From boss about how to use SMS marketing for e-commerce what a great topic that
Speaker:is, uh, and to do that justice and to give it a, you know, make it a bit more
Speaker:well-rounded and because so many new people are subscribing to the show at the
Speaker:moment, uh, one of the things I want to do is just give a quick shout out to some
Speaker:of the past guests and episodes where.
Speaker:Given that we are in fact, talking about SMS marketing for e-commerce.
Speaker:I thought you might enjoy the following episodes.
Speaker:So what does, you've listened to this one?
Speaker:Check out, uh, my interview with valentyn Radu on maximizing the
Speaker:lifetime value of a customer.
Speaker:I've got to know Valentine's since that recording is an absolute legend.
Speaker:Let me tell you such a great guy full of insight.
Speaker:Definitely check out his episode as well as, uh, Rouse episodes.
Speaker:Called referral marketing just got easy.
Speaker:One of my favorite titles, if I'm honest with you, uh, such a great conversation
Speaker:with rod, definitely check that out too.
Speaker:Now this episode is brought to you by the e-commerce cohort, which
Speaker:helps to deliver e-commerce wow.
Speaker:To your customers.
Speaker:What is the e-commerce cohort?
Speaker:I hear you saying, well, Let me tell you, uh, now you may well have come
Speaker:across folks who have got stuck with their e-commerce business, or maybe
Speaker:siloed into working on just one or two of their voluntary areas of their business.
Speaker:And they miss the kind of bigger picture, which is what happened to me.
Speaker:If I'm honest with you, uh, there's a story behind that which often tell,
Speaker:uh, on, on other people's podcasts when I get into and how it costs me.
Speaker:We lost millions as a result of that.
Speaker:So cohort has sort of been born out of that pain if you're like, uh, the
Speaker:e-commerce cohort is a lightweight membership group with guided monthly
Speaker:sprints, that cycle through all the key areas of e-commerce with the sober.
Speaker:Of providing you with clear, actionable jobs to be done for your online business.
Speaker:So you'll know what to work on when to work on it.
Speaker:And more importantly, you'll have the support and accountability to get it done.
Speaker:So whether you are just starting out in e-commerce or if like me
Speaker:you've been around for a while, a well-established e-commerce or
Speaker:as I like to call us, uh, then.
Speaker:Definitely encourage you to go and check out e-commerce cohort.com as it's gearing
Speaker:up for its founding member launch.
Speaker:Now you can also email me directly at Matt at e-commerce podcast.net with any
Speaker:questions that you have, because let me tell you, this is something that I.
Speaker:Right of we have done the online courses in the past.
Speaker:Yes, we have.
Speaker:We have done all kinds of crazy things.
Speaker:All of which I'm proud of and all of which have been good and
Speaker:cohort is taking all of that.
Speaker:Learning, putting everything together and in a very affordable monthly
Speaker:membership for the founding members.
Speaker:Let me tell you, so do go and check it out.
Speaker:Now let's jump in today's conversation.
Speaker:Shall we?
Speaker:So today's guest is the co-founder of cop boss, a text messaging solution
Speaker:for recovering abandoned cots.
Speaker:He's a former developer now focused on running day-to-day
Speaker:operations and achieving the long-term goals for his company.
Speaker:This is a conversation which is literally.
Speaker:Just touching the surface of SMS marketing and the power and impact it
Speaker:can have on your e-commerce business.
Speaker:So grab your pens, grab your notebooks, have your cup of coffee
Speaker:at the ready, because you're not going to want to miss any of this.
Speaker:Here's my conversation with.
Speaker:Sorry today.
Speaker:Thank you for joining me on the podcast.
Speaker:It is great to have you beaming in from what I can only hope is sunny Holland.
Speaker:Uh, but it it's great to have you.
Speaker:Thank you for joining me.
Speaker:How are you doing today?
Speaker:Good, good.
Speaker:Uh, thank you for having me.
Speaker:Uh, and it's not, it's not a sunny day in Holland.
Speaker:Unfortunately not it's a typical Dutch wet or right now going to start raining soon.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So it's not just, um, it's not just England that has the rain
Speaker:Holland has its fair share as well.
Speaker:Oh yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:We do have a, quite a fair share of rain.
Speaker:You can go outside and it's sunny one moment then it's raining the next.
Speaker:So it's an interesting experience, uh, was not used to it too, because I'm
Speaker:from Slovenia and I moved here in just.
Speaker:And I was quite shocked about the weather conditions here, but, uh,
Speaker:it's, it's actually quite nice.
Speaker:Uh, I, before it actually it's good.
Speaker:So yeah, when I come to England, uh, yeah, I'm going to be using.
Speaker:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker:You're going to be used to it.
Speaker:Uh, which is, which is helpful.
Speaker:I think whenever you're, whenever you're visiting.
Speaker:And so you are from Slovenia, you live in Holland and you're the co-founder
Speaker:of a company called cart boss, which is all about SMS or text messaging.
Speaker:As we like to say, saying in England, And one of the things that you
Speaker:mentioned on your website, we're going to get into the whole SMS
Speaker:marketing, text message marketing.
