How to Use Zapier to Automate Your SMS Marketing

Did you know that there are over twenty-three billion text messages sent every day all over the world? Believe it or not, 6 billion of those are sent in the United States.

Therefore, it goes without saying that SMS marketing represents a huge opportunity for marketers and businesses. However, manually building marketing lists, crafting personalized messages for each contact, and pushing SMS messages to each and every contact individually can not only eat up a ton of time, but it isn’t scalable.

In addition to building a good SMS marketing list, the other secret for a successful SMS marketing campaign is automation. 

Believe it or not, putting your SMS marketing efforts and initiatives on autopilot doesn’t require hiring AI specialists, robots, or coding. All you need is a few tools and a few minutes of your time.

In this article, we will share some steps and tips on how to use a third-party automation tool, Zapier to easily and seamlessly automate your SMS marketing.  Read more about using Zapier or watch the video below to learn more!

What is SMS Marketing?

However, before we get too, far, what is SMS marketing? 

SMS marketing involves sending deals, offers, promotions, personalized messages, and more via SMS, or text messages. 

The benefits?

People already spend an average of three hours on their phones every day. So, why not reach your prospects, contacts, and customers at the right place and at the right time?

Many top brands, such as Kohl’s, Best Buy, Chili’s, IKEA, Petco, and many others use SMS marketing to reach customers. 

5 Ways to Use Zapier to Automate Your SMS Marketing

Like any marketing effort and initiative, it can take time, energy, and resources to keep up with them—and SMS marketing is no different, especially if you are handling everything manually. 

For example, manually adding subscribers to your text campaign, sending out personalized text messages to every individual subscriber, and adding your subscribers to your SMS or email lists can eat up a ton of time. 

The good news is you don’t have to do any of it manually. 

Say hello to Zapier, a third-party automation tool. Zapier integrates with thousands of tools and apps to help streamline processes, procedures, and tasks, saving users tons of time every day. 

Here are several ways to use Zapier automation to streamline your SMS marketing efforts and how to build automated workflows so you can get more done.

1. Send SMS messages for new leads from Facebook Lead Ads.

How it Works: Catching new prospects, subscribers, or customers at the right place and at the right time is key for boosting conversions. You can maximize your conversion opportunities with this super-simple automation. 

Each time you get a new lead in from Facebook ads, you can set up an automation so that it sends the new lead a personalized SMS message, allowing you to act on them right away.

How to Set it Up: Set up triggers for both Facebook and a Zapier built-in phone number or other third-party SMS apps to send a limited number of SMS messages. 

Simply log into your Facebook account to connect it to Zapier. Then, enter the desired phone number so that Zapier can forward messages to it.

2. Send SMS messages with new contact activity in marketing automation platforms.

How it Works: As mentioned briefly above, Zapier integrates with thousands of tools and apps—and that includes sales and marketing automation tools, such as HubSpot, Salesforce, ClickFunnels, and many more.

For example, if a prospect or contact makes their first purchase, or signs up to receive a promo, or downloads a piece of content, then this activity can be tracked in your sales and marketing platform. 

By connecting your ClickFunnels account with Zapier, you can send SMS messages to contacts after they complete an action, such as a purchase, a download, or even use a coupon code.

How to Set it Up: Simply log into your sales and marketing dashboard to connect your account to Zapier. Then, add the contact’s phone number so Zapier can push messages directly to them—and at the right time.

3. Send SMS messages for new form submissions

How it Works: Similar to the example above, you can also send SMS messages after a contact or prospect completes a form. This includes form builder applications, including Gravity, Google Forms, Typeform, and many more. Set up form SMS alerts, messages, and notifications whenever a form is submitted. 

The only caveat here is to ensure that your form asks for the contact to add his or her phone number. 

How to Set it Up: Simply log into your form builder to connect your account to Zapier. Then, select the SMS app or provider that you use, or SMS By Zapier to add the contact’s phone number so Zapier can push messages directly to them, such as “Thank you for your submission! A member of our team will reach out shortly” or “Welcome to our VIP program!”

4. Send scheduled personalized SMS messages.

How it Works: This is a simple automation to set up that can save a ton of time and effort. You can use this automation for sending personalized messages, reminders, or other notifications to contacts or subscribers. You can also set up this automation to send SMS messages at certain days or times. 

This is a great way to keep your audience and prospects engaged, and truly harness the power of SMS marketing—all of which can be done for you.

How to Set it Up: With only a few clicks, you can set up SMS for Zapier, or another SMS application or tool, such as ClickSend, Heymarket SMS or another option. Select your desired SMS app, set the trigger to push a personalized message when a specific action occurs to a contact’s phone number.

It’s that easy.

5. Send SMS messages from sheets

How it Works: If you need to send a batch of different messages to a contact list, then give this Zap a try. You can store various messages in a digital sheet, such as Google Sheets or SmartSheets, set up SMS for Zapier or another third-party SMS messaging application, and build a Zap to push SMS messages to every contact on the sheet with the desired message. Gone are the days of writing and sending messages to contacts manually and one at a time.

How to Set it Up: Simply connect Google Sheets or Smartsheet to Zapier. Then set up a trigger to send an SMS message whenever a new field appears in your sheet application.

Automate Your SMS Marketing with VoxDirect

All in all, 90 percent of text messages are read within the first three minutes, and SMS response rates are 209 percent higher than that of email or other marketing mediums. Businesses that leverage the power of SMS marketing are more likely to boost conversions and sales. 

With a wide variety of thousands of apps, tools, and integrations with Zapier available, the possibilities are truly endless. 

By experimenting with different automation capabilities and building Zaps, you can save a ton of time, effort, and resources over time—and help scale your business. 

You can work with a trusted text marketing provider for your SMS marketing campaigns. VoxDirect also offers a Zapier integration so you can automate your SMS marketing efforts. 

If you are interested in learning more about SMS marketing or how VoxDirect can help, contact us today.