Did you know that more people are checking their chat apps than they are checking their social media accounts?
Facebook Messenger, the world’s largest mobile messaging app (with more than 1.3 billion monthly active users) offers a massive business opportunity to marketers.
By leveraging chatbots, brands now have the power to automatically engage with Messenger users.
This makes the mobile messaging app a perfect channel to connect, nurture, convert and up-sell customers. But how can you make everything work?
Here are some key points around why Messenger marketing should be top of your agenda moving into 2020 and beyond.
Why Marketers Should Care About Facebook Messenger Marketing
💀 Organic reach is dying
The average internet user is a member of 8.5 social networks. We’ve reached a peak point in social where every channel has been saturated and we’ve been forced to operate in a ‘pay to play’ environment by the social media monopoly. There’s currently 2 ways to gain mass reach across these platforms; 1. Amazing creative or 2. Paid ads. Not everyone has the capability to pull off number 1 so they resort to the easier option of number 2.
🔎 Let’s take a look at some numbers…
- More than 1.3 billion people use Messenger each month.
- Messenger is the 2nd most popular iOS app of all time, behind Facebook.
- 20 billion messages are sent between people and businesses on Messenger each month.
- 40 billion monthly active businesses on Messenger.
🤔 Did you know?
The top 4 messaging apps have now overtaken the top 4 social networking sites worldwide in terms of global monthly active users.
📈 You Can Get 10-80x Better Engagement
Facebook Messenger marketing has the best engagement rate for any marketing channel right now.
If you think about email marketing, you know you’re doing well if you can get an open rate of between 5 and 10 percent. On the other hand, Facebook Messenger boasts open rates of 70-80 percent within the first hour.
👨💻 Use cases
Here a just a few use cases we’ve come across in the industry..
- Customer Service: Automate basic customer enquiries in a place where your customer is comfortable and happy communicating with you. This can free up time for your employees to handle more complex cases.
- E-Commerce: Conversational commerce can create a really personalised experience for your user, combining this with customer service you could automate the whole transaction from start to end within Messenger!
- Lead Generation: Messenger is a superb way to generate leads as it’s a more personal space. You’re not nudging someone to leave their email at the end of a sign-up form or through a website popup.
👀 And finally It’s on Facebook’s Agenda…
At the beginning of 2019 Mark Zuckerberg outlined the 3 main growth areas for Facebook. Stories, Groups and you guessed it, MESSAGING! With the announcement of the 3 biggest messaging platforms (WhatsApp, Messenger, Instagram) being interoperable it’s clear where Facebooks intentions lie.
Key Takeaways
- Messaging apps are becoming increasingly important in an era where organic reach is dying. Not only do they give you fantastic engagement but if executed right it can create a personal and lasting impression on your end user.
- Engagement through messaging apps is unrivalled. Yes, email is still prevalent, and we recommend continuing using it in the right context. However, with this shift towards messaging taking place the opportunity is NOW!
- Have a clear use case for your messaging campaign, don’t do it just because you think it’s the ‘in thing’. You’ll most likely get poor engagement/interaction if this is your motive.
- Don’t go against FACEBOOK! Usually when Facebook set their sights on something, they achieve it. We’ve already seen the astronomical growth in stories on Instagram and Groups on Facebook, Messaging is just the next vertical to tackle for them.
