About SMS Marketing Companies in Australia

 

When it comes to having marketing campaigns, whether it is direct or offline or outbound or niche or internet-related, the way to go these days is through the use of an SMS marketing provider with expertise in marketing. Such marketing campaigns can be selling a product, informing about a service, letting customers know about special deals or alerting people to new products or services.

Since bulk SMS providers in Australia offer such a range of marketing-related features it can be a minefield trying to work out which marketing provider is good for your marketing needs. The amount of research and detail has been made easier for you through the development of this bulk SMS Australia site and the associated comparison table. By knowing and understanding what each provider offers in an easy-to-assess way, your job of selecting the right company is made easier.

This site and the associated SMS marketing comparison table have covered aspects that you need to know about including pricing, service-related features, reliability and latency as well as customer service.

Several SMS marketing providers will ensure good service with ease of distribution. By providing a database of a group of clients, customers, consumers, staff or the general public, the process takes only a few minutes from start to finish. Then it only takes just a few seconds to send a single SMS. It doesn’t matter whether the database contains hundreds or thousands of contacts. It is a friendly and efficient method of communication.

Bulk SMS Marketing Companies

Advantages of SMS Marketing

The main advantage of using an SMS marketing company is to engage them for a Short Message Service (SMS). The basic value is sending text messages through any mobile communication system whether it is a mobile phone or the Web within a matter of seconds. These providers have developed the platforms to ensure that mass SMS whether they be in low numbers or high volumes are effectively distributed when required. A charge is placed on the distribution of each SMS.
Bulk SMS Marketing Companies3

Other advantages make it an effective marketing channel for businesses of all sizes. Some of the key advantages of SMS marketing include:

High open rates: SMS messages have incredibly high open rates, with some studies suggesting that up to 92% of SMS messages are opened and read within three minutes of receipt. This makes SMS marketing an effective way to reach end users quickly and reliably.

Direct communication: SMS marketing allows businesses to communicate with customers directly and in a personalized way making it easier to target the right customers with the right message.

Immediate delivery: SMS messages are delivered instantly, which means businesses and organisations can reach end users with time-sensitive messages or promotions in real-time.

Cost-effective: SMS marketing can be a cost-effective way to reach customers, especially when compared to other marketing channels such as print or digital advertising. With bulk SMS marketing, businesses can send thousands of messages at once for a fraction of the cost of other marketing channels.

Opt-in requirement: SMS marketing requires customers to opt-in to receive messages, which means that businesses are only communicating with customers who are interested in hearing from them. This can lead to higher engagement rates and better overall ROI.

What is also so good for the client is that there is no need for any special software to download or to be installed, it is just a matter of having access to the internet and a web browser or a mobile phone so that the text message can be received and given the instruction on which database of contacts provided will receive the SMS. The providers are web-based.

What is the best SMS Marketing Company for you?

There are quite a variety of SMS marketing companies present in Australia. What needs to be sourced are SMS providers who are reliable, affordable, provide good customer service and provide a latency of distribution time that is efficient. As a result of extensive research and evaluation of suitable bulk SMS marketing companies, it was narrowed down to the following – Cellcast, Notifyre, WholesaleSMS, SMSTech, DirectSMS, SMS Central, ClickSend, TextIt, BurstSMS, SMS Broadcast and ClickSend.

From the evaluation presented below, the decision of SMS marketing providers that offered the best value all around was ClickSend and WholesaleSMS. However, other providers do offer a good range of features and should not be discarded from any decision process.

Charges by SMS Marketing Companies

Because marketing companies are engaged in mass communication of marketing and promotional events, special offers and deals, pricing becomes a major deciding factor. Each SMS provider will charge differently depending on the volume of text messages sent every month. Volumes can range from small numbers in the low thousands to mass numbers in the hundreds of thousands.

For low-volume distribution dependent on marketing distributors, prices ranged from 3 cents per SMS to over 15 cents for an SMS. As you can calculate the variation indicates a significant difference. With the huge volume of SMS (over 200,000) distributed over a month, the pricing is dependent on negotiating with the distributor.

This bulk SMS comparison table for bulk SMS marketers review shows that Cellcast offered the cheapest pricing structure followed by ClickSend. Direct SMS was within the middle range and TextIt was the most expensive in terms of pricing on SMS. It should be noted that SMSCentral does not disclose its pricing structure.

The method of payment varied between providers with some requiring pre-paid while others required pre-paid as well as invoicing the clients. Monthly plans also varied with some marketing providers not offering any monthly plan while others provided it as an option.

Since bulk SMS marketing providers can change their pricing at any time, the authors of this comparison site recommend that you check current prices and terms of charge on their sites.
Bulk SMS Marketing Companies5

Other Features of  SMS Marketing Companies

One must be fully aware of the features that SMS bulk providers have to offer.

