In the digital world that envelopes us, and with the abundance of multi media messages being rocketed around the ether, the challenge facing business marketers is not what to say or who to say it to, but how to land it.

Personalization, relevance, legitimate interest and privacy are the concepts driving bulk marketing in 2019 and businesses will need to understand what the boundaries are governing bulk sends whether email or sms. Easily identifiable Returns on investment are no longer the case, but one thing is certain, mobile and the mobile device will be the predominant platform for message delivery in 2019.

When delivering bulk email or bulk SMS, businesses will increasingly have to consider a more qualitative approach to measuring long-term success. At what point does ensuring or forcing an open or click through compromise a brand. At what point does an SMS shift from adding value to becoming intrusive and how is this measured. We hear all too often of power brands losing brand equity or forcing clients to consider loyalty due to poor retention marketing often delivered by bulk SMS or email. Similarly, a bombardment of bulk SMS or email sends as part of an acquisition strategy can compromise IP and lead to the black listing of send platforms.

Ultimately nobody wants an email inbox or a message inbox jammed to capacity with offers, discounts, sales and scams, what the consumer does want is relevant valuable communication delivered at the right time from the right provider. Most Email Platforms will today sift through the inbox using algorithmic AI and machine learning and determine what it feels the user might want to prioritize. The rest is rather unceremoniously dumped into spam, trash or clutter and the only chance it has of being read is if the user trawls through what was initially deemed unwanted or irrelevant.

The truth of the matter is that no matter how clever automation becomes and how smart we get at delivering bulk SMS and bulk email, regulation and user behaviour changes all the time, and even with the advances being made by email providers to circumvent spam folders, at best, expected click through rates for email seldom rise above 4% on a good campaign. Email may be inexpensive compared to Bulk SMS but the sheer scale and volume of the market, and the massive number of mails being sent contribute to an environment of clutter and waste – almost a too much to read can't be bothered approach.

Bulk SMS is slightly different, it's certainly a little costlier and it is more intrusive, but it works. The message inbox is often considered a more personal space and as such messages that land if not appropriate are viewed far more skeptically, but those that are appropriate deliver much longer-term value. In most cases people are more willing to share an email address than they are a mobile phone number and as such view unsolicited SMS very skeptically. The flip side of this is that response rates and engagement from bulk SMS is far superior to email. At first Bulk SMS may not seem as cost efficient as email but it is extremely effective. Any bulk SMS campaign will have a far greater open rate and click through rate than an email campaign even if on sheer price email is far cheaper. Recent changes to EU regulation and the introduction of GDPR in a pre-Brexit environment have already contributed to a more considered approach to bulk digital marketing. This approach is largely dictated by the contraction of the market, with more than 50 % of consumers stating that they would not opt in to future SMS marketing. The impact of this on acquiring new customers is not insignificant but the affordable cost of SMS and email, means one is able to target larger data sets.

Receiving information on our mobile phones is now very much a part of our lives and as consumers we will not be able to avoid SMS messaging. Tailoring this messaging will however ensure that when our phone beeps or pings we are almost always comfortable with the sender. Let's face it, knowing your taxi is waiting, your pizza is on its way and requiring a code to reset a password is increasingly part of everyday life and these fundamentals are all made easier by SMS messaging and the companies that can send these messages out in bulk, even if sometimes it is that unwanted dental appointment reminder.