Introduction
Communication tools are a vital part of any business communication. Businesses rely on these tools for easy engagement and better reachability. After all, business communication aims to make people aware of the company’s vision and products.
At the very crux of these tools, we find the veteran engagement services SMS and group text messaging. Group Texting is the most reliable and quick form of communication in today’s era and many global organizations use group texts for faster advertising and quick customer response.
So let’s take a look at the basics of what is group messaging, how to send group texts and much more in this comprehensive guide.
What is Group Texting?
Group Text Messaging serves the purpose of conventional two-way messaging but in a supremely efficient way. With Group Text Messaging, businesses can target even larger audiences with minimum effort.
In Group Texting, you segment your audience into groups based on the type of actionable messaging you want to send. Once the group is formed, you can directly send your messages to the members of the group. This way loads of people receive customized SMS campaigns in less time.
The most well-known fact about messaging is the open rate of SMS is a whopping 95%. That’s why leading corporations choose Group texting to send SMS campaigns to target large audiences. Now what’s even more interesting is the open rate of SMS marketing campaigns in 98% which is 5X more than that of emails. These solid statistics make Group messaging a very sought-after communication tool for reachability.
Types Of Group Text Messages
- All the recipients are added to a single group
In this group setting, all the participants are added to a single group. Here they can interact with each other, and respond to other participant’s messages. The SMS sent to the group can be viewed and responded to by every group member on a single ongoing thread, as in the case of WhatsApp groups.
- The group is made for the convenience of the sender
This kind of group is created for the convenience of the sender. The senders use these groups to send broadcast messaging campaigns. Through these broadcast SMS campaigns, the sender can garner personal communication threads with the recipients. Individual communication threads are created between the sender and each recipient IE the recipients of the group will have no idea about others in a particular text campaign. This allows each recipient to reply just to the sender and hence establish two-way communication.
This form of Group message communication gives a personalized texting experience between the companies and their precious customers.
Benefits of Group Text Messaging
Enhanced collaborations
Group Texting lets you collaborate and send your ideas through to other customers or clients with a single message. With less effort, you can easily deliver your CTA and get a quick response
Easy to use
The whole setup and use of Group messages is super easy. You just have to curate a message and send it to large groups in your audience. No technical help or tedious process. You can simply send a single text to any group within seconds
Cost-effective
Group Text messaging is affordable and drives results. 96% of business reports show that using text messages helped them drive revenue. But these group texts cost just a few cents to send. This makes Group messaging very inexpensive and fruitful
Immediate accessibility
Almost 85% of US adults own a smartphone and we are well aware of the fact that the open rate of SMS is 98%. If we connect the two dots, it gives a clear picture that group texts can be easily accessed through a smartphone without having to go through the trouble of receiving a call. People can send and receive group texts from any part of the world
Improved engagement
SMS and group texts are the easiest way to reach your audience and inform them about special discounts, promo codes, or even charity events. So using Group text messaging, businesses can easily scale their customer engagement.
Better productivity
Group texts let you contact massive groups of people with just a few clicks. You can schedule group texts for alter and the recipients can easily read and respond without wasting much of their precious time.
Use Cases of Group Texting + Free Templates
Internal communications
Easily communicate with your team members, and provide them with instructions or reminders about specific tasks. Get most teamwork done through Group texting
Meeting alert SMS
“Dear all [to all the members of one specific group ], the board meeting has been postponed till 12:30. Please be available after that in conference room 1.”
Restaurant client information
“Hey HeadChef [person 1] and our incredible staff [All the other group members], our important client is arriving at our hotel at 8 pm sharp. Please check the serving menu and the rest of the arrangements”
Alerts
Use group texts to remind your group members of important meetings, urgent client cases, or even hospital emergencies.
Businesses Meeting alert
“Dear all [to all the members of one specific group ], the board meeting starts in 10 minutes. Please gather in conference room 1.”