One of the features that should be important for marketing companies is that any SMS distribution becomes a two-way process. That means that when the client requires the SMS provider to send out a batch of text messages, it can request that it receive an assessment of replies that can easily be reviewed on either web or the client’s mobile. Such awareness makes both parties aware of how the communication or marketing campaign has been effective. A delivery record can be requested from the distributor and exported in an Excel spreadsheet that shows bounces of messages.

Another important feature that should be investigated is whether the bulk SMS marketer has the facility and capacity to run high-speed connections which allows them to send large volumes of text messages very promptly within a short time frame. The availability of onshore and offshore delivery platforms, as well as global coverage, is an additional asset that needs to be considered by clients if they wish to send SMS within or outside Australia and whether there is a need for global distribution.

Further features of SMS marketing companies may include:

SMS campaign creation tool for creating and sending SMS messages text message templates, message scheduling tools, and message personalization options. Opt-in and opt-out management to help businesses and organisations manage their opt-ins and opt-outs from their SMS campaigns. Reporting and analytics tools to help businesses track the success of their SMS campaigns. This may include metrics such as message open rates, click-through rates, and conversion rates.

Integration with other marketing channels that integrate with other marketing channels such as email marketing, social media, and digital advertising to create cohesive omnichannel marketing campaigns.Compliance tools to help businesses stay compliant with relevant laws and regulations governing SMS marketing. This may include tools for managing opt-in and opt-out requirements, data protection regulations, and other compliance issues.

Taking into account all the major features necessary for a good SMS marketing provider, the ratings show the ability to offer a range of features useful for a client in its request for distributing text messages effectively as well as efficiently. On the whole, SMSTech and TextIt had the best range of services compared to the other bulk SMS marketing providers. When it comes to offering a quality and diverse range of features for SMS distribution, Burst SMS rates the best of all the other SMS Bulk Australian providers.

Reliability and Latency Factor

Without a doubt, reliability and latency factors are also imperative parts of the offers provided by bulk SMS marketing providers. Latency is an expression of how much time it takes for data details (SMS) to travel from one designated point (the SMS provider) to the end user.

There needs to be a total assurance that any text message requested to be sent to specific target audiences should be done as requested by the client and at the time required by the client. It is a matter of scheduling when and how the SMS is to be sent whether it is as a reminder notice for appointments to new products or services offered to customers or staff. Bulk SMS Marketing Companies6

How is this measured? This is done by the providers offering uptime reliability and latency of 99% uptime to 99.9% or in some cases, 100% uptime as part of their overall assurance. A service level agreement is provided by some providers.

Additionally, each SMS company should ensure messages are both anti-SPAM compliant as well as provided with confidentiality and security of distribution. They are a cleaning service available with bulk companies which means that contact lists are cleaned on request.

Based on reliability and latency ratings, it is pleasing to note that many major distributors are very reliable and efficient in their distribution, particularly SMS Central, Burst SMS, SMS Global, ClickSend, WholesaleSMS, and SMSTech.

Customer Service and Help

In the investigation of all the major SMS marketing companies reviewed, all offer a phone support service except for WholesaleSMS.  They have a dedicated number to contact during business hours as well as an email support service when required.

As part of their mass marketing push by SMS companies to show the effectiveness of SMS, several SMS marketing providers offer a promotional package to prospective clients through the adoption of a free trial that enables prospective clients to ‘try and see’ their service. The free trials vary from five free SMS to fifty free SMS.

Reviewing all these major providers SMSTech is highly regarded as the most reputable organisation followed closely by SMS Central and ClickSend. However as you will notice from the graphical presentation, most of these competitors have a good level of customer service and assistance.

Several SMEs and large reputable Australian and multinational companies use SMS marketing Australian providers as can be viewed on their providers’ websites.

About SMS Australia Comparison Table

The key to an effective SMS comparison table and site is that it is easy to follow and understand. That’s why the authors, who were experts in the SMS business, but no longer work in that field, have provided you with this free site and table to make your selection choices easier.

The authors have reviewed all major Australian SMS providers and formulated a set of key selection criteria that they consider fair, and unbiased with an equitable overview of the services offered by these leading providers.

The Comparison Table and site are free to use to make your decision if you wish to engage a bulk SMS marketing provider. There are no advertisements or enticement factors to steer you to any one particular provider. However, should you use this site and select one provider to assist you with your SMS distribution, then the authors may request a commission from the SMS provider.

Should you notice when reviewing the mass SMS marketing providers that prices or features offered are different from the providers’ sites (due to changes without notification), then please let the authors know so that such changes can be made to this site.

Latest update on 12 January 2024

 

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