Text Messaging for Nonprofits: 5 Crucial Considerations
Finding the right text messaging service for your nonprofit comes down to features and price, right? Not if you want to get the most out of your text campaigns. You need a text messaging service that can help your nonprofit drive volunteer and fundraising efforts quickly, easily, and, yes, at a great price, so you can spend less time marketing and more time doing the important work you do.
We've helped over 210,000 customers grow with text marketing and we're proud to work with our nonprofit partners who are making the world a better place. We want to help you boost your nonprofit's impact with effective communication, too.
EZ Texting offers the most convenient and engaging way to send direct and two-way messages to your contact list. It’s also easy to segment your audience to create more targeted messaging, integrate your text marketing with your other efforts on popular apps like Constant Contact or HubSpot, and so much more.
Read on to learn how to find and use the best text messaging service for nonprofits.
Why Use Mass Texting for Nonprofits?
The short answer: mass texting is incredibly effective, and the numbers don't lie. Consumers are more than 130% more likely to respond to a text than an email and SMS messages have a 98% open rate. What makes mass texting work so well? Whereas social ads and email newsletters are easily overlooked, text messaging is direct, personal, and interactive. Additionally, nearly everyone has a mobile phone, and the majority of consumers want to receive offers and other messages by text.
For nonprofits, the potential is huge. After all, mobile users made up 33% of online donation transactions in 2019, and the average donation size for text-to-donate fundraisers is $107. Text marketing works, but what you can do with it is just as important. With a mass texting service like ours, you can promote and manage events, recruit volunteers, engage with new members, send text-to-donate reminders, and let your audience know about venue changes or donation deadlines. Although you can do all of these things via email or on your social channels, those channels don’t offer the ease and quick response times of text messaging.
How to Find the Best Text Messaging Service for Nonprofits
Finding the right texting service for your nonprofit starts with understanding what distinguishes the great providers from the average ones. Here are five things to look for while searching for the best services.
1. Ease of Use
It goes without saying that usability is important. You have a lot of work to do and you don't need to waste time learning a complicated system. You'll likely be cross-training other team members to help with texting campaigns, so the problems associated with confusing software can be compounded. Keep an eye out for a service that enables you to quickly and easily respond to incoming messages.
It's easy to use. Amazing customer service. The interface is simple and really requires no experience to use it. Just read the directions and start.
Finally, always look for customer reviews, like these we’ve received at EZ Texting:
“Very user-friendly! It was easy to set up, add phone numbers and send messages.” - Erin D.
“Compared to other platforms, I was able to just sign up and get going. The interface is very easy to understand, and our office manager was able to get up to speed real quick.” - Robert E.
2. Fantastic Support
Just as you offer a valuable service to those in need, your text messaging service should be there for you. Make sure to find a provider whose support team is friendly, knowledgeable, and responsive. The day will come when you'll be glad you did. At EZ Texting, we are always ready to help via live support chat Monday thourgh Friday 8AM—8PM Eastern. You can also browse through our extensive Help Center 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and our FAQs cover everything from the basics of SMS and MMS marketing to deeper questions about our features and service. Here are some examples of third-party reviews of our customer support.
"I actually made a mistake while importing my first round of contacts and I contacted EZ Texting via chat. They immediately helped me out and even gave me a credit to help fix my issue!" - Erin D.
"The once or twice I've needed to contact support - I received help immediately." - G2 Crowd Reviewer
"Lots of good features but the best is that they have a very responsive chat support to answer all my questions." - G2 Crowd Reviewer
"The tech support folks are super kind and attentive." - G2 Crowd Reviewer
"The support is unmatched! Loved the customer service." - G2 Crowd Reviewer
If the service you're considering doesn't have reviews like this, keep looking.
3. A Good Track Record with Nonprofits
Nonprofit marketers face different problems than other types of marketers. You have different regulations to adhere to and you have to pull different psychological levers to get people to take action. It's important to find a service provider that knows the challenges you face and how to overcome them through text messaging. In other words, look for a text messaging service that knows nonprofit marketing.
The best options will have in-depth texting advice for nonprofits, built-in text message templates for nonprofits, and maybe even something like a Nonprofit Text Messaging Playbook. You should also look for reviews from the service's nonprofit customers.
Here at EZ Texting, we've helped organizations like Big Brother Big Sister Foundation, Water is Basic, and the Bonneville Environmental Foundation achieve their goals, and we can do the same for you.
