Six Steps to Getting Started With Mobile

HOW TO LAUNCH A PUBLIC SECTOR TEXT MESSAGING COMMUNICATIONS CHANNEL Why should your organization start using mobile as a communications channel?

Because more than 7 billion mobile phones are in use around the world—equivalent to 95.5 percent of the world population.1 Mobile as a communications channel helps government organizations reach previously hard-to-reach audiences. Younger demographics that are harder to reach with other, traditional communication channels are constantly connected to their mobile phones. Low-income or rural groups of people who may not have access to Internet in their homes now have mobile phones in their pockets. And almost all of them are being used for the same thing: text messaging.

An estimated 96% of American smartphone users send text messages, and 98% read their text messages.2

Americans between the ages of 18—24 exchange a median of 109.5 text messages per day,3 and on top of that they look at their mobile phones an average 150 times per day.2

As a public sector communicator, there is real opportunity to capitalize on the use of text messaging to reach previously untapped audiences and get them to engage with your organization’s mission. Connect with more people than ever, wherever they are, with mobile communications that drive action. Here are a few tips to get started.

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¹ http://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Statistics/Documents/facts/ICTFactsFigures2014-e.pdf ² http://visual.ly/sms-marketing-stats-and-fun-facts ³ http://www.pewinternet.org/2013/05/07/young-adults-mobile-phones-and-socialmedia-technology-and-the-transition-to-adulthood/

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START WITH THE BASICS

SHORT CODE

To start, you need to lay the groundwork for your mobile strategy. Will you work with the phone company to send text messages through some gateway or will you leverage a communications partner to help you? Some communications platforms, such as GovDelivery, manage these relationships for you to launch a mobile program and achieve optimal delivery of messages.

You will also want to think about a short code to give your audience flexibility in subscribing to and receiving your digital information. By texting their email addresses or phone numbers and, if relevant, a keyword to your short code, your audience can sign up for alerts right from their mobile devices.

GovDelivery clients can use the “GOV311” short code, or they can create a custom code.

EMAIL KEYWORD

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TAILOR CONTENT TO MOBILE When it comes to preparing the content that will be sent out, you shouldn’t need to recreate the wheel. A “create once, publish everywhere” or “COPE” strategy works for many organizations launching any type of multichannel campaign. For messages that are relevant to your mobile audience, simply summarize the call-to-action in 160 characters or less and provide a link to a page if there’s more information to relay.

learn more at: govdelivery.com or govdelivery.co.uk | info@govdelivery.com

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BUILD AN AUDIENCE & MANAGE EXPECTATIONS Because your stakeholders, especially the younger demographics, carry their mobile phones with them almost everywhere, you have the opportunity to constantly build your audience and engage more people. Start by promoting options to subscribe to your mobile communications on your website, social media accounts and in your emails. You can also feature simple instructions to subscribe wherever your audience lives, works and plays, like on billboards, television, bus stops and in parks.

Your stakeholders are more likely to engage with your messages if they know what to expect. When new people sign up for updates, set a custom triggered message (like a welcome message) that includes expectations and cross-promotes your other services. Make clear the type and frequency of the messages you’ll be sending, and if possible give options to adjust preferences.

GovDelivery automatically triggers these messages for our clients.

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CRAFT MISSION-CENTERED MESSAGES Text messaging can help drive more stakeholder engagement and further your organization’s mission goals. Here are a few examples of the various text message topics that some government organizations are sending to drive mission impact: Weather-related or emergency alerts — keeping stakeholders safe: Text messaging is the perfect channel for both local and national organizations to reach stakeholders wherever they are with important weather updates or urgent alerts.

Transit alerts — increasing ridership and customer satisfaction: To improve customer satisfaction among your ridership, use text messages to send alerts on delays, elevator outages and other traffic updates.

Event related messages — improving event attendance and program engagement: Have to cancel a parks & rec class? Or move an after school program to a new location? Text messaging can help you catch your audience while they’re on the go.

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MEASURE THE RESULTS You can’t keep improving your mobile strategy if you can’t measure its impact.

Throughout your campaign, don’t forget to keep track of the analytics. Think about the metrics that you will be measuring your success by before launching the service, and track those numbers. Keep a close eye on your delivery success rate to ensure your stakeholders are receiving your messages and the growth of your subscribers to measure how text messaging is driving engagement with the wider organization. With a well thought-out measurement process, you are better positioned to execute a successful program.

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TAKE IT TO THE NEXT LEVEL WITH TWO-WAY TEXT MESSAGING Once you have your outbound text messaging campaign running smoothly as an integral part of your multichannel digital strategy, consider taking it to the next level with two-way text messaging, which allows your organization to provide automatic, customized information that will encourage people to take action.

Subscribers can text pre-defined keywords to a short code to receive a response.

For example, King County, Washington residents can text in their zip codes to a short code to get a personalized response with the nearest informational insurance event based on their locations.

In addition, Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) riders can text their transit stop number to a short code to recieve a response that lists information when the next train is coming.

Two-way text messaging provides a direct customer service line to generate automatic responses in the way stakeholders want to receive them.

GovDelivery’s two-way text functionality can send responses based on two factors: Dynamic information through API connections to dispatch centers, databases & more.

OR Set up 5-10 pre-defined responses.

learn more at: govdelivery.com or govdelivery.co.uk | info@govdelivery.com

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CONCLUSION Using text messaging as part of your mobile strategy enables your organization to connect with hard to reach audiences and deliver greater value to the public.

Get more tips and tricks on implementing a mobile strategy from our website www.govdelivery.com or contact us at info@govdelivery.com to find out why thousands of public sector organizations trust GovDelivery to help them reach more people, deliver billions of messages, and get their stakeholders to take action and engage with their communications.

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6 learn more at: govdelivery.com | info@govdelivery.com