SMS Marketing for a Canadian Business

SMS marketing gets described as though every business is running campaigns to a purchased list. For most Canadian businesses the reality is smaller and more useful: a few hundred regulars, and news worth telling them perhaps twice a week. That does not need a campaign platform. It needs a way for customers to opt in once and be told directly afterwards, which is a different shape of product from what the phrase usually implies.

Text message marketing gets attention because most people read a text within minutes of it arriving. For a business owner in Canada trying to decide whether SMS marketing is worth setting up, the real question isn't whether texts get read — they do — it's what you're going to send, who is going to receive it, and how customers find you in the first place. Building a subscriber list from nothing, and giving people a reason to opt in, is the part that actually takes work.

Most SMS marketing tools assume you already have a list of numbers to text. The harder problem for a business is building that list in the first place — doing it without a mailing budget, a large social media following, or a marketing department to run one. What actually helps is a public page customers can find on their own and subscribe to, plus a simple way to alert everyone on it the moment there's something worth telling them.

That's the part that separates a subscriber board from a closed messaging list. A private list of phone numbers only reaches people who already know your business exists. A board that's also a public, searchable page does both jobs at once: it keeps your existing customers posted on what's new, and it gives people who've never heard of you a way to find you through a search they were already running.

Setting one up is meant to be something you do yourself, not a project you hand off. You create your board, post your first update, and share the page or let it get found through search. From there, posting is the ongoing work — a special, a closure, a new item — and each post goes out to your subscriber list automatically.

EnAffaire is $69.99 CAD per month plus applicable tax.

There's a plain-language guide to setting up a board and getting it found on search at enaffaire.com/get-found, which is the best starting point if you're deciding whether this fits your business. From there you can visit enaffaire.com directly to get started.