When considering SMS marketing platforms for a political campaign, you may have heard of both Tatango and GetThru. While both platforms send political text messages, they do so through different means. Combined, both platforms can help create a winning SMS marketing strategy. Here’s a look at the differences and similarities between the two platforms and suggestions for when to use each one.
What Is Tatango?
Tatango is a political text message marketing platform that enables political groups and organizations to send mass text messages with ease to millions of opted-in subscribers.
Tatango helps increase donations to political groups and organizations, boost voter turnout, inform voters about important issues in real time, and raise support for campaigns. Text messages have a 99 percent open rate (compared to just 20 percent with marketing emails). As a result, text message marketing is an effective marketing strategy for political candidates to gather donations and win elections.
For more than 13 years, Tatango has been the industry leader in application-to-person (A2P) text message marketing (also referred to as SMS marketing). The Common Short Code Administration (CSCA) gave Tatango a premium designation as a preferred partner. The platform earns many of its clients $5 in donations for every $1 they invest in text message marketing.
What Is GetThru?
GetThru is a more personal, peer-to-peer (P2P) texting tool. Using GetThru, campaigns and political organizations can send and reply to individual text messages, rather than send mass text messages like they would with Tatango.
With GetThru, political campaigns can contact and confirm constituents are registered to vote, send voter research surveys, and share updates with subscribers. Because GetThru is a P2P platform, it requires more manual steps than Tatango. Instead of automatically sending mass SMS messages, an individual sends each text, one by one, via the GetThru platform.
How Are Tatango and GetThru Different?
The following are a few key differences and similarities between Tatango and GetThru, as well as P2P texting versus A2P texting.
P2P vs. A2P Messaging
The main difference between the two platforms is that Tatango is an A2P platform and GetThru is a P2P platform. With Tatango, a campaign can automatically text millions of subscribers at once, whereas GetThru sends one message at a time. GetThru provides a more personal touch for reaching out about voter registrations, petitions, and volunteer opportunities, whereas Tatango sends mass text messages about political donations, election deadlines, and campaign updates.
Tatango also easily integrates with political fundraising tools, such as ActBlue, WinRed, EveryAction, and others, incorporating clickable links in texts so recipients can tap to donate instantly. Simplifying the donation process is a major advantage for political groups and organizations. It removes barriers that often keep people from financially supporting your campaigns. Every dollar (and vote) can mean the difference between winning or losing an election.
Text Messaging Reach
Another difference between Tatango and GetThru is the amount of people that each platform can reach. Many of Tatango’s political clients have millions of subscribers. It’s not feasible to text them individually—this is where a mass texting platform like Tatango can help.
There are always important campaign updates, policy positions, and breaking news to share, and it’s to the campaign’s advantage to be the first to inform constituents. Using Tatango’s mass political text messaging functionality, politicians and candidates can send texts instantly.
With Tatango, clients can schedule messages by time zones to avoid startling and waking subscribers with rogue political text messages in the middle of the night.
And because of Tatango’s messaging speed—6 million texts per hour—supporters get your political text messages when the timing is crucial. Optimum text messaging speed can be vital in a tight race.
With GetThru, text messages go out one at a time (or up to 13,000 per hour if multiple users are sending simultaneously). This platform is an excellent option for adding an extra personal touch when messaging volunteers and local constituents.
SMS Short Codes and SMS Keywords
GetThru operates on long codes, which are 10-digit phone numbers like the ones you use to call and text friends and family. Using long codes is another way GetThru adds a personal element. Individual volunteers send messages to individual recipients—one voter to another.
Tatango operates on dedicated short codes, five- or six-digit phone numbers, such as 12345. Dedicated short codes are beneficial because they’re simple and clean, so they’re easy to remember. It’s common to see a political candidate’s short codes on their podium at rallies and press conferences. “Text WIN to 12345” is much easier for people to type into their phones. It’s also more likely that they’ll remember the number to use it later or share it with friends and family. Dedicated short codes help political candidates grow their subscriber lists quickly, resulting in increased donations, votes, and awareness.
Another benefit of using a short code in a political SMS marketing strategy is that it allows you to choose the best keywords to relate to specific campaigns. If your goal is to increase voter turnout in Iowa, a message telling constituents to “Text CALIFORNIA to 12345” carries greater personal appeal to those in California. It also helps the campaign determine where new subscribers are coming from (the keyword CALIFORNIA).
Long codes are more complex on campaign materials, buses, and podiums. GetThru doesn’t require keywords, so everyone opts in to the same list with no differentiation. That’s fine when there are only a few key text message templates for the entire subscriber list. But as the list grows and communicating with specific demographic segments becomes necessary, keywords can help.
Again, both of these are good tools and powerful platforms, but they’re more effective when correctly matched to the size and intent of your campaign. Each of these SMS marketing platforms plays an important (and complementary) role in your overall political campaign strategy.
SMS Sending Speeds
Tatango works well with political candidates and campaigns for which sending speed is among the highest priorities. The platform enables the delivery of millions of text messages in real time.
With Tatango, it’s possible to send nearly 100,000 text messages per minute, thanks to its A2P mass text messaging capabilities. With Tatango, you could send up to 6 million text messages in less than an hour. Tatango’s text message speed calculator helps you determine how long it would take to send to your entire list.
GetThru sends messages at a slower rate because of its more personal (one text to one person) touch. Still, you can send up to 13,000 personal text messages per hour when multiple senders get involved, which is still significant.
News changes quickly in an election cycle. Keeping your constituents updated is crucial and sending messages ensures they hear the news from you before anyone else. Reaching them first is vital to your campaign. Campaigns can send several text messages per day with Tatango. Used strategically before important deadlines, you can receive millions in donations to push your campaign past its fundraising goals. Check out how Tatango’s SMS messaging speeds compare to other A2P platforms:
Partner with Tatango for Political A2P Messaging
Those are just a few of the similarities and differences between Tatango and GetThru, and how both can work together to create winning political SMS campaigns.
Tatango is ready to support you with the fastest send speeds, highest reliability, strongest security, and most experience in the industry. Are you ready to get started with mass political text messaging? Contact our team of political text messaging experts today.