Speaker:One of the stats that really surprised me, which you mentioned on your website
Speaker:was that 99% of people open text messages, which I'd never really thought about.
Speaker:But I guess it's, I guess it makes sense.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, it makes sense.
Speaker:Everybody just checks out the text message.
Speaker:You're interested.
Speaker:You, you don't get, you know, as many text messages as you get emails, so
Speaker:it's not a full inbox of, of them.
Speaker:Uh, so the space, you know, for using text messages, It's quite a good,
Speaker:because yeah, you're not full of text messages the whole time, but there's
Speaker:one statistics that's even better.
Speaker:Uh it's that 93% of text messages gets read within three
Speaker:minutes of receiving them.
Speaker:Now dads, the statistics actually that I was just amazed at, and that's why
Speaker:it's so powerful to use them because honestly, when you get a text message,
Speaker:Open it usually quite immediately because your phone is constantly with you.
Speaker:And if you use text messages for remarketing or whatever you want, you
Speaker:get the results results instantly.
Speaker:That's why text messages are such a powerful tool in marketing.
Speaker:That's a really interesting idea that.
Speaker:93% of text messages read within three minutes.
Speaker:Does that mean, uh, without getting too granular in the detail just yet, but
Speaker:does that mean, um, if I send out an, uh, uh, a text message, um, I'm going
Speaker:to see the response within the next three minutes, and if it's, I'm not
Speaker:going to see too much response, maybe 10 minutes after I've sent it, you're
Speaker:going to see the bulk of it within the three or four minutes of sending it out.
Speaker:Would that be that.
Speaker:Um, well, not really.
Speaker:Um, when we know I can go a bit technical here because it depends
Speaker:on the level of conversation here.
Speaker:The thing is that, uh, when you send out a text message, we can see
Speaker:if a text message has been opened.
Speaker:We can get that information from various API calls and stuff like that.
Speaker:Uh, and we can see that a text message has been opened within.
Speaker:A specific timeframe, but if we're talking about conversions, meaning
Speaker:that after a text message has been opened and a conversion will be
Speaker:completed within a time span of five, 10 minutes, that's not the case.
Speaker:Uh, what happens is that when a text message is sent, uh, it's usually.
Speaker:And then it's opened again and then it's open again.
Speaker:It's opened actually a few times usually.
Speaker:And then the conversion occurs in a way that a link is clicked and then
Speaker:the recipient goes to the website and then dabs around the site, you know,
Speaker:again, and then, uh, complete the order.
Speaker:It really depends, but, uh, most, if we talk about abandoned cart, text
Speaker:message, Those can work a lot faster than usual marketing text messages,
Speaker:like most text messages or win-back text messages newsletter once.
Speaker:Uh, but the abandoned cart, text messages, those can work almost instantaneous.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And so, um, so let's, we'll come back to that because I want to get into that a
Speaker:little bit, but I guess before I get too caught up in the detail, which is, you
Speaker:know, my, my, uh, my weakness, I suppose.
Speaker:Um, let's just take a step back because I, I want to.
Speaker:Um, I'm imagining people who are listening to the show who maybe don't do text
Speaker:messaging, marketing, or SMS marketing.
Speaker:And so what would be the benefits of SMS messages for e-commerce marketers?
Speaker:Why?
Speaker:I mean, you've already mentioned that, you know, 93% of people are gonna open
Speaker:them within the three first three minutes.
Speaker:We don't get a lot of text messages, but are there some other reasons that
Speaker:we should really think about doing this if we're not already doing it?
Speaker:Um, well, I mean, we can think about abandoned cart emails.
Speaker:If you remember them, when they started appearing, when people started using them,
Speaker:what happened was they just converted.
Speaker:They gave more.
Speaker:They offered more sale to the stores, to the store owners.
Speaker:And it's the same with text messages.
Speaker:It just gives you another marketing channel to get in contact with
Speaker:your clients, with your customers.
Speaker:Um, doughnut difference is that the conversion rate is extremely higher.
Speaker:The open rate is just unimaginable.
Speaker:Having a, an having been open rate of 99% and a return of investment
Speaker:of somewhere between 2400%.
Speaker:And some of our users have a return of investment of, I think around
Speaker:7000% that outfits that's our top, uh, user, uh, and a few brands have
Speaker:a return of investment of 5,000 per.
Speaker:And not just like for a short time span.
Speaker:Uh, we just like two months ago, a large, uh, brand that does, uh,
Speaker:clothing, uh, started using us.
Speaker:I mean, started using card boss.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:They constantly just have like a 5,100, two and 5,000
Speaker:to 200% return of investment.
Speaker:So you don't lose money.
Speaker:Uh, You just sell more stuff and it's honestly a no brainer you've got nothing
Speaker:to do is, um, because yeah, I mean, if you just put in a bit of money,
Speaker:like 10 euros and you get 400 euros back, even more, you know, so yeah.
Speaker:It's just useful.
Speaker:And even people, you know, the recipients of the text message.
