According to a recent report by Nielsen, 13-17-year-olds send the most text messages every month. That probably doesn’t come as a big surprise. If you’ve got a business that includes teenagers in its target market, text message marketing can be a great way  to connect with this audience.

The report also observed that teens are making fewer calls—an average of 572 minutes per teenager. Why? The top three reasons given by teenagers for why the text instead of calling are that, according to them, it’s faster, easier and more fun.

Also interesting to note is that girls are texting more than boys. To be precise, female teenagers typically send 1,137 more text messages each month than teenage guys.

If you’re interested in learning more about how you can use text message marketing to connect with your customers, give us a shout… or send us a text! Text FLIPSIDE to 555444 to try out our FlipText system. (Your provider’s standards message rates apply.)

How many text messages do you typically send in a month? Do you text more than you call? What's the most text messages you've ever sent in a single month? Share a comment below.

Keeping on top of the ever-changing would of social media can certainly be a challenge. Just when you start to think you've got it figured out, along comes a whole new platform that apparently took the world by storm while you were sleeping.

The latest culprit? Pinterest. What is Pinterest? Here's the official explanation:

Pinterest is a virtual pinboard. Pinterest allows you to organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. You can browse pinboards created by other people to discover new things and get inspiration from people who share your interests.

People use pinboards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes, and share their favorite recipes.

Have you tried it out yet? At Flipside Marketing, we're not pinning like crazy yet, but we are intrigued by this new avenue for sharing and would love to hear what your thoughts are on it. Please, leave a comment below.

At the moment, Pinterest is an invite-only platform. If you'd like to give it a try, just e-mail connect@flipsidemarketing.ca and we'll be happy to send you an invite.

On a side note, we've entered the Freshbooks Creative Workspaces contest. We're currently in third place but just need 8 votes to take the lead. The contest ends tomorrow. If you'd like to vote for us, log into Pinterest, head to http://pinterest.com/pin/107945722288812090/ and 'Like' our workspace.

At Flipside Marketing, we're big promoters of using text messaging to connect with your customers. One great way to do that is to encourage those customers to text in to receive valuable information or tips from your business or organization.

It's important to take time to carefully consider every text message marketing program before you launch your campaign. Consider the return on investment potential, the target market and how the campaign will be promoted.

Here's an example of a campaign that perhaps wasn't thoroughly thought out. This public service announcement on a highway billboard contradicts itself, don't you think? I'm not sure where this is, or if it's even genuine, but thanks to Derek at Tatango for sharing! At the very least it serves as a great reminder to marketers to slow down and think your campaigns through.

So you think you want to run an online contest.

Perhaps you haven’t worked out all the details yet, but you know that Facebook is popular, you like the idea of creating videos and you want to grow your e-mail subscriber base.

It’s true that contests can be great ways to encourage engagement. But the key is to think through you contest idea thoroughly before you announce it to the world.

This is the first of a four-part blog series with tips for effective online contests.

Have a goal and understand the tools you'll be using.

The key is to start with a goal and then build your contest around achieving that goal. Too often I see small businesses start with a cool contest idea, and then try to find a way to make it achieve their goals. This backwards approach fails more often than not, leaving a bad taste for contests in the mouths of the business owner, and often the contest participants as well.

Once you've got a goal, consider the tools you'll be using and how they can work to help you achieve that goal.

Keep in mind that a social contest should be just that—social! If you want to encourage engagement, you need to make that an integral part of your contest. If you want you contest to go viral, it has to be designed to do so.

Too often I see contests promoted on business Facebook pages with a line like this:

“Like our page for a chance to win. Make sure you tell all your friends!”

There are two major flaws in this concept.

For one, if you’re promoting the contest solely on your page, you’re for the most part only reaching people who have already liked your page. Are existing fans eligible to win your prize too? You’ll need to make the answer to that question clear in your rules. If not, how will you know who was a fan beforehand? What if they "unlike" and then "like" your page again? Make sure you’ve got the answers to those question before you launch.

Here’s the other flaw in the above contest idea. Although you’re inviting your fans to tell their friends, there’s no incentive to do so. Well, I suppose knowing that a friend could win something is a bit of an incentive. But if there’s a great prize and I’m not going to get an additional chance to win by sharing, then the last thing I’m going to want to do is share. The fewer the entries, the better my odds!

Here’s a better contest idea:

“Tell us why you love shopping at our store. Post your answer on our Facebook page. Share it with a friend for an additional chance to win.”

This is just one idea. There are literally thousands of ways to use Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, you website or your e-mail newsletter to run effective contests.

One other thing to keep in mind is that the different social media platforms have their own rules for use, engagement and often contests specifically. Zack Spear from Informative Computer Solutions pointed out in a guest post last October that Facebook in particular has a stringent set of rules for online contests. Make sure your contest is in line with Facebook’s Promotion Guidelines.

Future topics “Stay within contest law”, “Set clear rules and post them up-front”, “Be ready to select a winner, and to respond to complaints”.

To register, contact the Saint John Board of Trade:

• register online
• e-mail info@sjboardoftrade.com
• phone 506-634-8111