Healthcare emergency alert
“ Team 5 of ER [to all the members of the group], please be ready to handle fire emergency cases on floor 3 ASAP”
Reminders
Use group texting to send reminders about special discounts ending soon, expiring coupon codes, etc. You can also use group messages to send reminders about due payments and installments for different company settings
“Hi, [To all the members of the group]. This is [company]. You have payments due [date]. You can pay online anytime ”
Promotional texts
Send the best discount codes and coupons to your specific group of customers using group messaging. You can offer exclusive loyalty program benefits and send special offers to specific loyalty customers using group text messaging.
“Hey loyal customers [To all the members of the group], to appreciate you, we are launching special loyalty program discounts. Avail them across the whole website on Sunday at 10:00 am.”
Appointment scheduling
Easily schedule the messages for your group of clients. In case of unavailability on a particular day, inform all clients from that particular day about the rescheduling using Group texts. Using group texts, you can segment and form customized messages for a particular set of group members.
“Hey. Your upcoming appointment has been rescheduled to Tuesday, [DATE] by Dr.[NAME] due to some server issues at the clinic. Please find the timings and reschedule details in the attached link elbow [LINK].”
Marketing
Use different occasions such as black Fridays, easters, and your client’s birthdays, etc. to prompt good offers and increase sales.
Group message/mass text for all the clients that share a birthday on a particular day. Add all such customers/members to send a group text. Here’s an example:
“Happy birthday, [To all the group members] 🥳 Here’s a code for [X%] off your next purchase with [company]:”
Send welcome messages to a set of newly joined clients through mass group texting and carry the conversation on individual threads. Here's an example:
“Hi, [To all the members]. Welcome to the gatherings of [XYZ church]. You’ll be the first to know about the latest discussions, choir recruitment, forum discussions, and more from [XYZ church]. Reply AGREE to get more info about timings and schedules”
Customer support queries
Resolve customer queries and keep a touch with all the customers to make sure they don’t run into technical glitches with the product or software. Keep the customers updated in case customer support is not working for a particular period.
“[Company]: The [service] will be down on [date] from [time] to [time] for system upgrades. Please plan accordingly [To all the members of the group]”
“We got your message! A representative from [company] will get back to you within [X minutes].”
How to Send a Group Text?
Step 1: Build your list of contacts
Step 2: Type your message - use templates, add properties, add images, etc
Step 3: Send it immediately or schedule it for a later date
Step 4: In case of a later schedule, select the date and time when you want to send the message
Step 5: Send it immediately or schedule it for later
How do you Send Group Texts to Segmented Groups?
Once you have understood how to create a group text and how to add someone to a group text then the next step is group SMS segmentation. Segmented group texting helps companies target their particular group of leads/clients with customized group texts.
Step 1: Create a separate group of contacts from your existing contacts.
Step 2: You can repeat Step 1 i.e. You can create multiple segmented groups that can have different contacts from your contact list
Step 3: Type your message - use templates, add properties, add images, etc
Step 4: Send it immediately or schedule it for a later date
Step 5: In case of a later schedule, select the date and time when you want to send the message
Step 6: Send it immediately or schedule it for later
How To Get Keywords And Shortcodes For Group Texts?
Keywords and shortcodes help you get started with personalized threads with your individual customers. You can use group texting and keywords together to keep potential buyers informed about awesome deals and special discounts.
Steps to follow for keywords/shortcode group texts:
Step 1: Build your list of contacts
Step 2: If you want, you can create a separate group of contacts from your existing contacts for sending only keyword-based messages
Step 3: Type your message - use templates, add properties, add images, etc
Step 4: Select a keyword or shortcode to send the user. Using this shortcode, the user can opt-in for the message service easily and start personalized threads. For example "Text SPECIAL to [phone number] to get weekly specials."