4. Price
Nonprofits often feel a responsibility to keep expenses under control, which is understandable. While you do want to look for an affordable service, you may not want to go with the cheapest. The savings you get may cost you more in lost hours, frustration, and disappointing results. And, you may get stuck with a service that starts at a low cost but raises its prices once you're locked in.
Look for a text messaging service that is reasonably priced for organizations of all sizes and offers straightforward billing so that you know what you're paying for. See our pricing here.
5. Robust Features
Many nonprofit marketers are surprised by how many things you can do with text messaging. You can poll contacts to learn their preferences, remind volunteers of service opportunities, run text-to-give campaigns, provide member support, and more. Beyond making it easy to reach out to members of your community, EZ Texting’s seamless integrations with popular applications like Constant Contact, HubSpot, and Squarespace, allows you to integrate your text messaging with your marketing workflows and even automate contact management across platforms. Overall, we offer more than 3,000 integration opportunities with a wide range of apps, from calendars and CRMs to payment processing programs and social media platforms.
Make sure that the service you select has the feature set to put this power in your hands. Check out our features here.
Also, see The 13 Must-Have Features of a Business Text Messaging App.
How Mass Texting Works for Nonprofits
Organizations wishing to send mass text messages to their members simply register with a text messaging service provider — the service provider assigns them a username and a password to access the online platform. Once logged in, the user uploads a list of contacts, composes a message, and clicks send. (Remember to make sure all your contacts have opted in to receive text messages before you send.)
Within minutes, the organization's members will be reading the message on their mobile devices with delivery rates and open rates recorded by the platform. The platform also receives replies. One of the purposes of these features is so that, in the event of an emergency, organizations can see who has received their message and who needs to be contacted via an alternative channel of communication.
When you think of using a text messaging service, think in terms of immediacy. The statistics show that people respond well to texting, but you don't want to overdo it and send too often or you'll run the risk of your messages being overlooked. With EZ Texting, you can reach out to volunteers and further engage new supporters with scheduled messages, but that's just the start. Our service enables you to segment your contacts, quickly import updated lists in Excel or CVS format, and analyze your results to optimize future campaigns. Your recipients can even opt-out of receiving future messages, which can provide additional insight into your messaging strategy.
Get to know what we offer by checking out our product features.
Mass Texting Examples for Nonprofits
Water is Basic
Water is Basic was founded to empower the local leadership in Southern Sudan to bring clean water to their people. In Southern Sudan, about 70% of the population does not have adequate access to safe water. Water is Basic was created in collaboration with Sudanese leaders and provides them with the equipment they need to drill wells. It is the organization's vision to see a well drilled in every Sudanese village. Water is Basic uses text messaging to keep donors engaged and raise funds to meet this vital need.
Read the Case Study.
Mass Texting for Nonprofits FAQ
Yes, although you need to obtain some kind of verbal or written consent from the recipient. To get consent, you can collect phone numbers in a way that implies some kind of buy-in from the receiver or you can invite your audience to opt in via your website or email newsletters, both of which can be effective in building your contact list. The rules for nonprofits are a bit looser than for-profit businesses under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), but make sure to consult an attorney if you have any further questions.
With an easy-to-use service like EZ Texting, of course. Not only is our service affordable, but our app integrations, bulk SMS and direct and two-way messaging features, and the ability to automate campaigns will take your outreach operations to the next level.
Rates vary by provider and the lowest cost per send may not get you the best result. Therefore, it's best to look for a service that also offers ease of use and cross-platform functionality like EZ Texting.
Many apps allow you to send mass text messages, but few offer all-in-one integrations and EZ Texting's other robust features.
To start with, you need to have a contact list of users who have opted in to receive messages from you. Then you need to import that list into a service like EZ Texting, which allows you to send messages to recipients and respond directly to them at any time. Use our platform and you can also segment your audiences and obtain valuable data-driven insights that can help you improve your messaging strategy.
Get Your Nonprofit Text Marketing Playbook
We’ve developed a text message marketing playbook specifically for nonprofits which you can access for free right now. In our Playbook for Text Message Marketing for Nonprofits, you’ll get 13 message templates to help you increase engagement and support from your contacts.
Message templates include:
- Text-to-Give Campaigns
- Event Reminders
- Thank You Messages
- Group Coordination Messages
- Emergency Alerts
- Welcome Messages
- Interactive Demonstrations
- And More!
Conclusion
With its effectiveness, mass text messaging should be an integral part of your nonprofit marketing strategy. Get Your Nonprofit Text Marketing Playbook and discover how EZ Texting can help you transform your contact list into donors, volunteers, and event attendees.
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