A small business with a customer list has three ways to reach it, and they are not substitutes. Choosing between them by open rate alone leads to using the most expensive channel for the least important messages, which is the most common mistake in small-business marketing.
Which channel gets opened most?
Wallet push notifications and SMS are both opened at rates email cannot approach, because both arrive on the lock screen and neither goes through a spam filter or a promotions tab. Reported wallet push open rates sit near 90 per cent against roughly 20 per cent for marketing email.
| Wallet push | SMS | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Reported open rate | ~90% | ~95% | ~20% |
| Cost per message | Effectively zero | €0.01 to 0.10 depending on country | Near zero at small volume |
| Length | A line or two | 160 characters practically | Unlimited |
| Links | Limited | Yes | Yes |
| Needs the customer to hold a card | Yes | No | No |
| Arrives when offline | On next connection | Usually yes | On next connection |
These figures are widely reported industry ranges rather than Loonine's own measurements, and they vary considerably by market and by how often you send. The ordering between the channels is stable; the exact numbers should not be treated as precise.
When should a business use wallet push?
For short, timely messages to customers who already hold your card: a reminder that a service is due, a reward waiting to be claimed, a new item on the menu, a change in opening hours. It costs nothing per message, which is what makes it the right default.
Its limits are real, though. A wallet notification is a line of text attached to a card, not a campaign: you cannot send an image, a long offer or a complicated call to action, and you can only reach customers who added the card in the first place.
When is SMS the right channel?
When the message must arrive and the recipient may not hold a card: the enrolment link itself, an appointment confirmation, a cancellation, anything time-critical. SMS costs money per message, which is a feature: it stops a business from sending fifteen a month.
The enrolment case is the one where SMS is irreplaceable. A customer at the counter has no card yet, so there is nothing to push to; a text message is the only channel that reaches a phone number a staff member typed ten seconds ago. That is why Loonine delivers the card itself by SMS and then uses wallet push for everything afterwards.
Is email still worth using?
Yes, for anything that needs length, images or a permanent record: a seasonal newsletter, a detailed announcement, a receipt. Email is the only one of the three channels where a customer can reasonably read three hundred words.
What email is not good for is anything time-critical, because a fifth of recipients opening it is a good outcome and a large share of those will do so days later. A message that is worthless if read on Thursday should not be sent by email on Tuesday.
What does the law require for each channel?
All three are electronic marketing under EU rules and require consent, and the consent must be specific to what you intend to send. Collecting a phone number in order to issue a loyalty card does not by itself permit you to send marketing to it.
| Channel | What consent covers | Must include |
|---|---|---|
| Wallet push | Messages about the card the customer added | A way to stop: removing the card ends it |
| SMS marketing | Explicitly agreed marketing, separate from service messages | Sender identity and an opt-out (STOP) |
| Email marketing | Explicitly agreed marketing | Sender identity, postal address, unsubscribe link |
The practical rule that keeps a small business safe is to separate service messages from marketing at the point of collection, with two sentences and two boxes rather than one. This is covered in more detail in Loonine's guide to GDPR compliance for loyalty programmes.
How often is too often?
For a small business, roughly one message a month on any channel, and fewer where visits are infrequent. The number that matters is not how many messages you send but how many the customer remembers receiving, and the second number saturates far earlier than owners expect.
| Business | Reasonable frequency | What to send |
|---|---|---|
| Café | Monthly at most | Reward ready, a new item |
| Restaurant | Every 6 to 8 weeks | Points balance, a quiet-period offer |
| Salon | Per appointment cycle | Rebooking reminder |
| Garage | Twice a year | Service due, roadworthiness test due |
| Garden centre | Per season | Bulbs, Christmas, seed-sowing |
Over-sending has a specific cost that is easy to miss: it destroys the one message that would have worked. A garage that messages monthly has trained its list to ignore it by the time the service reminder arrives, which is the only message it ever needed to send.
What should a small business do?
Use SMS to deliver the card and anything time-critical, wallet push for reminders and rewards, and email only when the content needs length. That division puts the cost where the value is and keeps the highest-opened channel uncluttered.
- Deliver the enrolment link by SMS: there is no card to push to yet.
- Move everything recurring to wallet push, which costs nothing per message.
- Keep SMS for confirmations, cancellations and the rare message that must arrive.
- Use email for seasonal content, and expect a fifth of the list to read it.
- Record consent per channel at the point of collection, not retrospectively.
What does SMS cost?
Between roughly one and ten cents per message depending on the destination country, and the spread is wide enough to change what you can afford to send. Gulf and European destinations differ by several multiples, and an international message to a visiting customer can cost more than the reward you are offering.
Two costs are commonly missed. Long messages split into multiple billable segments at 160 characters, so a message that reads as one text may be billed as two or three; and a number that has changed hands is charged for whether or not the person you meant receives it. Budget for the list you have rather than the list you started with.
What happens when a customer replies?
Somebody has to read it, which is the part most small businesses do not plan for. A customer who receives a text from a shop they use will reply to it, to ask a question, to book, or to complain, and an unanswered reply is worse than no message at all.
Decide before the first send whether the sending number can receive, and if it cannot, say so in the message. "Replies are not monitored, call us on …" is a short sentence that prevents a customer concluding they were ignored.
Which channel should carry the enrolment link?
SMS, in almost every case, because at the counter the customer has no card yet and often no intention of typing an email address. A phone number is one piece of information staff can take in three seconds and confirm out loud.
Email as the enrolment channel fails twice over: it needs a longer, more error-prone thing to be spelled out at a till, and a fifth of the resulting messages get opened. A card that never reaches the phone is the most expensive failure in the whole programme, because the customer is standing in front of you exactly once.