SMS and email are not interchangeable retention channels
Frequency tolerance, message length, and urgency all differ between the two — treating them the same wastes both.
SMS has a much lower tolerance for frequency than email before it starts damaging the relationship rather than helping it — a cadence that's perfectly reasonable in email can feel intrusive at the same frequency by text.
SMS suits genuinely time-sensitive or short messages well: an abandoned-cart nudge, a shipping update, a flash sale closing soon. Email suits longer-form content, product education, and messages where the customer benefits from more context before acting.
The practical rule we use: reserve SMS for messages where the timing genuinely matters and the message is genuinely short, and let email carry everything else. Brands that use SMS as a second email channel usually see opt-out rates climb faster than the channel's incremental revenue justifies.
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