Speaker:W we check, you know, how many people unsubscribed from the received,
Speaker:receiving the text messages on average?
Speaker:I mean, on average, on 2000 people that are contacted,
Speaker:uh, one person unsubscribes.
Speaker:So yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, well, honestly, I thought that more people will, when you
Speaker:compare them, when you compare that information to email marketing, which
Speaker:of course everybody should be doing.
Speaker:Uh, and we, we say that everybody should be doing email marketing.
Speaker:Um, but it's interesting when you compare those numbers to email
Speaker:marketing, because text messaging then, um, has a dramatically high.
Speaker:Uh, open rate, um, I mean, dramatically higher, you know, you're talking 99%.
Speaker:Um, it seems to have a much bigger return on investment than email marketing.
Speaker:Um, and it seems to have a lower unsubscribe rate than email marketing.
Speaker:At least that's from some of the numbers that you're telling me,
Speaker:I guess it's going to differ.
Speaker:From company to company and obviously a website to website.
Speaker:So you're going to have to check it out, but it's, it's interesting
Speaker:that you call text messaging, marketing a bit of a no brainer.
Speaker:So when you compare SMS marketing with email marketing, um, I guess
Speaker:it is a bit of a no brainer.
Speaker:So when our.
Speaker:When I'm starting out in e-commerce, uh, today I'm, I'm thinking, how do
Speaker:I build my e-commerce marketing list?
Speaker:How do I build my email subscribers?
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:How do I, cause I know that long-term, I need to have a good email marketing
Speaker:system, but how do I do that with text messaging subscribers?
Speaker:Do I need a strategy?
Speaker:Which says I need to do this to get new subscribers, to my text messaging, like.
Speaker:It's actually no different than with emails.
Speaker:You know, you can share a show up, pop up on the site, uh, explain that
Speaker:you are going to offer different special deals via text messages.
Speaker:And then the day we're going to be the first one to get it.
Speaker:Uh, but the most successful way is on the checkout.
Speaker:You know, where you can just say, have a checkbox underneath the.
Speaker:And just say like, Hey, would you like to subscribe to our text messages, text
Speaker:messaging, emailing, and that's it.
Speaker:Um, it's not a big, how do you say, um, a big, uh, mental breakthrough?
Speaker:You know, it's completely the same just with emails.
Speaker:Um, uh, because people don't want to learn new stuff.
Speaker:Like.
Speaker:Visitors of your website.
Speaker:They don't want to learn new stuff and you don't want to show
Speaker:them something revolutionary.
Speaker:You just have to keep it as things were before.
Speaker:Just introduce that.
Speaker:It's not going to be with emails anymore.
Speaker:That it's going to be with text messages, which is even better, you
Speaker:know, because old people, for example, they don't usually open emails.
Speaker:They don't even know what I mean.
Speaker:Usually they are really bad with emails.
Speaker:But with text messages, they're really keen on using them.
Speaker:They know how to use their phone.
Speaker:So it's a more personalized experience.
Speaker:So that's why people read, like, to, uh, subscribe to their mailing lists.
Speaker:I mean, to their SMS mailing lists.
Speaker:Um, it's better that way.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So putting it in checkout, um, I get that.
Speaker:That makes an awful lot of sense.
Speaker:Um, and to be honest with you, I'm just thinking about all
Speaker:the websites that I've been on.
Speaker:Very few of them are doing SMS marketing.
Speaker:Very few of them.
Speaker:Ask if they can send me a text message.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Is there, I guess, is there some kind of rules and regulations, like
Speaker:email is very highly regulated.
Speaker:You know, we've got GDPR now in Europe and all that sort of stuff.
Speaker:Um, it's just text messaging fall under the same banner.
Speaker:Do we have to, you know, think about things like compliance
Speaker:and GDPR compliance and.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:GDPR does comply in this case.
Speaker:Uh it's there's also a special regulation in the U S um, but
Speaker:regarding text messages, it's more in a way that even specific
Speaker:countries have their own regulations.
Speaker:So it needs to be checked if you can send them or.
Speaker:I mean, you are safe.
Speaker:If you show a checkbox, you know, underneath the phone field on
Speaker:a checkout that you ask them if they comply to receiving them.
Speaker:But if you want to optimize your marketing, you can check
Speaker:in, in each specific country.
Speaker:If the chat box can be preselected or if it even needs to be shown, you know, so.
Speaker:And that way you need to change those stuff out to optimize marketing.
Speaker:And then there is of course, the option to send post-purchase text messages or
Speaker:win-back, or campaigns to your existing clients, to your existing, to the
Speaker:people that already bought on your site.
Speaker:There was a question regarding if you can contact them without their consent.
Speaker:Uh, because if someone has already bought something on your side, they have to check
Speaker:that they comply with the regulations of the website of how they operate.
Speaker:And if you have that insight in the privacy policy written, in that
Speaker:case, you might be able to send them text messages and that specific.
Speaker:Uh, don't go anywhere.
Speaker:We're going to carry on this conversation very, very shortly,
Speaker:uh, about SMS messaging.
