SMS vs Email Marketing: Which Is Better in 2024?

Do you want to drive your online presence and reach a wider audience? To get the best results, it is recommended that a potent business digital strategy be created by leveraging two channels – SMS and email marketing!

According to Statista, the global number of smartphone users has increased significantly from 2014. This number is expected to rise by 1.5 billion between 2024 to 2029.

With this rapid growth of digital users worldwide, you can leverage SMS and email marketing to maximize your reach, engagement, and impact.

You may face many challenges when acquiring clients and retaining customers. However, with SMS and email marketing, you can develop rich and personalized content, establish a deeper connection with your target audiences, and increase conversions.

In this blog post, we’ll walk you through different ways to get started with SMS vs email marketing. Both serve different purposes and offer unique benefits. We’ll also provide detailed analysis to help you make an informed decision and decide what suits your business goals and objectives.

So, let’s jump in!

Table of Contents

Key Takeaways

SMS marketing, also known as text message marketing, offers more control over the customer’s journey, as they can opt in and out of marketing messages.
Email marketing is more cost-effective and scalable, allowing businesses to create personalized messages and segment their audience.
The open rates, CTR, and conversion rates of SMS are higher than those of emails.
However, certain factors, like the character limit, cost per message, and the limitation to plain text, make SMS marketing unsuitable for every business.
Email marketing is becoming popular today as it supports multimedia options, offers personalization and segmentation options, and is easily measurable.
Leveraging the strengths of SMS and email marketing can help you build more customer trust and boost conversions rather than just relying on a single marketing strategy.

Understanding SMS and Email Marketing

Let’s gain deeper insights into SMS and email marketing.

SMS marketing

Invented back in 1972, Short Message Service (SMS) marketing is a popular method for businesses to send text messages to their customers.

SMS marketing is a direct marketing method allowing you to get your customers’ attention and make them feel valued. However, while crafting SMS messages, you must ensure your content is concise and focused and does not include irrelevant content.

Before you start implementing this marketing method in your business, you must know that a single SMS supports up to 160 characters. However, it can vary depending on factors like the usage of special characters or Unicode encoding. If your SMS exceeds this limit, your message will automatically split into smaller parts, which are also known as concatenated messages.

This marketing strategy is working wonders for many businesses today because of the widespread usage of mobile phones. By leveraging the accessibility and convenience of mobiles, you can make the most of SMS marketing campaigns and reach your target audiences.

Email marketing

One of the most powerful digital marketing strategies, email marketing, has come a long way since its inception. You might be amazed to know that this marketing method established its roots in 1978, and today, it has become a potent tool for enhancing communication with your audiences.

This marketing method complements other effective strategies such as SEO and advertising of your products or services. With email marketing, you can reach your audience directly in their inbox and generate 50% more sales compared to any other lead generation method.

Considering the increasing usage of mobile phones, laptops, and other gadgets, email marketing has become essential to enhance brand recognition, build strong customer relationships, increase website traffic, and boost conversions.

Wondering what’s the magic number for an email length and why it matters? If you talk about the ideal subject line length, it is 28 to 50 characters. The email copy length should fall anywhere between 50 and 125 words, which is 200 to 320 characters.

Creating a strong email strategy requires you to pay heed to this character limit. Remember, the best things come in small packages. So, always be creative and impactful with your words to get your point across clearly and concisely. Furthermore, attachment limits should be set to ensure smooth operation and, therefore, prevent overloading.

While tailoring the content of your email to a specific recipient is important to increase engagement rates and conversions, make sure you design HTML email rather than using plain text.

HTML emails have everything that plain text emails lack, such as images, colors, buttons, links, and multimedia (such as videos or interactive graphics). This makes your email visually appealing and helps drive engagement.

Key Metrics Comparison of SMS and Email Marketing

When it comes to evaluating the best marketing strategy between SMS vs email marketing, we did not just skim the surface–we dove deep. Here is the step-by-step detailed comparison between SMS and email marketing:

1. Open rates

SMS

SMS open rate is the percentage of shoppers, prospects, or subscribers who open and view your text message. Compared to email marketing, the open rate of SMS marketing is 98%.

