We know that short codes can be a bit of a mind boggle to people who have never used or come across them before. But we can assure you that short codes can really give your business the boost that you need. There are so many different ways that you can use short codes, from competitions to advertising response for your company.

One of the main uses for short codes are competitions. TV shows such as X Factor and Britains Got Talent will use short codes for you to text or ring in. This could be to vote for your favourite contestant on the show. You will be asked to start your message with a keyword like ‘vote’ then the name of the contestant you are voting for.

An e-commerce business could use SMS short codes to persuade customers to purchase more products from them by giving them a chance to redeem a percentage off their next purchase by texting a keyword to a short code number. The short code number will be an easy to remember code so that it’s easy for customers and colleagues to enter it into their phones.

In the past, short codes have been extremely expensive for businesses, but not anymore, with the introduction of shared short codes. Shared short codes allow multiple businesses to run SMS campaigns with just one shortcode.

Another benefit of shortcodes is that they are easy to remember. You have more chance of a customer texting your short code if it is one that they can easily remember.

Once the customer has text your short code, you then have their mobile number for future use. You can then set up an Auto Response which will go out to every customer that texts the short code, for example, ‘Thanks for joining! Show this to at the bar to get a free drink!’. This will automatically go out to the customer once they have replied to the message. Making it a quick and easy way to gain customers.