People are connecting with their favourite brands on social media now more than ever. In a lot of cases, these platforms have become essential tools to a brand’s customer service, allowing consumers to engage with companies directly to ask questions, get more information, and even resolve certain issues they have with products and services.
So it’s not surprising that many companies are looking to advertise on Facebook Messenger, a messaging platform with more than a billion monthly active users. But just like any other digital marketing effort, you need to devise a specialised strategy to leverage the platform fully.
Marketing tools specifically designed to help companies run messenger campaigns are an important component of this strategy. In this article, we’ll discuss some of the best messenger marketing tools there are, and go through some tips on how to form a good strategy for this platform.
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What Are Facebook Messenger Marketing Tools?
Most tools for Facebook Messenger are chatbots, a form of AI technology programmed to mimic human speech through text. A Facebook Messenger chatbot is designed to support businesses and brands when it comes to interacting with their consumers through messenger.
In the age of the internet, people have big expectations when it comes to customer services. The most prevalent expectation has to do with 24/7 services, which is nearly impossible to accommodate for smaller businesses that lack the human resources. So, messenger chat bots step in and take over some of the workloads, ensuring that the consumer gets a quick reply to their query.
There are two main types of messenger chat bots. The first, more basic version is simply a program with a few pre-determined questions and answers. When a user asks a particular question, they automatically receive the answer. This works best for smaller queries with answers that are set in stone, such as the hours of a restaurant, or phone number of a company.
There’s also a version of these chat bots that leverage what AI technology can do, even more, these are the tools that can learn from interacting from consumers and improve their service over time.
Best Facebook Messenger Marketing Tools
If you’re planning to create a Facebook messenger marketing campaigns, here are some great tools that can help:
ManyChat
ManyChat is an easy to use platform that allows you to create ads and website chat widgets with a drag and drop editor. It also allows cross-platform integration, so you can connect it with Facebook Messenger to send messages to your audience directly.
ManyChat can work as a live chat tool as well, by setting up default respond to common keywords your consumers usually use.
Smooch
Smooch is a chatbot that can be easily integrated into your Facebook Messenger marketing campaign, but also other messaging platforms like Twitter or WhatsApp. It’s a good tool for a company’s sales department as it allows them to interact with consumers across all platforms, as the customer profile is saved to one location.
MobileMonkey
MobileMonkey is a free tool that allows you to set up simple chatbots even if you have 0 programming skills. One of its best features is the Click-to-Messenger Ads. If you connect your Facebook Page to MobileMonkey, you can then run high-quality Facebook messenger ads to grow conversions, get leads, and generally reach out to new customers.
One big drawback of MobileMonkey is that the platform is essentially designed for marketing purposes, meaning that the customer service component of the chatbot is rather limited. If you require an app to communicate with your customers, MobileMonkey may not be enough.
Botsify
Botsify, on the other hand, is designed for customer support exclusively. It enables 24/7 support with ease. If the live chat bot is not enough to help the consumer, the platform will send out a push notification that a member of your team is needed to finish the conversation.
Plus, you can use the same chatbot on your website as well, allowing your consumers to have access to the same quality of customer support on both platforms.
ChatFuel
Lastly, we have ChatFuel, a chatbot builder that requires no technical know-how at all. You can create set responses based on keywords, or by using conversion blocks that contain leading questions or calls to action. The benefit here is that you can control the direction of the conversation.
ChatFuel also has some impressive multimedia messaging features that incorporate visual and audio media in your messaging. You can even set it to answer comments on your Facebook page using the same methods as in the Messenger app.
Email Marketing versus Messenger Marketing: Which Is Better?
Some may argue that messenger marketing is a form of or at least similar to email marketing, but there is a pretty big difference between the two.
In email marketing, you are simply sending a message to consumers. However, you have little control over whether the consumer will open the message and read your text, as evidenced by the generally low open rates of emails.
There are other issues with email marketing:
● Emails can easily get into the spam folder;
● On Gmail, newsletter often show in the Campaign tab, for which the user doesn’t receive notifications unless they set up one themselves;
● You are competing with a lot of other newsletters for the user’s attention
With a Facebook Messenger bot, the user gets a different experience entirely. They are not receiving a piece of information only, but are interacting directly with your brand, which helps form a stronger connection with it.
There is also less competition, as you’re not fighting to get people’s attention with a messenger chat bot. Instead, you have people’s undivided attention, which opens a lot of opportunities for conversion.
But does this mean you should skip email marketing altogether? Not exactly. Emails still have a place in your 2020 digital marketing campaigns, as they are a good way to give people discounts and make special announcements. But Facebook Messenger bots take communicating with consumers to a new level.
Facebook Messenger Marketing Best Practices
Here are some great ideas for your Facebook marketing campaign you can start doing today:
Share Your Content
Have a new blog post? A traditional way to tell people about it would be to send an email or post a link to your Facebook page. An extra thing you can do is deliver the link in Messenger, with a personalised note encouraging people to click on the link.
Use It for Remarketing
Remarketing is a good way to increase conversions. Instead of targeting new customers, you target your ads to consumers who’ve interacted with your brand but did not convert. One way to approach remarketing is to reach consumers through a messenger ad the second time around.
The Click-to-message type of ads can allow you to speak with the consumers that did not convert, and potentially get them to take the final steps to complete the funnel. It’s a powerful approach that lets you get in front of certain hesitations the customer had that prevented them from converting in the first place.
Use Drip Campaigns
Drip campaigns are an approach where you automate a series of messages that go out based on a specific timeline you establish or based on user actions. This allows you to stay in touch with consumers and keep them engaged and in the loop.
For instance, if a user signs up for an event you’re promoting, this action could trigger the chatbot to start a conversation with the user, where you present further details, packages, offers, and more.
Create Ads Exclusively for Messenger
Facebook newsfeed is full of ads, which creates a big problem for advertisers. You are competing for the user’s attention. But Messenger provides more opportunities to get the user without the noise of the newsfeed.
These ads will appear in the Home tab of the app. The user clicks on the ad and can start a conversation with a chatbot or visit your website, depending on which option you’ve chosen. While it’s not a guarantee that these ads will get users to engage with you, it’s not a bad idea to target them with multiple placements.
Final Thoughts: Create Your Strategy Now
Facebook ads have the potential of delivering some amazing results, but if you want to ensure a good ROI, let us help. Australian Internet Advertising’s social media marketing team is here to assist your business in reaching its digital marketing goals and will help you create an effective campaign strategy.
Book a free 30-minute strategy session with us to find out more or call our office at 1300 304 640.
