Messenger Marketing 101: 12 Essential Tips, Tricks & Tools You Need to Know
Fact: Messenger marketing is one of the most underutilized marketing platforms.
Facebook Messenger has 1.3 billion users. Yes, billion. Yet only 1% of businesses and brands use this communications platform. Why? There’s still a lack of education amongst marketers and businesses regarding chatbot functionality and messenger marketing best practices. Last summer, I wanted some real knowledge about this innovative platform and completed a 10-hour messenger marketing course. It was SO eye-opening and I learned some ah-mazing things about messenger marketing and everything that goes along with it. To save you a little time (9 hours and 55 minutes to be exact), here are my top 12 takeaways:
The Tips
Give ‘em what they want!
Deliver helpful and timely content related to your brand or business through messenger. A few ideas could be a:
free downloadable pdf
product preview
helpful tip of the day or week
new blog post
The possibilities are endless – just make sure you’re delivering value.
Keep copy brief and human-like
Think of how you would text a friend, family member or colleague. It’s brief and interactive. The copy you create for chat flows (e.g. the string and logic you build to get more info from the subscriber), needs to be quick, concise, and clear – similar to a text message.
Don’t annoy or misuse
Repeat after me. Do not use Messenger for promotional stuff only. Again. Do not use Messenger for promotional stuff only. That earns you a one-way ticket to Facebook jail. Seriously, Facebook has an eagle-eye on brands who misuse chatbots to push promotional-only content. However, there is a way you can incorporate promotional messages, such as sales, offers, etc. ManyChat has an awesome guide to best practices that clearly lays out the do’s and don’t of sending these kinds of messages.
The Tricks
Create Drip Campaigns
Once a subscriber opts-in to your bot, you can automatically deliver timely information and content over a specific time period via Facebook Messenger. For example, your health gym can deliver subscribers daily exercise tips for five days. You can set the drip campaign to send one message per day and then follow up with a free seven-day gym pass.
Send Broadcasts
Have a blog post or another item of value you want to distribute to your audience? Send it in Messenger! There are two types of broadcast messages: subscription and promotional. Make sure that your broadcasts don’t violate the 24-hour rule, which states that you can’t send a promotional message to someone who hasn’t interacted with you in more than 24 hours. This will land you in Facebook jail.
Use in lieu of a landing page
In certain situations, Facebook Messenger can be used as an opt-in to access a free asset or enter a giveaway. Audience attention spans are shorter and shorter and landing pages, while still very effective, create a larger barrier to entry. Facebook Messenger seamlessly eliminates the number of steps needed to access the offer.
—-> Check out this demo bot I built for a special demo giveaway. This particular bot-generated just as many leads as the landing page!
The Tools
ManyChat
This is my messenger marketing platform of choice! ManyChat offers free and paid accounts (with the Pro account starts at only $10/mon. per page and scales as the number of users increases) so anyone can dive in and start building. Lots of dynamic and advanced features are included, making the platform really innovative. The BEST part is their interface is super user-friendly, making chatbots a breeze to build.
ChatFuel
This is another leading chatbot building option that offers powerful and advanced features. Chatfuel also offers free and paid versions, starting at $!5/month and going all the way up to $300/month for the top-tier subscriptions.
Facebook Messenger
Facebook Messenger offers its own native functionality that you can use to get started. The more advanced feature will require using another platform, like the two I mentioned above.
The gist of it is, messenger marketing should be in your marketing toolbox in 2019. If you want to learn more in-depth about this super innovative platform, check out my free on-demand webinar!