How quickly do you turn prospective customers into actual customers?

No matter what kind of business you’re in, this process is essential to get right, if you want to succeed.

Luckily, there is something you can do to both speed up your lead conversion process while making it easier on your prospects and your team.

What is it?

Sending text messages.

But, not just random texts, you need to send strategic SMS messages that’ll help move your leads from the first point of contact to becoming a customer.

Depending on your business and the types of deals you’re creating or products you’re selling, this process will be different. For some, it’ll be quite complex, while others it’ll be more straightforward.

But, using SMS marketing throughout the lead conversion process will only help you create more customers for your business.

Below you’ll learn what SMS lead conversion is, how to calculate your lead conversion rates, and a few expert tips on how you can improve your SMS lead conversion process. 

What You Need to Know About SMS Lead Conversion

To put it simply, lead conversion is the process of converting new leads into customers. A lead can be a person, a group, or a company that’s shown interest in your products or services in some way. 

This can be anything from filling out a contact form, to entering their email address on a landing page, to simply giving your business a call. The important thing is they’ve taken an action that suggests they’re interested in what you offer. 

In the realm of SMS, lead conversion is the same. It’s the number of leads who convert into customers using SMS as a channel. 

Now, SMS is a great tool for improving lead conversion for a lot of reasons:

• It gets nearly 100% open and response rates
• Your leads always have their phones on them
• It’s simple, easy, and personal 
• It can be used alongside other channels, improving conversions across the board 

The Simple Reality of SMS Conversion Rates

Calculating your lead conversion rates is pretty simple. All you need to do is take the number of leads and divide it by the total number of conversions. So, if your business has 1,000 leads and you converted 100 into customers, then your lead conversion rate would be 10%.

You can measure conversions across different campaigns you run, existing marketing funnels, flash sales, and more. Usually, you’ll be thinking about customers and sales when it comes to conversions, however, you can also measure sign-ups, webinar registrations, signing up for a product demo, and more. 

Although these actions aren’t direct sales, they’re indicators that a new lead is on the path toward becoming a customer. It’ll also let you see if you have any parts of your existing marketing or sales funnel that have high drop-off rates too.

Main Factors That Influence SMS Lead Conversion

Now, you’re probably wondering what are the main factors that influence your SMS conversions.

Overall, they’re similar to other channels. 

• Time sent: When are you sending your messages? Are you sending them at the right time of day when prospects are more likely to be engaged? 
• Message personalization: Are your messages personalized and feel like they’re written exactly for that one person?
• Message content: Does your message content engage your users and offer value?
• Message CTA: Is the call to action clear and inspire your lead to take action now?

Now, keep in mind that SMS doesn’t operate in a vacuum. It works best when integrated with other marketing channels. The above factors alone won’t make or break your conversions. 

Think of it like an orchestra. You need every instrument playing their part and in sync to create a beautiful piece of music that moves people to tears.

SMS is also unique in that it opens up a channel to truly connect with your leads. Once they’ve engaged and responded you can truly chat one-on-one and deepen the relationship with your leads. 

Now that we’ve looked at SMS lead conversion as a whole, let’s get into how you can improve your lead conversions with the powerful combination of HubSpot and Salesmsg.

How to Increase SMS Lead Conversions with HubSpot and Salesmsg

There’s a lot more that goes into Increasing your lead conversions via SMS than simply changing the individual messages you send. 

Overall, it’s about building a deep relationship with your prospects, so they trust you enough to make a purchase. 

Here are a few ways you can improve your lead conversions using the power of Salesmsg and HubSpot together:

Understand What User Actions Signal High Intent

No matter what kind of workflows you have running, certain actions suggest a lead is ready to make a purchase.

Maybe they’ve made it to a certain point in your sales funnel, they’ve watched three webinars, or their product trial is just about up. The same thing goes for website visitors, people who’ve read a few blogs aren’t in the same stage as visitors who have viewed your pricing page.

