SMS Voting Ideal for Creative Communities to Engage Followers
Twitter is a great place to quickly scan and see what is going on in the world, or in a particular niche topic. I was looking around at SMS related topics the other day and found many good (and some not so good) articles. But I also found many more pleas for votes from musicians, bands, and even illustrators.
The tweets were from all over the world, and I believe most were for different types of contests or competitions. By that I mean the tweets weren’t all asking for votes for the same reason or contest. Here’s a rundown of what I read and how you could put the same idea to work for your creative community.
Radio Stations
Quite a few of the tweets I read were made by radio stations. They were asking followers to send an SMS using the keyword for their favourite song or band. It didn’t appear that the followers would receive anything in exchange other than helping to determine the winner of whatever contest was being run. But it helps keep their audience engaged and primed as well as lets the radio station potentially grow their marketing list.
Bands
I think the largest portions of tweets I saw came from individual bands asking fans and followers to cast a vote for them by sending an SMS with their keyword. Sometimes winning a local best band contest is a huge stepping stone to greater visibility. It’s an opportunity for fans to directly show their support.
Artists
Maybe it’s because my daughter is an artist and illustrator, I tend to notice contest announcements or related information. She’s entered several contests online, but I had no idea that so many of them asked for voting by SMS. Just like for bands, a single win in an art contest could really boost the career of an artist.
Asking for votes directly via SMS
Using Twitter to ask for SMS votes makes perfect sense. It’s a good way to reach many people all at once. If they are reading social media that is. Often tweets or posts can get lost in a sea of updates. In many cases though, it would be possible for a band or artist to ask for the SMS votes directly using their own SMS campaign. Loyal followers of a band just might be willing to give their mobile number in exchange for updates on new releases or performance dates. Bands could also use it to ask for support in contests or other activities.
My daughter subscribes to many artists on YouTube who have hundreds of thousands of subscribers. If they could get a fraction of those people to sign up to an SMS fan list, they’d probably dominate any contest they entered!
Radio stations, or even concert halls and event centres, can benefit from SMS beyond using it for contests. Once someone votes in the contest, simply ask if they want to be on the SMS list to get notifications of future contests and opportunities. If they say yes, then there’s one more number added to the potential list of customers for SMS marketing.
Other similar examples
One of the towns near my home runs a “Best of” contest each year. Anyone can login to the contest administrator’s website and fill out the survey to vote for their favourite restaurant, hair salon, bookstore, or chiropractor – basically any kind of business or service is on their list. But the survey is cumbersome. You have to make your way through all 250 categories and decide if your favourite place is listed, or even if you have an opinion at all (I’ve never been to a tattoo shop!).
It would be great if they instead let people vote via SMS for the places people really care about. For example, my chiropractor and wellness centre are amazing. Great people who really care, have reasonable prices, and are always willing to go the extra mile. They’ve won their category five years in a row. I feel strongly enough about them I want to vote. But I don’t want to sift through all those pages on the survey to find them (though I do anyway).
Why not let the different places use social media and print adverts to rally their customers to vote for them via SMS? More people would vote that way I imagine, and the results would be more valid because people don’t pick random place on that huge survey for categories they don’t really care about. It would take some changes on the side of the people who run the contest, but in the end it’s all a form of advertising for them anyway (it’s actually an entertainment weekly paper behind it all).
Creative communities and organisations can use SMS messaging to run their own contests to help raise awareness of new artists or promote the best of the best. SMS messaging lets you reach people more directly than via social media and has many other positive possibilities. Artists, musicians, bands, and other creative types can gather their fans on a list too, letting them reach out directly to the people who support them the most.
Have you ever voted in or run a contest for a creative community?
Related Articles
How to Have Your SMS Messaging Pay for Itself
SMS messaging supports all sorts of use cases. Most of the time, businesses consider it an expense. But for some businesses, there's a method that could turn that expense into income. See some examples of how it works, and if it might be for you in this blog.
How One Small Business Keeps Her Customers Happy – and On Time!
People have their mobiles within arm’s reach about 22 hours of every day. That means even while they are sleeping! It makes sense then, that if you want to remind someone of an important event (an appointment with your small business for example) you should use their mobile.
Pagers vs. SMS Messaging for Emergency Services
For decades, all kinds of emergency personnel relied on pagers to communicate with each other and their organisations. The system was created long before the days of mobile phones or even text messaging. But now things are changing, as we explain in this blog post.
Why SMS and Mass Participation Sports Events are Made for Each Other
Most major sports teams in the UK and US already know the power of SMS for engaging fans via scores, stats and other data. But the power of SMS can extend far beyond the world of the major leagues. SMS is ideal, not only for communicating with participants but to coordinate teams of volunteers across the event.
How Your Health Club Can Start Using SMS to Support Members Today
You’re all excited about the number of new members you have in your health club thanks to your latest member drive. And you want to do everything you can to help them reach their goals and stay a member for a long time. Here's a quick few steps to get you up and running as quickly as possible.
5 Tips for Charities Using SMS Marketing
It's sometimes a challenge for charities to get people's attention. But once you get it, SMS messaging is a great way to keep it. Why? People freely give their emails, but their mobile number is often closely guarded. So when someone opts in to your charity campaign with their mobile number, it means they are invested in your cause.
How Clubs Can Benefit from Using Text Messaging
Read how clubs can benefit from the use of text messaging services to reduce wasted time and increase customer satisfaction. They can confirm appointments in advance with an option to text back to cancel or re-schedule thus reducing no-shows. SMS is also great for sharing news and special offers with members.
SMS Messaging Offers Opportunity for Fundraising
Is your charity taking advantage of mobile fundraising? A report from ThirdSector indicates 55% of charities aren't doing so, which creates a huge opportunity for those that do. In the UK, almost three quarters of the population, 72%, use smartphones.
Using SMS Messaging For a Cause is Catching On
As old as SMS messaging is (going on 25), is it surprising to know that for non-profits and political campaigns it’s just now catching on? It might be, but if you think about it maybe it isn’t surprising. Until the last few years, people have been very reticent to hand out their personal mobile number. Now though, they’re more willing – if they care about the source of the messages.
SMS Marketing for Charities – How it’s Changing, and How to Stay on Trend
There are just shy of 200,000 registered charities in the United Kingdom. Between them, they spend around £80 billion per annum. SMS marketing for charities is coming of age as an important tool for reaching supporters and benefactors alike, and there are a few important things that charities should be bearing in mind if they are to make the most out of this fact.