As the car rental space evolves in a fast-paced digital world, text is a key way to enhance customer engagement while maintaining a competitive edge. With the goal of unlocking an additional bookings channel to drive urgency in a highly competitive industry, one of the world's best-known car rental brands turned to Wunderkind as its text partner. Wunderkind's identification scale, campaign expertise, and full-services teams have turned text into a key reservation driver. Wunderkind Text is now responsible for 2.4% of total site bookings ($43m in directly attributable revenue) for this Global Car Rental Brand.
Faced with increasing pressure to stand out among numerous global and local competitors, this partner needed to identify a new booking channel that would prompt its audience to act quickly. In 2023, 32% of travelers used mobile devices to book their trips. Given the continued rise in mobile device usage, text messaging presents a key opportunity to engage visitors in a new way. As their customers often compare multiple options before making a decision, this brand sought a partner that could help them engage and convert interest into action in today's fast-paced digital landscape.
Owned channels are the backbone of successful brands. With clickthrough rates four times higher than email, text has positioned itself as a valuable performance driver. Recognizing the potential of text as a new revenue channel, the global car rental brand partnered with Wunderkind. Leveraging Wunderkind's identification scale, strategic expertise, and cross-channel approach, they not only grew the text channel but also increased the email channel by 19% year-over-year. By utilizing Wunderkind's AI technology, the car rental brand identified high-intent visitors in real-time and sent targeted, time-sensitive text messages to drive immediate action.
This new customer-centric approach enabled the car rental brand to reach visitors directly on their mobile devices through holistic list growth campaigns, on-demand texts, and behavioral messages. By seamlessly integrating text with the brand's existing email strategy, they maintained a cohesive customer experience across channels while enhancing their ability to engage customers with the right message at the right time. The results? The car rental brand saw over 318,000 text-attributed reservations in the text channel's first year. As their business continues to scale, text has driven over 2.4% of all direct bookings, while triggered emails have seen a 19% year-over-year revenue increase. With Wunderkind's network and strategic partnership, they not only turned text messaging into a powerful new revenue channel but also continued to scale email performance.
"Owned channels are the backbone of successful eCommerce brands. As Facebook, Google and Amazon become even more crowded, diversifying owned channels will be critical over the next 2 years."
- Wunderkind Strategic Services