Speaker:Uh, but first here is a quick message from this week's show sponsors.
Speaker:Hey, there are you a business owner here at orient digital?
Speaker:We know firsthand that running an e-commerce business can be really hard.
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Speaker:so, uh, yeah, today before, uh, we were talking about permissions and
Speaker:how, you know, a simple checkbox, um, would be helpful and maybe
Speaker:updating the terms and conditions on your, on your website, obviously.
Speaker:Um, you need to add, well, I don't want to do is get into
Speaker:giving all kinds of legal advice.
Speaker:We're just going to recommend people, go check out rules for themselves,
Speaker:but these are some of the things that obviously people have, uh, some
Speaker:of your clients have done before.
Speaker:Um, so we've got the permission of the subscriber, right?
Speaker:We've.
Speaker:We've got they've, they've checked the they've checked.
Speaker:They've ticked the checkbox.
Speaker:Uh, and, uh, we've got the permissions.
Speaker:Now you mentioned about, um, abandoned cars.
Speaker:Let's talk about that for a little bit.
Speaker:Uh, how can SMS marketing then, uh, help us reduce abandoned carts?
Speaker:How do you see it working effectively?
Speaker:What are some of the strategies there?
Speaker:Well, uh, it's simple when someone abandons their car, As soon as possible,
Speaker:you automatically send them a text message saying, Hey John, you forgot
Speaker:something in your cart, or you can even go for it or saying like, Hey, you forgot
Speaker:the basketball in your shopping cart.
Speaker:Don't forget to check out complete your order.
Speaker:Before the stock runs out, there was a link in the text message who clicks on the
Speaker:link gets to the checkout, the checkout.
Speaker:Already prefilled with his information, uh, because that's the thing
Speaker:like 70% of, uh, abandoned carts actually fill out the complete form.
Speaker:And then they abandoned the cart because that is the reason behind
Speaker:that is that when you're on the phone, you know, you write in all the
Speaker:information, then you get to the price point or you see that the shipping is.
Speaker:Bryce and additional fees and stuff like that.
Speaker:And then you live with the site.
Speaker:So that's why they fill out most of the form.
Speaker:Anyways, they get automatically redirected to the checkout.
Speaker:That's already prefilled with all their information.
Speaker:If you perhaps offer a discount it's already embedded and a checkout.
Speaker:I mean, in the past, So, all they need to do is complete the
Speaker:door or, I mean, click complete.
Speaker:Uh, usually what you do is you have two, three text messages set up, you
Speaker:know, like the first one is honestly just the best way for the first one
Speaker:is just to have it as a gentle rule.
Speaker:Not to offer any discount at all.
Speaker:And why I'm saying this is because that text message
Speaker:actually offers the best results.
Speaker:The first one with zero, uh, discount, nothing special adult.
Speaker:Um, then the second one is usually with some kind of a discount or free shipping.
Speaker:Depends, you know, on your shop.
Speaker:What's the bottleneck white people.
Speaker:Don't complete the order.
Speaker:And then perhaps the third one, but they all should be spent in a.
Speaker:Um, small time span, for example, the first one after five, 10 minutes, 15,
Speaker:perhaps if you have some kind of other upsell options as well on your site,
Speaker:uh, then the second one after two to four hours, something like that.
Speaker:And then the third one, perhaps after six, 12 hours, something like, yeah.
Speaker:Oh, short time span for the abandoned cart text message.
Speaker:Because a lot of people actually.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, I mean, you do want to convince them to complete the order and if a
Speaker:gentle reminder does it work, that means that they honestly don't want to buy
Speaker:it because of the price or something.
Speaker:Uh, so it's best just to send them different offers, to see which
Speaker:one is the one that can work.
Speaker:And then if you see, for example, that the, I dunno, appreciating
Speaker:is the one that really work.
Speaker:That means that your shipping costs are too high and maybe you
Speaker:should change them on your site.
Speaker:And that way you wouldn't even get so many abandoned carts and.
Speaker:That's really.
Speaker:Um, that's really, I, I mean, that's a top tip right there.
Speaker:You know, you, you, uh, you look at, um, I like that.
Speaker:I like that a lot.
Speaker:So if you're sending out, um, you know, free shipping text messages in your
Speaker:abandoned carts are converting as a result, check your shipping cost because
Speaker:maybe they asked too high and you can experiment with that a little bit.
Speaker:I think that's, that's, that's very clever.
Speaker:It's useful.
Speaker:I think when you look at.
Speaker:You know, these, these tactics like SMS messaging, and it gives you data,
Speaker:which helps you make your website better general, meaning you can
Speaker:use it in multiple different ways.
Speaker:Um, to the, you know, that sort of make sure website better, which I really like.
Speaker:I really liked that.
Speaker:So the first email is a first email.
Speaker:Sorry.
Speaker:The first text message is, um, is a sort of a general, uh, a gentle reminder.
Speaker:I like that phrase a gentle reminder.
Speaker:Uh, the second one is maybe free shipping or a discount on the product.
Speaker:What would the third text message.
Speaker:Uh, just the percentage.
