HubSpot | Handling unsolicited inbound messages

Triggering workflows based on contact activity relating to an outbound message from another workflow is easy. But what about triggering a workflow from an unsolicited inbound message?

Let's say you're running a competition where you invite people to text a word to a central number. You have no idea who is going to text in, but you want to respond to them with an acknowledgement.

We have a process that's designed to handle just that kind of scenario.

Firstly, what happens when an unsolicited SMS is received?

• A contact will be created using the phone number that the inbound message was sent from.
• By default, the email address field for that contact will be populated with the Email to SMS address for that contact's phone number (e.g. 0400000000@messagemedia.com).
• In the contact record, the first event in the activity timeline will indicate what triggered the creation of that contact.

This all makes it possible to now set up the following workflow:

1. Start by creating a new contact-based workflow

2. Set your enrollment trigger as "SMS for HubSpot: Unsolicited inbound"

3. Click on "Occurred"

4. Set the date parameter to "is before" and select today's date

5. Click "Apply filter" and then "Save"

6. Add a new action and select "Send SMS/MMS"

7. For the phone number, select "Contact token" and choose "Phone number" from the resulting list

8. Select a Sender ID for your message to be sent from

9. Create your message

10. Click "Save"

To activate your workflow:

1. Click on "Review and publish"

2. Select the option to enroll existing contacts into your workflow

3. Click "Turn On" to activate your workflow