If you are a trader, you must have heard and maybe even participated to the famous “Black Friday”. Arrived in France just a few years ago, this sales day is becoming more and more popular among French people. If you want to reach this target, and more widely European customers, you should take this opportunity to create special offers.
Discover in our article everything you need to know about this sales day and how to enhance your communication with professional SMS to make it even more successful!
The history of Black Friday
Its origins in the USA
Black Friday officially started in the United States of America in the 50’s. It always happens on the day after Thanksgiving –the fourth Thursday of November– and it’s considered as the beginning of the Christmas shopping season. In 2018, Black Friday will be on the 23rd of November.
There are several explanations as why it is named “Black Friday”. For some, it represents the day stores finally make profits and no longer are in deficit (therefore, the numbers in the books are going from red to black). For others, it describes the heavy traffic in the streets on this day. Whatever its origin, this day is very important and taken seriously in the USA. In some states, such as California, it is actually a public holiday!
The concept is simple: stores offer exceptional sales on Black Friday. Originally dedicated to high tech products, it widened and today, all sectors take part in this “holiday”: fashion stores, department stores… In 2016, Americans spent on average $289,19 over Black Friday weekend.
Those last years, Black Friday started to spread in the world, convincing more companies to participate in this particular day.
Its arrival in France
In 2016, 15 million French people participated to this special day and 1,4 million products where sold during the 24 hours of Black Friday. In 2017, the number of sales went up 30% and people spent, on average, 118€ against 112€ in 2016. Black Friday is unquestionably becoming more and more popular In France!
Moreover, if in the United States Black Friday is as popular in physical stores than online, in France it is more successful for e-commerce websites. It is a tremendous opportunity for online sellers to increase their profit and if you have one, you surely need to participate!
Black Friday is a rare occasion for businesses to increase their profits before Christmas and winter sales. It would be a shame to miss it! But how can you make this day a true success? Discover in the rest of our article how to have a successful Black Friday thanks to promotional SMS.
Send successful sms campaigns
You know it, the first step for a successful event is a good communication! You must always choose a communication mean adapted to your image and to your needs.
Promotional SMS has a 97% reading rate, a 80% memorization rate and a return rate swinging between 20 and 30%. Moreover, an sms campaign can be programmed in just 10 minutes. Well mastered, it will fully satisfy your needs on Black Friday!
Present yourself
It is essential that your recipients know from whom the messages are coming from. To do so you have two solutions.
First, you can personalize the sender of your message with the name of your brand. If you choose this solution, a 16-characters STOP mention will be added to your message and you will have 144 characters left to write your message. Indeed, for promotional SMS, it is mandatory to offer your recipients a way to unsubscribe to your campaigns.
Secondly, you can say who you are at the beginning of your message. No mention will be added: your clients only have to respond to your message to unsubscribe. This way, you will be able to use all your characters for your message.
Write a good message
You should send a short and striking message, that will appeal to your clients in just a few words. Let your creativity speak and offer a clear, but original, message that your clients will remember. Talk directly to your customers with well-balanced catchy phrases with capital letters and a bit of punctuation. This way, you will stand out in the crowd of mails, flyers and others social media communication.
Insert a short link in your SMS
To facilitate your clients and prospects purchases, and to increase the ROI of your ecommerce website, you should add a short link leading to your site in your SMS! Thus, your clients will only have to click on your link to find the page with all the awesome promotions you have put in place for this day!
Thanks to our URL shortener, you can also know which numbers clicked on your link. It will not only allow you to measure the impact of your Black Friday communication, but also to know which clients are interested in your offers, enabling you to improve your targeting.
Choose the right moment to communicate
Of course, the timing of your sending is really important. Apart from the restrictions concerning marketing SMS –you cannot send them from 8pm to 8am, on Sunday or on Public Holidays– you must think about the best time to send your message. You are in the alimentary sector? Send your offer on the lunch break! You are in the high-tech sector? Favor the morning!
Moreover, you should also send several SMS campaigns on Black Friday, to communicate with your target at different times.
You should send a promotional campaign by sms a few days before the D-day, to let them know about your online and offline promotions. You should personalize your sendings according to the interests of your clients, to persuade them that you are the shop they need.
You should also send a campaign on the D-day, to remind them of your special offers! For it to be more efficient, you should send it at 8am so that your offer is the first received by your clients!
Rent a mobile database
To boost your sales, you should also rent a mobile database: make the most of this day to develop your customer base!
After choosing the best criteria to target your prospects (postal code, purchase behaviors, socio-professional categories…), send a message with your Black Friday promotions and that’s all there is to it!
You have questions about sending sms campaigns on Black Friday or you need help to create your campaign? Contact our team, they will be glad to help you settle your best Black Friday communication!