Business Texting

Confirm & Schedule Appointments

• For service-oriented or by-appointment businesses, scheduling can involve a lot of back and forth. Texting makes appointment reminders simple for your customers.
• Text messages make it much easier to reach people to book and confirm appointments.
• Make phone calls more convenient for your customers by sending them a text message asking them to call when they have a few minutes available.
• Make your life easier by setting up messages as tasks so that you can easily send them out on the right day, at the right time.
• Send text messages through your business phone number using Weave’s mobile app.

Works With Your Current Methods & Tactics

• Business text messaging isn’t meant to replace phone and email communications, it’s meant to support them and make them more effective. Text messages open up new channels to communicate with your customers, taking the burden off your phone lines or email inboxes. Business text messages also boast amazing deliverability and response rates!
• You can maximize how you communicate in each channel by playing to their strengths; texts are perfect for short and quick communications or to plan more substantial communication in the future.

Saves Your Business Time and Money

• How does texting actually cut costs and increase profits? Businesses who utilize text messaging can save significant amounts of time in comparison with other communication methods.
• With texting, you don’t have to worry about missed calls or buried emails. If you can’t reach the customer, you can simply shoot them a text and reach them directly. This is great news for your office staff and is also more convenient for your customers.
• The time saved by implementing texting in your business can be refocused into more productive things like streamlining your operations, fostering good relationships with your customers, and growing your business.

Share Valuable Information To As Many Customers As You Want

• Texting is a great way to share event announcements, company updates, or just resources that customers might find interesting. Since almost all people own smartphones, you don’t have to stick to plain text; you can add photos, videos, and links to articles on the internet. Businesses can use this for branding, building customer loyalty, or simply providing value to their customers.
• You can quickly and efficiently send a message to one, dozens, or even hundreds of people at the same time. Our business texting service offers a group broadcast feature that allows you to send mass texts that still feel personalized for the person receiving them.

Follow Up With Customers

• Text messaging is perfect for customers who need a short and fast answer to a question. They get a simple yes or no answer or collect information like email addresses or contact numbers through text. You don’t need to play phone tag or leave voicemails. With text messaging, follow-ups are quick, simple and effective!

Set Up A Phone Call

• Most people don’t like it when businesses call them without warning. If your customers are at work, or in the middle of a family event, they are likely going to decline your call, and possibly be annoyed that you called at an inconvenient time.
• Because of texting, your calls can be significantly more effective. If you need to speak with your customers on the phone, you can show that you respect their time by sending them a text message first. If they’re not free at that moment, you can schedule a phone call for when they’re more available. This makes the likelihood of you getting the person on the phone much higher!
• Texting helps you communicate with your customer at the best possible time, leading to a better relationship and smoother experiences for both parties.

Collect Reviews

• SMS is a great way to ask for reviews when it matters the most: right after your customers finished their appointment. You can text customers after they’ve visited your office, asking for feedback and a review. This can improve your online rating and your overall reputation. This can provide an amazing boost for any business trying to build a good reputation!

Foster Good Business Relationships

• You can send text messages greeting your customers on the most important occasions, such as holidays or birthdays. Being kind and treating them as humans (not just your profit source) goes a long way in making your customers feel cared for. You will often see responses showing how important these simple texts are to your customers!

Communicate With Your Team

• Business texting isn’t just useful to connect with your customers, it’s also useful in uniting your staff. Having your staff on the same page allows you to provide the best experience possible! Quickly schedule meetings and get work updates, whether your staff is onsite or working remotely.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. I already use phone and email. Why should I start texting?

• If your business already has a solid communication strategy involving emails or cold-calling, then you’re probably wondering why you should bother with business texting. Well, the benefits are clear, but here are some of the biggest advantages you get when you use texting as an outreach tool for your business.

Business Texting Allows You To Open Up Your Business To New Customers

• You can make a better impression on prospective customers by utilizing text messaging. Some people may be interested in your particular service or business, but not enough to make the effort to call or email to inquire.
• Almost 9 out of 10 customers want to engage via text. Your business sets itself apart by providing a communication channel that your customers want!
• Adding this new communication channel will make engaging with your business much easier, allowing you to reach people more than ever before. It may seem very simple, but it can definitely broaden your potential audience and help you edge out the competition.

Business Texting Demands Your Existing Customers’ Attention

• Today’s customers are very familiar with old-school marketing tactics like online ads, sponsored posts, and email blasts. These techniques were once innovative and attention-grabbing, but we’ve become so accustomed to them that they’re practically background noise. As a business, platforms that help you break through the noise are extremely valuable.
• Texting is one way to appeal to consumers. Even if the execution is unpolished, business texting boasts an incredibly high read and response rate. In our busy lives, we might miss a call or let an email slip through the cracks. But we pay attention to our texts. In fact, text messages have a near-perfect read rate at 97%. Want to successfully land something in front of your customers? Texting is a great option!

