TextMagic Review, Pricing & Features

What is TextMagic?

TextMagic is an SMS marketing platform that helps a diverse range of small businesses execute successful SMS marketing campaigns. TextMagic is best for businesses looking to import their existing customer lists and sending text blasts. However, businesses will find TextMagic’s pricing and lack of segmentation limiting.

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Table of Contents

• What is TextMagic?
• TextMagic Review Summary
• TextMagic Pricing & Cost
• TextMagic Features
  • Subscriber List Building
  • Message Creation
  • Campaign Building
  • Two-Way Conversations
  • Automations
  • Analytics
• TextMagic Integrations
• TextMagic Customer Service
• TextMagic Alternatives & Competitors
• Is TextMagic Right For You?

TextMagic Review Summary

TextMagic was founded by Dan Houghton in 2001 in the United Kingdom. Today, the company has served over 100,000 businesses globally and counting.

TextMagic’s features are similar to most SMS marketing tools. Campaign surveys and two-way messaging are its standout features. TextMagic does not have dedicated subscriber segmentation, and is one of the most expensive solutions on the market. These are concerns that are not present in similarly priced solutions like SlickText.

TextMagic’s pricing starts at $0.04 per message. Most customers pay between $20 to over $1,000 per month. This makes TextMagic one of the most expensive SMS marketing tools.

Overall, TextMagic is decent for small businesses looking to engage with their existing subscriber base. Due to limits in data collection methods, segmentation, and customer list building, businesses will most likely leverage TextMagic for mass texting. Alternatives like SlickText are similarly priced yet far more powerful.

TextMagic Pricing & Cost

TextMagic pricing starts at $0.04 per message. Businesses will typically spend anywhere between $20 to $1,000, making it one of the most expensive SMS marketing tools on the market today. Here are some prices your business might pay depending on messages sent per month:

TextMagic Features

Let’s discuss the major features that TextMagic offers and how they can help your SMS marketing and business goals. Product screenshots are included to add context and demonstrate the user interface.

Subscriber List Building

TextMagic has a decent amount of subscriber list building options. You can build your list through manual imports, keywords, and web forms. SlickText and SimpleTexting offer alternative campaigns such as text surveys and opt-in links. This lack in variety means your business has less opportunities to build subscribers and customers in diverse and engaging ways.

Manual Imports

You can manually import subscribers through .csv, .xls, and .xlsx files. TextMagic also supports importing from existing CRM or Helpdesk apps. Here are some of the most popular apps you can import contacts from:

Keywords

Keywords are phrases that customers text to become subscribers. They are one of the primary ways to build your SMS contact list. TextMagic’s keyword creation is easy to set up and comes with a multitude of editing options.

Editing your keyword response is slightly different from other SMS marketing tools. There are a number of different auto-response types, including voice messages. Although you’ll most likely utilize standard text responders, these unique options can help your business stand out and engage with subscribers.

You can also target keywords to work with specific countries. This is helpful for businesses who want to target one particular population without running the risk of subscribers from other countries opting in.

Web Forms

TextMagic’s web forms are basic. Although they enable your subscriber list to grow, the only data fields you can capture are subscriber names and phone numbers. This means your business cannot capture valuable subscriber data to leverage for highly personalized messages.

Options for form design are limited to color. This means you’ll find next to no options in communicating your company branding and style.

Message Creation

Message creation in TextMagic is inadequate. There are two main drawbacks. The first issue is that MMS messages are sent as links rather than gifs or images. Additionally, you have to manually enter all customer data into the system, which makes it difficult to implement personalization at scale.

TextMagic supports a number of templates to choose from such as the example shown above.

You can also create an unlimited amount of custom fields, which expands your capability to produce highly personalized messages. Unfortunately, you have to enter all customer data manually. This makes it challenging to take full advantage of your customer data for custom fields and content personalization.

Finally, TextMagic cannot generate trackable short links.

Campaign Building

Campaign building is average in TextMagic. Custom campaigns are easy to set up, and text surveys are the standout campaign type. Ultimately, this simplicity means your business has very basic methods of engagement with customers.

International Coverage

TextMagic supports messaging in over 200 countries. Messages are sent via local dedicated SMS numbers or text-enabled landlines.

Custom Campaigns

Building a custom campaign in TextMagic is similar to many other SMS marketing tools. You can choose who to send your campaign to, custom fields, and external media for MMS messages. As we mentioned in the Message Creation section, MMS messages are automatically converted to short links.

Scheduling options are also standard. There is no option that prevents texts from sending to subscribers who’ve already received one within a certain time frame. This means your business must take additional measures into consideration to prevent spam.

Text Surveys

Text surveys in TextMagic are a unique way to engage with subscribers. Creating surveys is an intuitive experience. However, the data collected through surveys cannot be automatically added to your database, which would prevent you from fully leveraging it for segmentation and content personalization.

The best aspect of surveys is the user interface. This is a helpful way to visualize the flow of your survey.

Unfortunately, there are no question types to choose from – all questions have open, text-based answers. This means that it’s far more difficult to set up multiple choice or numerical scale questions. There are also no opportunities to store data from your subscribers like SlickText’s surveys.

Two-Way Conversations

TextMagic’s inbox for two-way conversations is helpful and easy to navigate. This enables your business to easily facilitate one-on-one engagement with customers.

The inbox is well-designed and shows subscriber text history for additional context.

TextMagic allows you to add team members and delegate them to specific inboxes. Team members can be assigned to two access levels: administrator or regular user.

Automations

Automations are actions triggered by specific events. The most common use cases of automations in SMS marketing include messages automatically being sent out to customers, customers being categorized into different lists, and more. In TextMagic, automations are found in keyword autoresponders and list building, both of which streamline your engagement and list building.

Keyword Autoresponders

Autoresponders in TextMagic are messages sent to customers immediately after they opt-in through a keyword. Some unique editing options are available such as targeting your keyword to specific countries. The standout feature is selecting specific countries that your keywords target.

When customers subscribe, they are automatically added to a list corresponding with the keyword they used. Automation rules in TextMagic also allow you to add them to additional lists for targeted marketing opportunities.

You can also choose to send your autoresponder once per unique sender. Additionally, you can schedule your responder to only run in specific hours of the week.

Analytics

Analytics in TextMagic are very basic. This is primarily because there are virtually no opportunities to drill down on statistics. Furthermore, there are no analytics on campaigns. This means your business has no quantifiable way to gauge whether its campaigns are successful or not.

TextMagic Integrations

All of TextMagic’s integrations are handled through Zapier. TextMagic also has a REST API. Some common uses of TextMagic’s REST API include:

TextMagic Customer Service

TextMagic’s customer support team is very helpful. They are reachable through live chat, text, and phone. Hours are 6am to 11pm UTC on Mondays through Fridays, and 9am to 3pm UTC on weekends.

TextMagic’s secondary material consists of a blog, alongside SMS marketing guides for the diverse range of businesses they support. Both new and experienced SMS marketers will find these resources helpful.

TextMagic Alternatives & Competitors

TextMagic competes with a number of SMS marketing tools that either support all businesses or hone in on specific industries like ecommerce. The product is most comparable with SlickText and SimpleTexting.

Is TextMagic Right For You?

TextMagic is a basic SMS marketing solution used by over 100,000 businesses. It includes a majority of features most SMS marketing tools have, excluding segmentation. Its strongest features are its surveys and two-way messaging.

TextMagic is ultimately expensive when compared to alternatives. SimpleTexting has similar features, yet is far more affordable. SlickText, although still in the upper range of pricing, is still more affordable and offers more features.

If you're interested, you can try TextMagic today.