There are so many local businesses on our planet and with over 5.5 billion phones and over 2.2 billion smartphones available to market to, it is an awesome way to stay connected with your clients who want to shop at your place of business.

In this case study it is a retail store in the gaming industry.  They have an awesome desktop website selling everything from online games to games for Playstation 3, Wii, Xbox 360 and many, many other platforms.  In 2004 they saw a report stating that the gaming industry as a whole was worth 10.3 billion.  A couple of years later, they opened up their first store.  They now have 2 stores and looking at expanding and adding more locations.

It was obvious to them that the demographic coming of people into their stores where very text messaging savvies.  Just about everyone had or used a cell phone and constantly where texting.  They where not sure if everyone had a smartphone, as they where thinking of possibly putting an APP together, but rather what they knew for sure was that just about everyone was texting one way or the other with their hand held device.  It was crazy!  It was at this point that they started thinking Mobile Marketing and began implementing campaigns to their clients through their mobile phone.

This is a true example of which I speak about every day to local entrepreneurs……Mobile and Local Internet Marketing!

Their text messaging campaign took only minutes to set up once they found the right company to help them with it!  That was it and they where ready to go.  Even when it came time to send out their first text message, it took less than a minute as everything was so quick and easy to do.

HOW THEY SET UP THEIR SMS TEXT CAMPAIGN

They selected a keyword representing their business.  They then where given a 5 digit short code number.  They then put that keyword and short code on everything and everywhere!  They had it on their website, receipts, mailers, posters, facebook, e-mails and displayed it around the store in various places.  They figured that if a customer was looking at something in their store, they most likely had a their mobile phone with them and they should opt-in to their message campaign.

WHAT THEIR FIRST TEXT MESSAGE SAID

They sent the following text message out to their SMS subscribers midday on Sunday saying “Our Street Fighter IV tournament is this Sunday at 7:00 pm!  Sign up online at resetgames.com and pre-order Super Street Fighter IV for next Tuesday!”

RESULTS

With the last minute reminder via text message, they had a record attendance at this specific in-store event.  It was awesome!

ADVICE FOR OTHER RETAIL STORES LOOKING TO LAUNCH AN SMS TEXT MESSAGING CAMPAIGN?

Promote your SMS keyword on everything!  An SMS keyword is the biggest asset for any retail store.  With the small additional cost to add an SMS keyword to a poster or mailer, you can generate hundreds of captive customers.  Mobile and Local Internet Marketing is a NO-BRAINER!

If you are interested in learning more about this type of Mobile and Local Internet Marketing campaign for your business, please feel free to fill out your information at http://www.cheryllynninternational.com/contact  or email us at support@cheryllynninternational.com.