Consumers don’t just want you to text them. They’ll get mad if you won’t.
According to a new study out of cloud communications provider Flowroute, 47% of consumers said they’d react negatively if a company didn’t offer a way to text.
Flowroute conducted a nationwide survey of 1,300 people to explore how consumers like to engage with businesses. In particular, they compared text messaging with email and voice.
According to their results, “Short message service (SMS) ranked highest among the top three channels, with respondents identifying text messaging as both more relevant and timely than other channels.”
They saw that 82% of texts from businesses were opened within 5 minutes – which dramatically compared with business emails, where only about 25% got opened at all. Consumers especially preferred SMS for logistical concerns, such as appointment reminders, prescription refills, or service outage notifications
“Businesses that still rely on email to get time-sensitive information and offers to customers, have lost their voice,” said Dan Nordale, Flowroute’s CMO.