Speaker:It can be a percentage discount or a few of our, uh, users do a free gift,
Speaker:for example, complete your order and get a free gift with, uh, with it.
Speaker:So that that's, that's one type of text message.
Speaker:But.
Speaker:Mostly it's just like they send, like the first one is free.
Speaker:The second one is a discount or free shipping.
Speaker:And the second one is if previously it was free shipping and now it's a discount
Speaker:or a higher discount than previously.
Speaker:So nothing special.
Speaker:Honestly, the free gift is just some alternative that some of our users do.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:That's really, really fast.
Speaker:So all you need is three text messages for your abandoned cart.
Speaker:If they've still not purchased that day, have you, is there a fourth text message
Speaker:the next day, or do you just kind of go wait, you know, Leave that person alone.
Speaker:They're obviously not that interested or maybe put them
Speaker:in an email funnel somewhere.
Speaker:Yeah, no, you just leave them alone because if they didn't convert
Speaker:now, they, they just love it.
Speaker:You know, they've got a text message that we're waiting for them if they decide to.
Speaker:Uh, but if that doesn't help it, it's useless.
Speaker:You're just losing money at that point.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Yeah, no, that's helpful.
Speaker:So, um, I can see how X, uh, text messaging works for abandoned carts.
Speaker:I think, um, one of the things that I'm, I'm deeply concerned about or deeply
Speaker:interested in is maybe a better way to put it when it comes to e-commerce.
Speaker:Um, certainly on our sites is the whole customer experience.
Speaker:You know, how do I, how do we make customer service better?
Speaker:How do we make the whole customer experience better?
Speaker:And I guess one of the ways that I see.
Speaker:Um, text messages being super helpful.
Speaker:And I, and again, let me know what you think about this.
Speaker:Um, With simple things like shipping updates.
Speaker:Hi, we've got your order, your, your, your order shipped.
Speaker:Here's the tracking number as well as sending that out by email.
Speaker:Are those text messages helpful or should I not, not really think
Speaker:about those and just focus more on maybe marketing specific.
Speaker:Uh, we don't actually do that with, uh, Carlos.
Speaker:We don't offer that kind of support, but during the research,
Speaker:uh, the number of, uh, Products.
Speaker:I mean, the packages delivered.
Speaker:Uh, S higher.
Speaker:I mean, when you do, um, cash on delivery payments, uh, there is a lot of people
Speaker:that don't actually just take the package.
Speaker:They decide, decide not to even take it.
Speaker:So the post needs to bring it.
Speaker:If you do use text messages to remind them, Hey, your package is on the way.
Speaker:Uh, if I remember correctly, there was an increase in
Speaker:deliverability of the packages, but I don't recall how big into us.
Speaker:I mean, what the percentage was
Speaker:in the scalp does.
Speaker:I mean, I'm intrigued.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:I'm intrigued.
Speaker:Why.
Speaker:And while you caught boss, don't do that then.
Speaker:Is there a reason you've not gone down that road?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Uh, there was a lot of different, uh, suppliers, you know, for
Speaker:example, you've got the HR again and multiple different, uh, offers.
Speaker:Uh, then you've got to different, um, Uh, those, um, companies, you know, did they,
Speaker:uh, offer billing and stuff like that?
Speaker:Uh, they also have like integrations with that.
Speaker:Our main focus is on sale, you know, selling as much recovering, abandoned
Speaker:carts, growing your conversion rates.
Speaker:That's our main focus.
Speaker:After the sale has been done.
Speaker:We're just focusing on nurturing that a client of yours not doing the
Speaker:whole deliverability and everything that that's not our main goal.
Speaker:Our main goal is car.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Ah, the clue as they say is in the name.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:No, I get that.
Speaker:And, and, and actually you're right.
Speaker:The more I think about it, I mean, a lot of the male companies that we use
Speaker:will actually send a text message to clients say, no, we're going to deliver
Speaker:between 11 and 12 today or whatever.
Speaker:So you focus on sales.
Speaker:So you obviously we've talked about cart abandonment.
Speaker:That's one area that we can use text messages, and you've alluded
Speaker:to some other areas like wingback campaigns and stuff like that.
Speaker:So why don't you elaborate on maybe two or three other key areas that
Speaker:I should really think about text messages and maybe give us a bit
Speaker:of insight into strategy into that?
Speaker:Well, uh, text messages.
Speaker:That simple after you complete an order, you, we have a funnel for
Speaker:example, that after four weeks after you compete in an order, you get another
Speaker:text message saying, Hey, thanks for being a loyal, loyal client of ours.
Speaker:Here's a coupon code for 20% off on anything on our site.
Speaker:And that's it.
Speaker:And they convert amazingly.
Speaker:I mean, you must take into account what kind of a website you have
Speaker:this win-back text messages.
Speaker:They are useful, really useful.
Speaker:They have a return of investment of around 5000%, but they are useful
Speaker:for brands they're not useful for just like regular impulse.
Speaker:Shops, you know, where they sell a bunch of different stuff.
Speaker:You need to have a shop.
