Text messaging has become such a popular form of communication that many people now prefer to text rather than have phone conversations in both their personal and professional lives.
Correspondingly, as retailers look for better ways to connect with customers and add value to their experience, they’ve also begun looking for ways to incorporate text messaging into their communication efforts more effectively.
Chief among such companies is Nordstrom, which is now using such a service from Twilio.
One third of Nordstrom customers prefer text communication, the company says, and Nordstrom has been utilizing opt-in text service for some time—but one that was too costly, and had many limitations and time constraints.
Thanks to the new service from Twilio, Nordstrom now has the ability to access “fast and affordable” image-based text messages, which their in-house personal shoppers can send directly to customers (including images of merchandise they may be interested in). As an added benefit, the personal shoppers do not need to utilize their personal cell phones to text their clients.
“Before Twilio offered this new service, Nordstrom associates could text customers who’d opted in to notify them of new merchandise,” says Rachael King of the WSJ. “But it was expensive to text images. Plus, the retailer had to wait for months to receive a short code, the five or six digit number to which a text message can be sent. Twilio says that all told, companies usually spend more than $10,000 per short code annually.