Step 5: In case of a later schedule, select the date and time when you want to send the message
Step 6: Send it immediately or schedule it for later
Legal Aspects of Group Text Messaging
- The legal requirements for group texting are contained within the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) of 1991
- With a lot of improvement and changes, the Act has frequently been updated—most significantly following the passage of the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003.
- Compliance with the Act is overseen by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
- Organizations are also ordered to follow the Mobile Marketing Association's Code of Conduct – even for non-commercial purposes
- This code of conduct is responsible for maintaining best practices to protect the mobile channel from abuse and limit consumer backlash
- Along with TCPA and the Code of Conduct, phone carriers (the telephone companies that carry and deliver text messages) impose their set of rules on what can be included in group texts
- Most carriers will block messages containing illegal drug use, violence, adult material, profanity, hate speech or inappropriate content.
These restrictions apply to both SMS and MMS messages.
Future Predictions of Group Text Messaging
Well, it’s no news that businesses heavily rely on messaging especially group text messaging to converse and engage with potential buyers, customers, and leads. This leads to the next big discussion of what can be expected by Group text messaging in the future.
Well by observing the trends it is clear that enhanced safety and privacy measures along with next-gen integrations like chatbots and AI would be seen. There would be no limit on how many people can be in a group text. These added abilities would make group text messaging easier and highly profitable for businesses.
Send Group Text Messages With Emitrr
Emitrr is a top-notch texting software that has a highly capable group messaging feature. You can simply use group texting and mass texting with Emitrr’s robust platform.
With Emitrr, sync data from your current CRM, run drip campaigns and even track metrics. You need not change your phone number as your current mobile or landline number can be easily used to send group texts.
Step 1: Integrate your contact list. Let Emitrr’s technical team take care of importing your contact list. Then start by Creating your own group. Choose the option to create a group
Step 2: Select the number of members and their contacts you want to be included in the group and give a meaningful name to the group
Step 3: type in the message you want to send to the group. Attach any media file, photo, etc. with the message
Step 4: Select whether you want to forward the message as a group text or Mass text (broadcast messaging)
Step 5: Choose whether you want to attach a shortcode/keyword to your message. Then select the shortcode you want to attach to add your message and check the preview section to finalize the overall look of the message
Step 6: Choose whether you want to schedule the message for later or immediately send the message. In case of a later schedule, select the date and time of sending the message
Step 7: Either send it immediately or schedule it for later.
Group Texting FAQs
Naming any group text is fairly simple. You can just change the name of the group in the settings menu and add any meaningful name to the group used for sending group texts. Apart from this, you can make use of a robust texting software like Emitrr whose competent technical team helps you with the basics of all such small tasks of group texting such as naming a group, adding members to a group, etc.
Emitrr is the best group texting app that offers advanced group texting capabilities. Emitrr is a highly rated robust software that helps you start your journey of group text messaging at a very affordable price You also get to enjoy the other added texting capabilities along with group SMS campaigns. The best part about Emitrr is its amazing customer support team that walks you through the whole setup and is 24X7 available to aid you in case of any issues.
Adding members to a group is fairly simple. You just need to import your contact list and create a group. Then you can keep adding the members you want in your group for group texting. These simple steps become even easier with a texting platform. Emitrr, a highly rated texting platform, offers great group messaging features and its technical team helps you with complete setup. So you can easily learn and understand the simple steps of adding group members from a team of experts.
Group texting is a fairly simple and easy-to-use capability but it comes with its own set of limitations such as:
- Character limitations: Most text messages have a character limit, so users may need to keep their messages clear and concise
- Opt-out feature: Users must provide recipients with the option to opt out of receiving future messages, as required by regulations.
Message delivery: messages are usually delivered instantly, but factors like network congestion or recipient settings may affect delivery time
Conclusion
Now you have all the important points you need to remember for group text messaging. If you are someone looking for a good and efficient group messaging platform, then look no further. Go check out Emitrr and its amazing group texting qualities. Book a demo here!
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