Speaker:That's really focused on those specific things like clothing and stuff like that.
Speaker:Um, but if you have a site like that, then you can just send each month a text
Speaker:message saying, Hey, here's a coupon code.
Speaker:And to the second one, the next month again, Hey, it was a coupon code.
Speaker:It's good that the messages are.
Speaker:Uh, because otherwise you just have like, uh, you know, like the
Speaker:default text messages, text message.
Speaker:Did you get kind of used to, and you can even say to yourself, oh, this
Speaker:month I'm going to get the same text message again with the coupon code.
Speaker:Uh, but otherwise if you just change the text a bit each month and yeah.
Speaker:Done deal, you know, people are just going to convert because
Speaker:everybody's into those special offers.
Speaker:Text message viewed the results, honestly.
Speaker:Uh, you can also do, you know, uh, special landing pages, for example, for just
Speaker:for the recipients of text messages.
Speaker:And you can include the link in the win-back text message saying, Hey,
Speaker:because you're a loyal customer.
Speaker:You're going dis link and choose five different products and they
Speaker:are all discounted for you for 50%.
Speaker:Uh, those types of messages also give amazing results, you know, uh, but
Speaker:mentioning this specific, specific way, this is something that we collaborate
Speaker:with big brands and give them the idea to do something like that.
Speaker:We help them.
Speaker:Yes, the whole text message to get or so that they don't mess anything up.
Speaker:We talked to the developers to give them like a heads up, like,
Speaker:look, this would be a good way of doing it and stuff like that.
Speaker:Um, because it, it is important that you collaborate with, uh, companies,
Speaker:even if we're a SAS company, you know, we do make calls to them, uh,
Speaker:just to optimize the whole process of, uh, Just to give you an example.
Speaker:Uh, if you've got a landing page, I mean a one pager, where does.
Speaker:Order completion form is in the bottom and the top, you've got the product details.
Speaker:You know, we talk to the developers and explain to them like, look, when
Speaker:someone receives a text message, they should be scrolled down
Speaker:completely to the bottom line that they get just to the top of the page.
Speaker:And that affected the conversion rates drastically.
Speaker:I mean, if I remember correctly, it was somewhere around 20%.
Speaker:Yeah, that's important.
Speaker:Well, that's interesting that you would, um, that you would do, uh, I like that
Speaker:landing specific landing pages for your SMS campaigns, I think has a clever
Speaker:idea, um, and testing the different offers and the different timeframes
Speaker:on the wind back, uh, messaging.
Speaker:So I've got abandoned cart, I've got a win back messaging sequence.
Speaker:Um, is there, is there another sequence, uh, that I should think of?
Speaker:What should I use it?
Speaker:For example, if I'm just.
Speaker:Um, should I use SMS, I guess just for general offers or general, just
Speaker:sort of, you know, like we'd send an email maybe once a month to scan,
Speaker:oh, this is this, or this is a new product or something like that.
Speaker:Would you use SMS for that kind of general?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, you would.
Speaker:Uh, but the thing is that we haven't gone down that path yet because when
Speaker:we did a lot of, I mean, we do a lot of research before we do a fresh
Speaker:functionality, the results from other companies, weren't that good at all.
Speaker:I mean, you didn't get a return of investment of 5000% or 2400%.
Speaker:You got a lower percentage.
Speaker:You got like 800% or even less.
Speaker:Uh, so one thing that, uh, that we do have is post-purchase text messages,
Speaker:meaning exactly after, uh, order has been completed just like five minutes
Speaker:afterwards, send a text message.
Speaker:Uh, and those are also really, really successful.
Speaker:Those Gadens, uh, depending on the site as well again, uh, but those
Speaker:get a return of investment of around 3000%, which is also quite nice.
Speaker:So yeah.
Speaker:So what does a post-purchase sequence look like?
Speaker:Uh, honestly that's not even a sequence.
Speaker:That's usually just one text message or perhaps two text messages, but it's
Speaker:just, Hey, uh, Thanks for buying it us.
Speaker:Here's a link to a product page, select any product you want.
Speaker:Uh, that's one example or the second one is, Hey, thanks for buying this product.
Speaker:Would you be interested in this and this and this?
Speaker:Uh, and there, there was just the Lincoln site.
Speaker:Um, of course the product needs to be quite cheap, uh, so that they
Speaker:complete the order or have like, you know, the 50% off or 90% off even.
Speaker:Um, but yeah.
Speaker:It's almost exactly the same, like with emails when you do both purchase or
Speaker:post-purchase marketing just adhere, you usually want to be more personal
Speaker:faster because you know that the response is going to be immediate.
Speaker:Uh, but otherwise, yeah, uh, nothing that's special honesty,
Speaker:just that it's text messages.
Speaker:So what you're, what you're saying today is, is that, um, and what I'm
Speaker:hearing is that SMS marketing for e-commerce businesses is remarkably.
Speaker:Um, and remarkably effective when you just focus on one or two key areas,
Speaker:um, and don't really try and make it any, anything more complicated,
Speaker:which multi is a brilliant try to do.
