Training Your Team in SMS Marketing
The beauty of SMS Marketing is that it’s so simple one person can do it. You can create, manage, send, and receive messages all by yourself, armed only with a smartphone. Still, if you want to take your SMS marketing campaign to the next level, you could employ some extra help. If everybody in your place of business is engaged, you can turn your bulk SMS account from a simple one-way text service to a fully interactive marketing campaign.
You can task your team with anything from recruitment to branding to maintenance. Don’t be afraid to bring in new minds who can explore new dimensions of your campaign or just take the pressure off when the workload becomes too much. Because the mechanics of opt-in SMS Marketing are so simple, training your staff on them should be just as easy.
First things first: sales. Your opt-in SMS group is a product that needs to be sold. So make sure your staff is as dedicated to “selling” your SMS group as they are to selling the tangible products on your shelves. Keep them aware of the features and benefits of your SMS group and equip them with answers to the most basic questions of who, what, when, where, and—most importantly—why. It can take some convincing to get people to allow your business into their cell phones. Fortunately you don’t need to rewrite the book on sales to accomplish it.
Branding is still key. Remember the work you did to get customers to know and remember the name of your business? Now you have to do some of that work again to get the same customers to know that you have an SMS group. Have your most creative and energetic team members create materials to promote your group in your place of business and around the neighborhood. You can’t step outside your front door anymore without a business touting their Facebook or Twitter account. Join the fray by putting your SMS group front and center.
Even if you can do the actual “hands-on” work of SMS Marketing on your own, it’s still nice to have at least a couple of trusted partners at your side to take over in case of vacation, illness, or plain old burnout. Train them on the particulars of how to use your SMS account and the type of messages to send. That way they can take some of the burden off you.
And don’t forget: as is the rule for all traditional leadership tasks, you must be the most passionate about your idea. Have fun with your SMS Marketing campaign and your team should follow from the example. This isn’t the old, boring approach to marketing. You are using technologies and strategies that are cutting edge. Right now, the potential is limitless. As a small business owner, the idea of expansion has probably crossed your mind. Take the first step by expanding your SMS campaign team.
