Church Text Messaging Optimization: Strategic Approaches

As we dive into comparing texting with some other marketing methods, some stats may make it seem like texting is far superior due to high response rates high open rates and more but please understand it is intended to complement and augment other outreach efforts - not replace them.

While we focus on the benefits of texting in this article, texting is also greatly limited in many ways. This is why each tool has the greatest benefit to churches when used in strategic and complementary ways. Texting is just one of the tools that should be in your toolbox for outreach and evangelism.

Texting is ideal for:

• Urgent communication reminders
• Quick and short messages
• Communication with existing subscribers and members
• When you need a response NOW

Texting is not ideal for:

• Outreach beyond existing members or subscribers
• Long form content
• Ads or complex imagery
• Low budget or free outreach

Think of texting like snow-day notifications for students: brief, limited details. School is either closed or not. There is nothing attached to the message like what you should do with your snow day or whether you should have cookies or hot chocolate or go sledding or build a snowman. School was either open, on a two-hour delay, or closed. Good text-based communication is just like that: brief but informative.

texting Comparisons

Did you know texting helps email marketing? Texting in conjunction with email can boost email open rates by 20 to 30%. We like email outreach, but many churches and businesses stop there when they need to be doing more. Only 39% of organizations send texts to communicate – a big missed opportunity! Texting provides tons of benefits when added to email marketing. In fact, 93% of consumers have more trust in text messages than emails.

The greatest standout advantage of texting over any other form of social communication is connection. People simply need to look at their phone to see their text notifications, as opposed to social media, email, and other apps which require you to specifically open their app to see notifications, messages, ads, etc. When compared directly to social media, texting seems to outweigh social media in every comparison.

• 85% of people own smartphones compared to only 80% of people using social media.
• 66% of Americans check their phones in average of 160 times a day and 25% of that is within minutes of waking up whereas 70% of Facebook users visit the site daily with only 49% checking the platform quote several times a day.

Social media does outweigh texting in one major way: social media allows for reach and influence far beyond your existing followers and subscribers. For example, let’s assume some congregants shared your most recent devotional post on Instagram. This means your post is now seen by everyone on their followers list, in addition to your own followers.

With texting, you can only send texts to your subscribers who have opted-in to receive texts. This means texting is not a solution for boosting organic growth. That’s okay: consider social media for reaching new followers and texting for nurturing the current flock.

Rethinking Evangelism^®

Our team is passionate about helping churches grow. Our blog talks about ways to build and reinforce your community’s gut feelings about your church – so be sure to follow along for more tips, tricks, and advice. Subscribe so you don’t miss out!

If SMS is something you’re interested in, but you don’t have the capacity to take this on yourself, we’re happy to work directly with your church. Simply contact us to start the conversation.