Speaker:Aren't they they're just, let's just make this more complicated than it needs to be.
Speaker:Why?
Speaker:Because we just want it.
Speaker:And, uh, so, so one of the things that you mentioned actually, which I
Speaker:just want to pick up on in our pre.
Speaker:Um, so the call we do before we do the podcast, uh, is that text message
Speaker:marketing is more effective in some countries than in others, for example.
Speaker:Um, and you.
Speaker:You mentioned that a few.
Speaker:I can't remember the countries that you mentioned now, but I just remember,
Speaker:I just remember you pointing out that actually that in certain countries, SMS
Speaker:messaging was super, super effective.
Speaker:So if you are operating in those countries, you definitely
Speaker:need to take advantage of it.
Speaker:So what, what countries does SMS messaging work super well at the moment?
Speaker:Uh, yeah, you've got, uh, Poland, Czech, um, hungry, uh, Um, uh, Ponant I did
Speaker:mention, I mean, honestly, there's most countries that operate amazing.
Speaker:Uh, then there is countries that are, for example, Germany, isn't that good because
Speaker:they're not into that kind of thing.
Speaker:They don't enjoy receiving a text message.
Speaker:All of a sudden, uh, Austria is also not that good, which is.
Speaker:Similar.
Speaker:Um, so those two countries are imbed goods, but otherwise you've got, for
Speaker:example, there's, uh, Italy, that's a bit low on the performance, but do
Speaker:keep in mind low in performance for us means that it's somewhere between
Speaker:under 2400% and definitely above 1600%.
Speaker:Uh, original of investment.
Speaker:Um, so yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Do keep in mind that, uh, and all other countries are usually
Speaker:roughly around 2400%, but there are countries that do get like 3000%,
Speaker:4000% and somewhere around dead.
Speaker:But, uh, honestly you, you cannot, uh, mess things up.
Speaker:You have nothing to lose, uh, eh, Uh, that's why we did like, uh,
Speaker:look just register and we'll give you 50 bucks free credits, just try
Speaker:it out and you'll see how it goes.
Speaker:And, uh, because you know, people are just like, yeah, I don't know.
Speaker:Maybe I'm just going to lose money and everything and yeah, no, you're not,
Speaker:you're definitely not going to lose money.
Speaker:Even if you operate in Germany, you will not lose money with us.
Speaker:I mean, just the return on investment.
Speaker:Won't be as high as.
Speaker:2400%.
Speaker:Yeah, I guess the, the, the response here of course is you've got to test it
Speaker:haven't you and see what works for you and your, your business, your website, your
Speaker:product, your, you know, your customers really, and see whether they're there
Speaker:it's the whole SMS thing, but it seems like you say like a bit of a no brainer.
Speaker:So, um, I guess how to, um, if I'm at an e-commerce.
Speaker:Entrepreneurial and business, uh, um, I'm kind of interested in the numbers.
Speaker:They all seem a little bit too good to be true.
Speaker:So I'm clicking, I'm curious, I'm going.
Speaker:I want to try this.
Speaker:How can an e-commerce business start using, uh, SMS marketing?
Speaker:What's a good place to sort of begin.
Speaker:Uh, well you just have to type in on Google cardboard to get to us because
Speaker:the thing is that why we're different than everybody else is because we've
Speaker:got everything already prepared.
Speaker:Meaning we've got the WooCommerce plugin, Shopify app, um, custom
Speaker:software development kits that can be quite easily implemented.
Speaker:Um, and we're doing additional add on support, different platforms.
Speaker:Uh, But that's not, I mean, that is important because otherwise you wouldn't
Speaker:have an instance, uh, integration with us.
Speaker:You just write in the API key and that's it.
Speaker:Uh, the text messages are already prepared and translated, you know?
Speaker:Uh, so I mean, you can write your own if you want, but otherwise
Speaker:you've got everything already set up.
Speaker:Uh, we detect the language of the recipient, so we don't need
Speaker:to do any settings, you know?
Speaker:Connect your site.
Speaker:Uh, the recipients will always get their text message in their own language.
Speaker:And because they're already written and translated and tested,
Speaker:everything works out of the box.
Speaker:Uh, the links are automatically detected for, you know, linked to the checkout.
Speaker:So everything is there.
Speaker:Uh, you honestly just connect your site.
Speaker:Of course you can choose what kind of text message you want to say.
Speaker:And what's the kind of delay what the discount amount, but otherwise,
Speaker:yeah, it's, it's, you know, when they say it's a five minute integration,
Speaker:uh, and then it boils it down to being a 10, 15 minute integration.
Speaker:Uh, we, it's not this isn't a five minute integration.
Speaker:It's I dunno, it's a two minute integration, including the registration.
Speaker:Connect your site, install the plugin, put in the API key, activates
Speaker:two different text messages done.
Speaker:You don't even have to think about it.
Speaker:And the thing is that our solution is so dead simple that we get
Speaker:actually a lot of questions like, Hey, where do you set the language?
Speaker:I mean, I know that it's written that it's, everything is already
Speaker:prepared and translated, but what do you actually mean by that?