Create Effortless, Instant, & Meaningful Experiences For Your Customers

• Phone calls and emails can demand a lot of time and energy. Calls interrupt your customers’ day and toes the line between helpful and annoying. On the other hand, texts are short, informal, and very easy to answer at their own convenience. Personalized texts are extremely successful when it comes to replacing many types of phone calls.
• Business texting services help you reach out and respond to customers in a convenient manner.
• You can send valuable information to customers in a way that feels human, authentic, and thoughtful. This creates positive associations with your business rather than becoming a nuisance like repeated calls often become.

Plus, if they have any questions or problems come up after the initial communication, unlike a one-time phone call, they can easily open up the dialogue again.

2. Isn’t texting unprofessional?

• In 2019, it’s not just accepted but encouraged to use new forms of communication such as social media, instant messaging, and texting to reach new markets and strengthen relationships with your consumers. Be where your customers are!
• What we’re learning today is that it’s not necessarily what platforms you use but how you use it that determines your professionalism. Customers appreciate technologies that make their lives easier. Texting can be one of those technologies for your business!

3. My customers aren’t millennials. Will they really use texting?

• While the millennial generation widely used and popularized texting, it isn’t just millennials who are avid texters. Over 97% of smartphone owners text and that includes people who are hitting their 50s, 60s, or older.

4. What if I’m a small business? Isn’t this only for big businesses?

• Businesses of all sizes can benefit from having a direct line of communication with a customer through texting. Exceptional customer experiences are important in business of all sizes, and texting helps your business create those exceptional experiences.
• Small businesses often can’t compete with big business’ marketing budgets, but texting seems to be a good equalizer. Texting doesn’t have to cost a lot to make a significant impact on your customer service and reach, making it an incredibly cost-effective tool that works for everyone regardless of capital or size.

5. How much time will business texting take?

Contrary to popular belief, it doesn’t drain a lot of your time and resources to get in on the texting trend. Implementing any business or operational change will take a little bit of getting used to, but it’s not a very difficult challenge especially since many on your team probably already text in their day-to-day lives. Learning the basics of SMS marketing and relationship building will be easy for those who are already familiar with texting—and, who isn’t these days?

Costs are another major concern for business owners, but texting is one of the cheapest yet most effective communication methods you can implement. In fact, you can start communicating through texts with virtually no additional costs. Many VoIP services, like Weave, offer two-way texting as a built-in feature because of how valuable it can be for businesses.

6. How long should my texts be?

K.I.S.S. = Keep It Short And Simple

This old adage definitely applies to business texting. Texts are built for brief and quick communications only–save the lengthy paragraphs for email, or a phone call that you can coordinate via a convenient text. A short text message has a much higher chance of being read and responded to. The shorter it is, the less it demands of your customers. Get to the point, and make sure you communicate what you want your customer to do about your text.

Do you want them to confirm something? Do you want them to click a link? A quick call-to-action or simple yes-or-no questions work great.

7. Since it’s texting, should my messages be more casual or should I keep it formal?

Keep it casual and light. Text using a tone that is friendly, polite, positive, and professional. Avoid pretentious words or complicated sentence structures–this is a text message, not an academic paper. Simple texts require less effort on the part of your customers and increase the likelihood they will respond. Simple, personal texts create loyalty and friendship with your customers.

Don’t be scared to inject wit and humor into the text, but be wary of anything that is too jokey, rude, or offensive. Emojis are more and more acceptable (especially for younger, more hip businesses), but keep them to a minimum. Avoid abbreviations or shortcuts like “lol”, “idk”, or “u” that make you look too casual. Your customers love personalized communication, but be sure to keep the content to things they will understand.

8. When should I send messages?

With marketing, when you communicate is almost as important as what you communicate. Timing is everything if you want to make the most out of your texts. Send out texts at a time and day of the week when your customers are most likely to see and respond. Think about your customers personally. What is going to be the best time for them?

Depending on your customer base, this could be anywhere from early mornings on weekdays to weekend nights. Experiment and find a schedule that works best for your business.

Also, make sure that you send notifications and confirmations with enough lead time. For major events, alert people 1-2 weeks prior to give them time to clear their schedules. For regular appointments, send a confirmation text a few days before. Texts should be helpful, so send them in a timeframe that gives your customers time to plan accordingly.