Email

The email open rate is typically between 15 and 20%. This implies that up to 20% of your recipients open specific emails on average. Many businesses consider email open rate to determine the success of their email marketing campaign.

2. Click-through rates (CTR)

SMS

The click-through rate determines the number of clicks your SMS receives when you send it to your audience. If your SMS includes a link, the average CTR is around 36%. However, without a link, CTR ranges between 6 and 19%.

Email

The CTR of your emails measures the number of clicks received on your email in relation to the total number delivered. The average CTR of emails is relatively low as compared to SMS, which is around 2.6%.

3. Conversion rates

SMS

The conversion rate is the total number of recipients who convert into paying customers and buy your product or service through the SMS you send. The conversion rate of SMS is approximately 29%.

Email

The email conversion rate depends on the nature of your target audience, the clarity of the CTA, and the effectiveness of your campaign. On average, the email conversion rate is 15.2%.

Advantages and Disadvantages of SMS and Email Marketing

Both strategies offer distinctive benefits and drawbacks for businesses. Let’s examine each in detail.

SMS marketing

Here are some reasons why SMS marketing can be an excellent marketing weapon.

Advantages

Here are some of the advantages of SMS marketing.

1. High open rates

One of the greatest advantages of this marketing strategy is that SMS messages have a very high open rate, at around 98%. This means around 98 customers open all the messages you send to your customers out of 100, and that, too, within 15 minutes of receiving them. If you compare this number with email marketing, the open rate for SMS is very high.

2. SMS is a direct, immediate channel

Most of the text messages tend to open within 15 minutes of delivery. Thus, you can be assured that most of your messages are read by your recipients instantly. It is the sole reason SMS marketing campaigns generate a high ROI that reaches over 50% when combined with other popular channels such as social media and email.

3. Personalization

SMS marketing can easily be personalized by incorporating customer data to create customized and targeted messages. Furthermore, personalized messages enhance your customer engagement across every touch point.

4. Instant opt-in and opt-out

SMS marketing campaigns are great for hyper-time-sensitive offers; it’s no wonder SMS are read almost immediately.

Moreover, the advent of shortcodes enables customers to opt in and out of an SMS stream. This allows your customers to jump through if they do not want to receive any communication longer. The process contributes to a positive brand opinion and high subscriber satisfaction.

5. Integration with other channels

SMS is a powerful standalone channel. The best part is that it can enhance and support other marketing mediums, such as web apps and chat programs your team already uses to communicate. SMS integration can also connect your text message marketing to Slack to get notifications and assign tickets within the same program.

Disadvantages

Here are some of the drawbacks of SMS marketing.

1. Limited character space

SMS messages are limited to 160 characters, challenging you to convey complex messages or call-to-action offers. Due to the character limit, many businesses even think about sending more than 1 message, which adds to the cost.

2. Cost per message

While SMS marketing can be a cost-effective tool to reach a wider audience, it can become expensive if you send bulk messages. This is because there is usually a potential cost involved in sending each message. Therefore, always ensure you do not go over the character limit or use features like Unicode unless you need it.

3. Potential for spamming

You risk being seen as spam if you do not follow the best practices or send messages in bulk without targeting the right audience.

4. Low conversions

Although the open rate of sending text messages to your prospects is very high, this might not be the best option if you want to increase the number of leads converted into paying customers. It is always a good idea to perform A/B testing to see what can work for your audience.

5. Does not support media

SMS marketing is limited to plain text. Thus, you cannot include media, such as images, videos, or any other apps, in your SMS. Another disappointing aspect is its inability to support rich text formatting, which means you won’t be able to use italics or bold text.

6. Legal restrictions

It might be illegal for some countries to send messages to your customers without their permission. Thus, a good practice always involves asking them to opt in. Additionally, SMS marketing campaigns require you to comply with regulations related to the content of SMS messages, specifically related to gambling, high-risk financial activities, or data protection and privacy.

Email marketing

Email marketing offers ample advantages and some disadvantages. Let’s discuss what they are.

