The Batch SMS function allows you to send a message to multiple individual contacts at once. Your bulk message can be generic, or you can personalise it to each recipient using merge fields, you can also schedule your message to send at a later time, as well as set it to send at recurring intervals.
Before we dive in, we need to talk about your message recipients. To send a Batch SMS, the contact records will need to be selected from a Saved Search list, so you'll need to have the list (saved search) prepared before we can get started.
To navigate to the Batch SMS feature, hover over the MessageMedia SMS option in the banner menu, then go to Batch SMS and click on New Batch SMS:
You'll then be taken to the Batch SMS screen:
1. Add your message recipients by using a pre-prepared Saved Search list. Just drop your curser into the search field and start typing the name of your list and it should come up below.
2. Once you've selected your recipient list, you can select individual contacts from the list to send to, or select all. You can also opt to use the custom phone field for your contacts instead of the default if you need to.
3. Add a header for your message (e.g. a personalised greeting)
4. Add a footer (i.e. a signature or sign-off)
5. If you'd like to send your message from a specific Sender ID, select it from the dropdown menu here, otherwise leave this blank and the system will just use the default Sender ID.
6. If you have a pre-saved message template you wish to use, select it from the drop-down menu here, otherwise leave this blank.
7. Compose your message. You'll see the character count climbing at the bottom, as well as any special character alerts if you include Unicode characters (e.g. Emojis):
8. To personalise your message, you can add merge fields from contact profiles (e.g. name).
9. See how your message will read in the preview.
10. When you're ready, either click Send (to send now) or Schedule (to schedule the send for later).
Recurring Batch SMS
For instructions on how to make a Batch SMS recurring, please read this article.
SMS Credential Prioritisation
When sending SMS via the API, SMS credentials are prioritised in the following order:
1. Individual credentials
2. Global credentials