Engagement is probably the most important word in marketing today. It’s also overused and poorly understood on a lot of levels. How do you measure engagement and interest? Even Facebook questions the metrics designed to answer these questions. Nate Elliott, VP and Principal Analyst at Forrester Research, published a report called Stop Measuring Engagement. The argument is that the engagement levels are only part of the answer. True value from engagement comes when your target audience gets your message and acts on your message.

Text message marketing, also known as SMS Marketing, is the next evolution of marketing directly to the people who want to hear from you. SMS Marketing is a way to communicate directly with the people who are interested in your products and services via text messages directly to their mobile phones.

1. SMS Marketing is permission based – The core reason that SMS marketing messages are opened is that SMS marketing is permission-based. Yes, that means the recipient needs to give you permission to get texts, so you need to keep your traditional approaches alive and healthy to build your SMS marketing campaigns. And when they do give you the ok, you can bet they’re listening to what you’re saying, or in this case, reading what you’re texting.

2. SMS marketing is really affordable. No, REALLY affordable – A small business can plan and execute an SMS marketing campaign for far less than other campaigns. It’s cost effective, and unlike other media marketing campaigns, the return on a well targeted SMS marketing campaign can be very attractive. SMS marketing can cost about 50% less than email, and leads to conversion rates at 8.2%, with email around 1.7%.

3. SMS marketing is really easy. No, REALLY easy – Small businesses can launch mobile campaigns quickly and easily. With the right tools and a bit of small business marketing savvy, anyone can launch an effective SMS campaign.

4. It’s a 2 way street – Questions, polls, or even requesting advice on a what-if can get your audience active and replying to issues they find interesting. Linking to external content like images and videos also continues the engagement. With the increase in bandwidth and unlimited data plans, marketing with images and video is opening up the messaging canvas to all sorts of possibilities.

5. People open text messages – In a recent article, Mobile Marketing Watch indicates that marketing messages sent by SMS had an open rate of 98 percent. 90% of texts are opened in the first 3 minutes. Compare that to marketing emails, opened at about 22% percent. If people don’t read your message, they can’t engage with you. That’s not a problem with SMS marketing.

Getting in touch with the people that want to know about your services and products is the goal of marketing. Driving them to your sales network by engaging their attention and their interest is key. And reaching more people who are qualified and likely to engage while limiting cost is a formula for success.

In today’s marketing environment, businesses big and small are equipped with an array of impressive tools to get that done. Facebook, Linkedin, Instagram, and a multitude of other social networks all compete for attention. So where can you get your target market, all in one place, all focused on your message? By texting it.

Are you using direct messaging in your marketing?