Advantages

Here are the advantages of email marketing.

1. Cost-effective

Email marketing is a cost-effective form of marketing that allows you to send unlimited emails at an extremely low cost per message. The only cost associated with it is the email automation tool you are using. Still, it is considered one of the most affordable forms of marketing.

2. Permission-based

This form of marketing is permission-based. It means your marketing list will only include those interested in receiving your emails. It also encourages customers to interact more with your brand and its products or services.

3. Increase brand awareness and website traffic

Businesses can showcase their brand personality and values via email marketing. Email campaigns also provide an opportunity to provide insights, share stories, and communicate with their subscribers, which helps them humanize their brand and foster relationships with them.

4. Personalization and segmentation

Integrating email marketing with your CRM system is easy. One such CRM that makes email integration a breeze is EngageBay. This platform allows you to manage all your emails from a single dashboard and facilitates 2-way sync with Outlook 365 and Gmail.

EngageBay also makes it effortless to personalize your message by including your customer’s name or past purchases to build strong relationships.

At the same time, CRM tools, like EngageBay, also help you segment your marketing list and allow your customers, especially those interested in your products or services, to receive emails.

5. Scalable

Email marketing can be scheduled to send emails in bulk beforehand. This makes this method a highly scalable marketing strategy because it makes it easy to reach a large audience or a smaller targeted list. Running an email marketing campaign also facilitates identifying overlaps, ruling out unnecessary steps, and covering any gaps with well-timed messages.

6. Supports multimedia

Another winning email marketing tip is that this strategy allows you to use an interactive experience to collect information from subscribers. But what gives you scope to convey your business branding and make your email visually more appealing? These elements include static and animated images, videos, and other media formats.

7. Measurable

Many entrepreneurs still ask this — is email marketing a game changer? The short answer is yes, it is. If you are not convinced, we will tell you how.

You can easily measure the effectiveness of email marketing campaigns using metrics such as open rate, click-through rate (CTR), bounce rate, conversion rate, and unsubscribe rate. This is the ultimate way to know your audience, determine what works and eliminate what doesn’t, and create a strategy accordingly.

Disadvantages

Let’s know about the disadvantages of email marketing that may impact its effectiveness.

1. Spam and deliverability issues

Suppose your marketing emails are flagged as spammed; you might face deliverability issues. This increases the chances of your audience deleting the email without interacting with it or reading it. The probability of email deletion increases, especially when you are sending cold emails.

2. Design issues

Before reaching out to your audience through emails, it is essential to design your email to hook them. Thus, you must ensure your emails look professional, address dark mode compatibility, code HTML emails, and choose the best solution to any accessibility issue.

3. Email marketing list keeps on changing

The email marketing list you collected today may not be valid after 3 months. This implies that you need to update the list regularly.

Additionally, your prospect’s email addresses might change with time or when they change the organization they were working with. This forces you to use email verification tools to confirm the address of your prospects each time before you send them an email.

4. Data privacy concerns

Email marketing campaigns focus on personalization and segmentation, which may hinder data privacy. Thus, marketers also need to bear the responsibility of protecting the data of their subscribers.

Cost and ROI Analysis of SMS and Email Marketing

SMS and email marketing are cost-effective strategies. However, both have different costs and ROIs. Let’s conduct their cost and ROI analysis separately.

Cost considerations

How much does each channel cost? Let’s calculate.

1. SMS

SMS marketing costs vary depending on your brand, industry, chosen service provider, message volume, geographic reach, campaign keywords, and use case.

For example- if you are selling a product online, product launch campaigns won’t be able to yield as effective results as abandoned cart reminders do. This is why the cost per SMS in both cases will be different.

On average, the costs of sending an SMS with up to 160 characters range between $0.01 to $0.015 per message. However, if it reaches up to 320 characters, the cost increases to $0.03; for up to 480 characters, the cost is calculated at $0.045.

2. Email

The cost of your email marketing campaign depends on factors including list size and quality, monthly email volume, templates used for sending emails, the service and features you require, and email marketing automation tools & services.

