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I like SMS marketing as much as the next mobile markerter… In fact, I am a HUGE proponent of it. But this statement may be a little over the top. As Mobile Marketing Watch reports, Marc Hyatt of Txtlocal recently made the claim that SMS advertising is capable of achieving more than a 100% response rate. Unfortunately, his statement is not just overzealous, it is flat out wrong. And even worse, he is advocating a bad design model for SMS marketing.

More than 100% response rate? Meaning that if I send out 100 SMS messages, I have the potential on getting more than 100 responses back?

OK, to be fair to Mr. Hyatt, he didn’t say that it was likely, only that it is possible. In theory, it could happen. As Mr. Hyatt explains,

“This is one of the few forms of marketing where people will send the message on. They will do the marketing for you if you have a good offer that people are interested in… People just send it on to each other, because it’s so easy just to forward – it’s not like an email.”

Now I realize that Mr Hyatt works for a company that specializes in sending SMS marketing messages. But as I stated earlier, his theory is flawed. First of all, response rate measures the rate of response per marketing message (OK, overly simplified definition, but it will works for our purposes). If I send a message to one person, and that person forwards it on to another person, and they both respond, that isn’t a 200% response rate. It is still just a 100% response rate, because 100% of the people who received the message responded to it. What Mr Hyatt is likely referring to is increased ROI. As a marketer, if you only incur the cost of sending out one message, and you receive two responses, then your ROI is much higher.

Terminology aside, there is another major problem with his theory. SMS marketing is successful because it is targeted and personal. Yes, it is possible to send bulk SMS advertisements over SMS, but then you are losing the unique intimacy of mobile marketing. And I question whether or not people are as willing to forward on SMS marketing messages like they are via email or social media. Everyone remember when your great Aunt Sally finally got email, and for the next month you received every email forward on earth? Annoying, wasn’t it? Do we really want to bring that behavior to our mobile devices, which represent a much more personal connection?

I do like Marc Hyatt’s enthusiasm for SMS Marketing. And I do think that it represents some incredible opportunities in the world of marketing. But we need to make sure we use it correctly and responsibility, and realize that even though it is a very powerful marketing channel, it can’t do the impossible.