You need to spend some time looking through your analytics data, including your website analytics, HubSpot workflow data, and Salesmsg analytics to see if you can determine what happens before a lead converts, along with which messages and workflows convert the best.

You might find that you have a sequence that outperforms the rest, and you can use some of those messages across other active workflows. 

Here’s an example of some of the data you’ll have access to inside Salesmsg:

Automate Your Lead Nurturing Workflows

Nurturing leads isn’t easy, but it’s simple.

It involves sending additional information that’ll help your leads make a decision. For example, if a lead is considering your product, you can send them case studies, product tutorial videos, in-depth blog posts, and more. 

You probably already have a few different lead nurturing workflows set up within HubSpot. Now, to take these to the next level, all you need to do is add texting.

Whether you’re delivering on an opt-in promise, sending a simple follow-up message, or something else. Texting makes this easy.

With the Salesmsg integration active all you need to do is load up your SMS messages within your HubSpot workflows and they’ll get sent out automatically.

Not only does SMS have the highest levels of deliverability and open rates, but it can be used alongside other channels. It never hurts to send a quick text, who knows it might be the thing that takes a person from lead to customer.

A/B Test SMS Messages

Whenever possible, test your SMS messages. You can experiment with message length, message copy, CTA, time sent, and more. For those struggling on the creative end, we even have built-in AI messaging tools that can help you draft new message variations quickly.

Here are some different SMS message elements to test:

• Multiple or single CTAs and CTA placement
• Images, graphics, or plain text
• Emojis
• Message length and line breaks
• Single vs multiple messages

Even though these might seem simple, the tiniest tweaks can lead to big results. 

Another thing you can test and optimize is your lead conversion path. Think of this as the trail that leads a new lead on the path to becoming a customer. Throughout this journey, your leads will be exposed to different content, offers, and calls to action.

Since there are so many different touch points here, the question is:

How can you utilize texting throughout these different touchpoints?

Consider trying some of the following: 

• Welcome SMS messages the moment a lead opts-in
• Follow-up messages to ensure they’ve downloaded and consumed the opt-in
• Value-based texts that help your leads solve small problems
• Personalized discounts based on lead interests and behaviors
• And more

Segment Leads Based on Behavior and Interests

Proper segmenting can go a long way in elevating your conversion rates. Segmenting allows you to send the right message to the right person, at the right time. You can even create segmented workflows within HubSpot based on user tags.

When new leads are added to your pipeline they can be tagged based on how they opted-in. Then, as users complete workflows, or take specific actions, tags can be added or removed. 

Without proper segmenting you’re left sending messages to your entire contact list. On the other hand, segmenting lets you put a personalized touch on your messages, even when running automated workflows. Plus, it lets you deliver more relevant messages to keep your users engaged. 

Elevate Your Follow-up Speed with SMS

One of the best ways to improve lead conversion is to increase your follow-up speed. The moment a lead gets in touch, you can have an automated workflow that starts the conversation. 

For example, within an existing HubSpot workflow, you can have a follow-up SMS message that gets sent out automatically. 

(image of follow up inside workflow)

You can use quick and simple follow-up messages across a variety of different workflows you’re currently running.

For example:

• Automated SMS message after a sales call
• Post-webinar thank you message
• Quick welcome message after a user subscribes
• Alert messages when a free trial or demo is set to expire
• After-purchase follow ups for upsells and congratulations

Sending these quick and easy messages goes a long way toward making your customers feel valued and supported by your business. 

How Salesmsg and HubSpot Help You Automatically Convert More Leads Into Customers

Converting new leads into customers is the only thing that’ll keep your business thriving.

With the power of SMS powering your marketing and sales activities, you’ll be able to move leads through your pipeline faster, reduce drop-off, and improve relationships.

Integrating Salesmsg into your HubSpot workflows is an easy addition to improve your conversions across the board. Plus, it’s a great way to deepen your relationship over time to ensure customers stay with you over the long-run too.

If you’re already using HubSpot, then you can get started with our Salesmsg integration today. All it takes is a couple clicks and you can start texting your way better conversions.