For example, if you need advanced automation and segmentation features, you may need to pay extra for email marketing software. Every extra add-on gives you more insights, which will cost you more.

So, how much do you need to spend per email? It largely depends on the list size and price range of the email marketing automation tool you are using. You can use EngageBay to scale your email marketing process and drive more conversions to reduce this cost.

Here is a quick review of the average cost of sending emails to your prospects:

List Size	Average Cost
0-1000	$18
5000	$62
10,000	$100
50,000	$270
100,000	$420

ROI

Let’s calculate the ROI of using SMS vs email marketing.

1. SMS

ROI is a crucial metric when choosing a marketing strategy to expand your audience reach.

If you are considering urgent promotions for your product or service, SMS marketing is an ideal strategy that can deliver a strong ROI. Although it may have a higher initial cost, it ultimately provides worthwhile outcomes.

To calculate the ROI of your SMS marketing campaign, you need to determine net profit by calculating the total revenue generated from your campaign and subtracting the costs associated with running it.

The next step is to add all the costs incurred to implement and run the SMS marketing campaign, such as SMS service fees, campaign setup costs, and staff wages. Now, divide the net profit by the investment cost and multiply it by 100.

According to HubSpot, most businesses implementing SMS marketing campaigns boast 71 times their initial investment on every $1 spent. So yes, this can be considered a benchmark if you create an SMS marketing campaign.

2. Email

Many businesses use email marketing to establish strong customer relationships.

Suppose you want to maximize the ROI of your email marketing campaign. In that case, you must do an in-depth competitor analysis and strategize and plan your campaign after brainstorming ideas with your marketers.

To calculate your ROI in email marketing, you need to apply this simple formula:

ROI = (gain–spent)/spent

Gain = Value of a Lead × Number of Conversions

A good email ROI rate ranges between 3600% to 4200%. This means that for every $1 spent, you receive a return of $36 to $42.

Comparing SMS marketing’s ROI with email marketing, it can be concluded that SMS marketing has more potential to generate higher ROI due to its quick reachability and immediate customer attention.

However, if your business needs to host an extended marketing campaign while sharing detailed information about your product or service, email marketing is a preferable choice.

Use Cases and Best Practices of SMS and Email Marketing

SMS and email marketing campaigns can be used together but offer different USPs.

SMS has higher open and engagement rates, whereas emails are ideal for formal communication and sharing complex information. Let’s know which marketing strategy to use and when.

When to Use SMS

When is SMS preferred over email? Let’s take a look.

1. Time-sensitive promotions

Marketers send these texts to inform customers about special offers or discounts, clearance sales, and limited-time special sales on particular products/services. They are one of the most common types of SMS marketing communications.

These messages create an urgency among the customers because they are time-sensitive.

When mobile users sign up to receive texts, they mainly check out messages to get instant access to discounts and promotions. Therefore, these types of SMS promotions will help drive sales instantly.

2. Urgent notifications

Businesses usually send these texts to inform customers about important updates, personalized alerts, or deals.

They create curiosity among customers, which helps increase conversions. Thus, these text messages are great for reaching customers instantly and driving instant action.

3. Appointment reminders

Appointment reminders are best to improve your workflow and customer relations.

It is an easy and cost-effective method to inform customers about your reservations, appointments, payment due dates, etc. By using SMS marketing for appointment setting, you can create an exceptional customer experience, increasing productivity and maximizing booking rates!

When to Use Email

When is email preferred over SMS? Let’s take a look.

1. Detailed newsletters

Various companies send email newsletters to stay on their customers’ minds.

These emails are usually sent to highlight new products or services. Newsletters are an excellent way to educate customers about your products, employees, company’s achievements, etc. They can also send company updates, blogs, feedback requests, or promotional announcements.

2. Product launches

Product launch emails are a great way to showcase your new product to your target audience. Marketers use these emails to build anticipation within the potential market for their product.

To make your product launch email more persuasive, it is recommended that you use captivating visuals, opt for storytelling, and use a clear and compelling interactive element that directs the audience to take action, such as clicking a button, filling out a form, or making a purchase.