Speaker:And then we need to explain, you know, like, yeah.
Speaker:Everything is on automatic, completely automatic on autopilot.
Speaker:You don't have to even think about it.
Speaker:Um, and yeah, after they go through the shock of being so simple to integrate it
Speaker:in their real commerce or Shopify store, they're just like, this is amazing.
Speaker:This is just amazing.
Speaker:It's so simple.
Speaker:Um, and then we usually get, I mean, occasionally we do
Speaker:get after two or three days.
Speaker:A text message from them or an email saying just like, well, this really works.
Speaker:This is insane.
Speaker:Um, and they showed their results, you know, they send us their return
Speaker:of investment and everything.
Speaker:I'm like, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:You find anybody we know.
Speaker:Um, but yeah, it it's, it's honestly really good.
Speaker:Brilliant.
Speaker:Well, that's how you get set up.
Speaker:Um, so I thought I was going to summarize this.
Speaker:What is a good SMS marketing strategy?
Speaker:What I've heard today and correct me if I'm wrong is number one.
Speaker:Obviously you need to set up some kind of system, whether it's with
Speaker:cop boss or somebody else, but capo seems pretty straightforward.
Speaker:Um, number two, you're going to have to get permission from your users.
Speaker:Um, And, you know, figure that out.
Speaker:Number three, you're going to have to set up some sequences.
Speaker:So your abandoned cart sequence, your win-back sequence and your
Speaker:post-purchase sequence seemed like three good things to sort of stop.
Speaker:Obviously your system has already got those included, but make sure they're
Speaker:going to work for you and your clients.
Speaker:Number four, test your results.
Speaker:Uh, and then number five sent today and text message a few weeks later again.
Speaker:Yeah, actually this really works.
Speaker:Uh, and that seems to me to be a, a great SMS marketing strategy.
Speaker:Is there anything that I've missed there, but no.
Speaker:No, just don't don't waste time.
Speaker:Just do it, you know?
Speaker:As soon as possible, because the sooner you start, the sooner you're
Speaker:going to get better results and just demolish your marketing.
Speaker:I mean, you're just going to grow.
Speaker:I like that.
Speaker:Demolish your marketing as a brilliant place.
Speaker:Uh, listen, uh, today I've thoroughly enjoyed a conversation I really
Speaker:have, and I guess there's going to be people with questions that
Speaker:want to reach out, want to connect.
Speaker:So people want to connect with you and get ahold of you.
Speaker:What's the best way to do that.
Speaker:You can send me.
Speaker:Which is weird because we do text messages.
Speaker:But now I say, send me an email, uh, email on info ads, card,
Speaker:bus, uh, info ads, card, boss.io.
Speaker:That's one way, uh, they can contact me via LinkedIn.
Speaker:Uh, anyway actually is okay.
Speaker:We've got a contact form on our website.
Speaker:You can do a dare as well.
Speaker:Um, anything goes actually, and we usually respond within one day.
Speaker:So.
Speaker:Great.
Speaker:Wonderful.
Speaker:Make sure you do too.
Speaker:If you've got any questions I'm SU I'm sure there'll be
Speaker:more than happy to help you.
Speaker:We will, of course put all of the links to today, uh, in the show notes
Speaker:and you'll be able to reach out to him, um, and ask your questions yet,
Speaker:but like you said, do it get started.
Speaker:I'd love to know the results as well.
Speaker:So if you are going to implement SMS marketing, uh, please do
Speaker:let us know how you get on.
Speaker:Uh, I think.
Speaker:Today, all this left for me to say is, thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker:It's been an absolute privilege to talk to you a real treat.
Speaker:Uh, and I'm, I'm curious to see the impact of this for our, for our show listeners.
Speaker:Thank you.
Speaker:So.
Speaker:Thank you for having me.
Speaker:It was really nice.
Speaker:Thanks.
Speaker:So there you have it.
Speaker:What a fantastic conversation.
Speaker:Huge.
Speaker:Thanks again to today for joining me.
Speaker:Don't forget to check out a complete back catalog online.
Speaker:Just head on over to the e-commerce.
Speaker:I keep saying that don't I, whenever I do the segment of the show, it's
Speaker:not the e-commerce podcast.net.
Speaker:I am going to buy that domain.
Speaker:Because I've said it so many times, uh, check out e-commerce
Speaker:podcast.net is the right domain.
Speaker:Uh, and there you can subscribe to the show.
Speaker:We'll let you know what's coming up.
Speaker:You can check out all the back, uh, issues.
Speaker:Is it back issues back versus back catalog back catalog is probably the
Speaker:right phrase of the e-commerce podcast.
Speaker:Cause we've got well over a hundred episodes now all devoted
Speaker:to helping you get better on line.
Speaker:Don't forget.
Speaker:Don't.
Speaker:I need to put my teeth back in.
Speaker:Don't forget to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts from, because we have
Speaker:some great conversations lined up and I don't want you to miss any of them.
Speaker:And in case no one has told you today, you, my friend are awesome.