How often to send marketing SMS without wearing out your list

The short answer: send only when you have something worth saying, at a pace you can keep up and that you told customers about when they joined. Never repeat the same campaign to the same numbers several times in one week. The signs that you are overdoing it are easy to spot: more opt-out requests and fewer responses with each campaign.

Why SMS wears people out faster

An SMS pops up on the screen, makes the phone buzz and sits in the same inbox as messages from family. That is what makes it effective, and it is also why it becomes annoying quickly. One e-mail too many goes into a folder; one SMS too many makes the customer opt out.

How to decide the pace

1	Promise a pace when people sign up and stick to it, for example "no more than [N] messages a month". People who know what to expect are less surprised.

2	Plan the month on a sheet: which campaigns, for which groups, on which days. See the SMS marketing calendar.

3	Check who is in several groups. A customer in "Shoes", "Children's clothes" and "Active" may get three campaigns in one week without anyone noticing.

4	Measure after each campaign: responses and opt-out requests, then adjust. See how to measure a campaign.

Warning signs

Sign	What it usually means	What to do
Opt-out requests go up	Too many messages, or messages to people who did not want them.	Space campaigns out and review where the list came from.
Responses drop from one campaign to the next	The list has learned to ignore you.	Fewer campaigns, with better and more targeted offers.
Complaints or angry calls	Wrong time, or a repeated campaign.	Review your times and do not repeat the same offer.
The same few customers always respond	The rest of the list has lost interest.	Split "Active" and "Inactive" and treat each group differently.

Service notices are a separate matter

An order update, an appointment confirmation or a reminder the customer asked for is not marketing, and customers want it. Frequency is a concern for promotions. But do not hide an offer inside a notice: it is the content that counts, and a notice with an offer becomes marketing. See transactional SMS.

Fewer, but better. One campaign with a strong offer does more than three with weak ones, and uses a third of the credits.

Re-sending the campaign to people who did not respond seems like a good idea, but for them it is the same message twice. If you want to try again, change the offer or the angle, and leave a few days in between.

Want to plan campaigns at the right pace? See the SMS Marketing tools.

See the SMS Marketing page

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