3. In-depth updates

Update emails are one example where content and product teams must come together for a successful outcome. These emails help build awareness and reduce frustration among users.

For example, a sudden change in your product without prior communication with the user can be frustrating. Notifying the user about updates beforehand will help the user know what to expect and when to expect them.

4. Transactional emails

These emails are automatically triggered when your contacts take specific actions, helping them complete the process. These include order confirmation emails, shipping updates, and refund confirmations.

They have a relatively higher CTR than other types of emails because they contain information that customers are looking for precisely, like when their order will arrive or the next steps after making a purchase.

Integrating SMS and Email Marketing

Integrating SMS and email marketing can create a seamless customer journey. To nurture your leads and conversions, you must know how to integrate SMS into email marketing.

Let’s first learn the benefits of integrating SMS and email marketing.

Combined strategy benefits of integrating SMS and email marketing

While SMS and email marketing have unique benefits, combining them into one can maximize your campaign’s impact. Here are some major benefits you get from combining these two marketing methods.

1. Cross-channel marketing

Today, reaching your audience through multiple marketing channels, including SMS and emails, is an excellent idea to capture their attention and create a unified and impactful customer experience.

2. Increase engagement and ROI

Integrating both marketing methods will increase customer engagement and maximize ROI. But how? If you send messages to your customers’ email inboxes and mobile devices, they are more likely to read them.

Another advantage of integrating both is that SMS provides concise and prompt updates, while email delivers detailed information and visuals.

3. Improve metrics

Thanks to robust analytics and reports provided by EngageBay, you can track the performance of both communication strategies. With this tool, you can identify and use the insights to improve the crucial metrics and elevate your business game.

Implementation tips to integrate SMS into email marketing

These are some of the best practices to help you integrate an SMS strategy into your email marketing campaigns:

1. Cross-promotional campaigns

Combine SMS and email marketing strategies to provide incentives for your subscribers. Send an email with a CTA allowing your subscribers to opt-in for exclusive SMS offers. Similarly, send SMS messages prompting them to check their email for further details.

2. Understand the unique qualities of both channels

Do not treat both channels as the same, as each is packaged with unique strengths and weaknesses. You can do this by using emails to deliver detailed content, while SMS is perfect for concise messages and timely alerts. This is why you must tailor your approach for a more targeted marketing strategy for each platform.

3. Don’t overwhelm users with too many messages

Strike a balance between over and under-communication by establishing a reasonable communication cadence, considering your audience’s preference and engagement patterns.

4. Track and analyze users’ response

Monitor both marketing channels’ click-through rates, open rates, conversion rates, and other key performance indicators. Doing this will help you identify all opportunities for improvement in your SMS and email marketing campaign.

Case Studies and Examples of SMS and Email Marketing

Let us examine some excellent case studies of businesses that used SMS and /or email marketing to their advantage.

1. Reset Games

Reset Games is a locally owned video game store and coin-op arcade. They buy and sell video games and accessories. This brand also has a classic arcade and machines to play. Its work is offline, store-based rather than online. Therefore, they struggled to understand which marketing strategy to use to increase their brand awareness and sales.

They tried many things, but the method that worked best for them was SMS marketing. They started sending messages to their potential customers, such as time-sensitive offers, promotional deals, loyalty programs, reward updates, and contests and giveaways.

This helped increase their engagement rate as customers who receive SMS from brands experience it as a one-on-one interaction, which created a strong bond with their customers and improved their customer loyalty.

2. Nike’s Campaigns

Nike is one of the most well-known shoe and clothing brands and needs no introduction. Yet, they use SMS and email marketing to launch their products and capture a massive global market share.

Their SMS campaign was named ‘Impekable,’ and it helped them boost revenue by 400% compared to their prior campaigns.

Nike's SMS Marketing Campaign by Impekable — *Source*

You will be amazed that this campaign was just for 2 months and got them such overwhelming revenue. In this campaign, they just sent SMS to their new and potential customers as new products were launched.

