SMS Campaigns (Admin Center SMS Features)

• Usage
• SMS Best Practices and Obligatory Registration 
• Access and Existing Campaigns
• Campaign Settings
  • Sender Phone Number (10 DLC Registration)
  • Text Message (Placeholders and Segments)
  • Recipients
• Starting and Scheduling Campaigns
• Campaign Message History 

Usage

SMS Campaigns is an automation feature for sending messages to a list of recipients. Campaign messages can be delivered instantly or on a schedule. Messages can be general or personalized with placeholders that pull details from recipients' contact cards.

To create a campaign, you first need to have a list of recipients. Recipients are created, updated, or uploaded on the Contacts page.

Campaign messages are charged depending on the number of segments. Pricing is further explained here. 

SMS Best Practices and Obligatory Registration

The Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association (CTIA) and other regulatory bodies have enacted principles and laws that protect cellular consumers from unsolicited SMS messages or messages that do not follow certain guidelines. Not adhering to these may not only irritate the recipients and harm your business image, but can also entitle consumers to sue for damages.

Additionally, you are required to register any ten-digit phone numbers (known as 10DLC – 10-Digit Long Code) used in your SMS campaigns with The Campaign Registry (TCR). Failing to do so may prevent your messages from being delivered and may lead to fines levied by the mobile operators.

Therefore, before starting any SMS campaigns you should carefully study these two articles:

• CTIA Messaging Principles and Best Practices. 
  
  
• Text Messaging Campaign Registry for Telebroad Customers.

It is also recommended that you familiarize yourself with Telebroad's SMS/MMS Messaging Terms of Service. 

Access and Existing Campaigns

The SMS Campaigns page is accessed by navigating to Admin Center Menu>SMS Features>Campaigns. 

Existing campaigns are listed by Name, the Phone Number used for sending the messages,  the type of Recipient list (All recipients from your contact list, a select number of Contacts, or contacts selected based on a Tag), and Campaign Status (Enabled for live campaigns or Not Enabled for campaigns that require registration or activation).

You can delete campaigns by checking them and clicking  , but be aware that this cannot be undone. Click  on the top-right to download a CSV file of existing campaigns.

Campaign Settings

To add or modify SMS campaigns, a user needs to have an Account Owner role or a role with an SMS Campaigns view permission. Roles are further explained here.

Select an existing campaign or create a new one by clicking New Campaign to open the campaign's settings.

Sender Phone Number (10 DLC Registration)

Select one of your SMS enabled 10 DLC phone numbers for delivering the campaign messages. You can enable phone numbers to be used for SMS messaging from their General Settings.

The number also needs to be registered with The Campaign Registry before it can be used.

Unregistered Numbers

If you select an unregistered number, it will be indicated with a note alerting you that the number needs to be registered. You will only be able to save the campaign, but not start it.

When you Save the campaign, you will be prompted to register the selected number with The Campaign Registry. The prompt will direct you to the support article mentioned above or to contact Telebroad's support at smscampaigns@telebroad.com. 

Select REGISTER 10DLC to submit a registration request for the phone number. The Campaign will be listed on the Campaigns page with a "Not Enabled" status. Once the phone number is registered, the status will change to "Enabled" and you can start the campaign

Text Message (Placeholders and Segments)

This is the text that will be delivered to the recipients. You can enter a general message or personalize it by pressing { to use placeholders that will pull details from contact card fields. The placeholder drop-down menu can be scrolled up and down to show more fields. 

For example, instead of sending the general message "Thanks for confirming your participation. We are looking forward to seeing you next week.", personalize it with the recipient's first name as shown in the figure. The system will insert the first name of each recipient from its contact card before sending the message. 

As you write your message, the system will calculate the number of segments it will require. Multiply this by the number of recipients and by the cost per segment for the total price of sending the message once to all recipients. If you use placeholders, the message will differ for each recipient. The the actual number of segments can only be calculated after each message is processed.

Recipients

You have three options for selecting the recipients of the campaign:

• All Contacts available on your Contacts page.
  
  
• Select Contacts lets you check specific contacts.
  
  
  
  
• Select Tags lets you include all the contacts associated with specific tag(s).
  
  

Starting and Scheduling Campaigns

After you fill in and set all of the campaign settings, you can select:

• Save the campaign to be used later (or to wait for registration of its 10 DLC number, if that's the case). On the Campaigns page, the campaign will be listed as "Not Enabled".
  
  
• Save and Start Campaign and select –
  
  
  • Send now to immediately deliver the campaign message. The campaign will be marked with the current date and time in the Campaign Message History (discussed next).
    
    
  • Send later to schedule a later delivery time. Set the date and time, up to two weeks in the future, for the desired delivery. 

Click Start Campaign to proceed. On the Campaigns page, the campaign will be listed as "Enabled" and the message will be sent to the recipients immediately or at the scheduled time. 

Campaign Message History

Here you can examine and switch between all active campaigns using the Select Schedule drop-down list. Click the refresh button () if you don't see a campaign you recently started.

Each campaign lists all its recipients with the Name or Number of the Recipient, Status of the messsage ("Pending" for scheduled messages and then "Sent" or "Delivered" once the system sends it), the phone number of the Sender (identical for all messages), and the Message itself (which may or may not be same for all recipients, depending if you used placholders).

For campaigns that have been scheduled for a later time, you can click Cancel Messages to cancel sending to all recipients or to cancel individual recipients. These messages will be marked with a Canceled status.