Impekable’s bulk SMS marketing solution also delivered interest-based alerts to customers who had opted in to receive promotions. This feature was quite beneficial, as it was important to Nike’s customers to be the first to know when new products were available.

Next comes their email marketing campaign. By implementing this marketing method, Nike built long-lasting relationships and nurtured their entire customer journey.

When you sign up for Nike’s email list, they send a welcome email inviting you to join Nike Plus. Signing up gives you access to contact Nike experts who can help you pick the perfect pair of sneakers and get other member-exclusive perks.

At the bottom of the email, they follow up with an effective CTA to find stores near the subscriber’s location, likely to help people who would rather shop in-person rather than online. They use email marketing at every step of the buyer’s journey so that they do not miss any opportunity to convert leads into paying customers.

3. Turtles Share the Love

Amigos of Costa Rica homepage — *Source*

Amigos of Costa Rica is a non-profit organization. They contribute to the well-being of Costa Rica by putting in efforts to ensure that clean water flows to all living in Costa Rica’s central valley, trying to provide educational scholarships or animal rehabilitation. The brand collects funds, and last year, it donated around $6.5 million, which it used for good causes.

They also started a new campaign, Turtle Love, to protect sea turtles as they are threatened by poaching. They have various segments in which you can donate, such as:

Sponsor a school trip ($50)
Adopt a nest ($100)
Adopt a sea turtle ($150)
Sponsor a beach survey ($250)
Sponsor a local assistant ($500)

Creating this microsite and segments made it easy for the supporters to understand the cause. This helped them get more traffic and donations.

Pro tip: No matter whatever marketing method you choose, email or SMS, it’s vital to consider your business goals, objectives, and target audience to choose the right channel or combination of both.

Conclusion

Leveraging customer data from one channel to enhance the success of the other can be a game-changer for your business. If you keep experimenting with SMS and email and find the optimal blend, you can grow your business by increasing conversions.

If you are looking for a marketing tool that can assist you in email and SMS marketing, EngageBay can be the go-to tool.

Alongside tailoring your SMS marketing campaign precisely, you can choose from over 1,000 email templates that make them captivating and match your audience’s needs and interests.

FAQ

What are the key differences between SMS and email marketing?

SMS marketing is a strategy in which promotional messages, offers, or alerts are sent to customers through text messages, with an open rate of 98%.

On the contrary, email marketing strategy involves sending commercial messages, newsletters, or promotional emails to a group of people via email, with an open rate of 20%.

Which marketing channel offers a higher ROI?

The ROI for email marketing is relatively low compared to SMS marketing. For email marketing, it is $36 for every $1 spent, whereas for SMS marketing, it’s $71 for every dollar spent.

How can small businesses effectively combine SMS and email marketing?

The best way to use them together is to send timely information through SMS and monthly newsletters via email.

What is the best practice for SMS marketing?

One of the best ways to do SMS marketing is to get your customers’ consent before sending them messages. Once your customers opt-in for messages, you can incentivize them with an attractive offer, such as a discount or free service.

What are the best practices for email marketing?

For the best email marketing response, you should use a subject line to entice the recipient to open the email, personalize it by adding the recipient’s name, and keep the body of the email concise, relevant, and easily scannable.

How can I measure the success of my SMS and email campaigns?

To calculate the ROI of an SMS or email marketing campaign, you’ll need to compare the revenue generated by the campaign to its running costs.

What type of messages are best suited for SMS marketing?

Depending on your type of business, you can use various messages in SMS marketing, such as welcome offers, special time-sensitive offers, thank you offers, or personalized offers.

How can I avoid my emails going to spam?

You must clean up your email list regularly, comply with internet privacy laws, and provide a double opt-in.

What are the cost implications of using SMS vs email?

SMS campaigns are highly cost-effective as compared to email campaigns. However, the exact cost will depend on your chosen marketing campaign platform.

How do I gather customer preferences for SMS or email communication?

There are various ways you can gather customer preferences for SMS or email communication, such as:

Ask your customers one or two more questions whenever they log in, visit your website, or download content
Set up your customer’s default preferences based on similar customer personas
Provide customers with one place where they can create and amend all their preference