LoyalShops Texting is capable of being used in all our subscription options including a Texting Only subscription.  When you first open up our Texting Menu, you will find two menus are enabled.  Authorize Texting and First Time Guide (what you are reading).   Authorize Texting is needed to enable your texting service.  We ask for a marketing website of yours like a web store URL or Facebook Business Page we can view.  This is our first level to validate your company and avoid criminal attempts to use our services.  

Authorizing Texts doesn't add any costs to your account, so feel free to authorize texting and try it out by sending texts to yourself if you want to understand and see it working.  

C) Once you complete the Authorize texting, even if you haven't been approved yet, next go to the Texting Dashboard.  

Item (2) Subscription MTD Cost - How much your texting bill will be at the end of the month if this is how many texts you sent this period.  Also notice that in this example it's a deep purple and so is the Message Rates Bar (8) below.  This shows that the current text rate in this example would be $.0360/Msg for an SMS message or 3.6 cents per SMS message per person sent  (purple bar).  Once you have sent 1,000 texts (1 customer sent a text equals 1 charged text), your rate for all SMS messages for the subscription month would drop to $.0270 or 2.7 cents a message.  Each time you move to a new volume tier, we move the bar down, change the color for that bar, and in the MTD box as well to match and ALL your text messages sent that subscription month is priced at the new lower rate.  We hope that this easily lets you see where you are with your texting bill at all times and you can see where your next volume break is on texting.  With LoyalShops, we don't lock you into a fixed monthly rate that ratchets you up when you go over your plan's limits.  Instead, you just pay for what you use each month and as you send more, we give you volume discounts for the full subscription month.  Send zero and pay zero for texting that subscription month.  A message counts per message to a person, so if you sent to a list of 10 people, one message, that would be 10 texts sent and counted for charging.   At LoyalShops, we are charged by carriers and the government for every business text you send, so we feel it's a fair model for you to just pay for the texts you send.  

Item (3) shows you how many have opted-in this month and how many are currently opted into your texting service. 

Item (4) Your Subscription Period is based on when you started your subscription and covers approx. month-long periods.  At the end of each subscription period, you are charged for any texting you have used in the concluding subscription period and if you have a another service with us, that monthly subscription is charged for the next subscription period. 

(5) Your Texting Number is your unique texting number.  Your customers once opted in will receive your messages from this number.  Customers can also send "YourKeyword" to this number to Opt-in.  For example, in the above demo account, you would send "demo" to 833-708-2197" with their text messaging app.  This is one way for your customers to Opt-In to your texting and you can find more ways in the Texting / Grow Subscriber menu.  You can send to customers on this texting number from the "Text Your Customers" menu to send to groups of your customers like "All" Opted-In, or "Shop Live" as a default list for Live Shopping, or "Just me for testing".  You can always send it to the "Just me for testing" list for no charge.  We will send it to your Mobile Number as a test.   

(6) Your Personalized Keyword - This is best to be one or two words, and can't have any spaces or special characters to help identify your business.  It can be mixed upper and lower case to make it easier to read, but when customers enter it, case doesn't matter. Customers can text this keyword to Opt-In to your texting business. One negative to using a keyword to have customers opt-in is you only get the customers phone number as the contact information and that makes it harder later to see who your texting. 

When they Opt-In to your texting, the service will reply back with a legally required welcome message that includes "Welcome to KEYWORD Notices".  Your Keyword must be unique inside of LoyalShops, so it's possible, your first choice may already be taken.  Try and choose a word(s) that are easy to spell and your customers will likely recognize as attached to your brand.  You can go to Texting - Custom Welcome Texts and further customize that Welcome Text to include more branding, perhaps include a coupon as a thank you, etc.   We usually default this keyword to your first and last name or company name based on the initial setup.  Change it to what you wish from available options.  Also note, we have helpful web pages like Landing Pages for Text Opt-In.  These pages will use your Keyword as part of the URL www address.  So note that changing your keyword will affect your texting and any landing pages you have created in our service.  

(7) Your Mobile Number - Please put in your Mobile/Cell Phone Number.  This number is used for sending you test texts and this number is not exposed or shared with your customers.  

(8) Call Forwarding Number - If you have a call forwarding number, it will be listed here.  If you need this number changed, please reach out to LoyalShops support with the number you need to change it to. 

(9) The Phone / Texting Carriers require us to submit your texting application to them for approval.  This is standard across the texting industry now to help protect the texting business from criminals and enforce laws and carrier policies.  It can have one of 4 states.  False - Submission hasn't been submitted or approved yet - either don't text yet or text to just yourself for testing.  Pending - Your number has been submitted to the carriers for approval.  You can use your texting number during this approval period, but you will see some limitations to the amount of texts you can send during this approval period.  If you find this is truly limiting your business, reach out to LoyalShops Support and we will review and work to escalate your approval.  Approved - Your texting application has been approved and the Pending Limitations have been removed.  Failed - Your texting application has failed.  This can happen for several reasons and some of them can be fixed.  Reach out to use if you see your application has failed and we will work with you on it.  

(10) The Message Rates Table shows what your current SMS, SMS+, and MMS  costs per message are based on the volume you have sent in the current subscription month.  Also, see item (2). The rate highlighted by the colored bar will apply to all messages sent that subscription period (4).

The OptIn Status is the column that shows customers are legally Opt-In to your texting service.  You can click this Green Check for Opt-In Status and opt the customer out.  The other columns to the right are Texting Lists.  You can have up to 15 lists total and you and the customer can add/remove from these lists as needed.    Customers that have Opted-Out can be found by clicking on the Opted-Out button sorting button.  

You can bulk add texting customers if you have their permission in two ways in the subscriber section.  From a Spreadsheet CSV file imported with the Orange "Import csv Customer List or send your list to support@loyalshops.com clearly stating you have permission to text this list and we can do it for you. 

Key notes about your Text Opt-In List

1) The customers must have clearly agreed to be texted recently by your business.  Don't text people without their express prior permission.  If you are moving from one texting company to another, you can opt-in those customers that were opted in at the other texting service.  If you export your contacts from your previous texting service, remove any opted out customers from your spreadsheet your using to import into Loyalshops Texting.

2) Label on Row 1 of your spreadsheet, First Name, Last Name, Phone, Email.   Email, and Names are optional, but it's best to use all the information you have on a customer so you better know who your texting.  If the customers First and Last Names are combined in 1 cell, use the "Name" label instead for that column header. 

3) Don't leave lots of blank rows in the sheet,  

4) Review the numbers and delete entries that are known as bad, landlines, etc. 

Finally, you can choose a list to choose on who to send to.  As you choose a list, you can see how many customers are on that list and will be sent that text.  The default selected list is always "Just Me For Testing", so if you accidentally send it early, it just goes to you.  If you do send a test text and it looks good, you can bring back that previous text from the "Previous Text To Use" pull-down and then send it to a customer list.  

If any customer replies STOP, that ceases all text messages from your Texting Number to them.  They should reply "UNSTOP" also to your number if they change their mind or did it accidentally.  

Please click to review another help file on how to add customers to your new LoyalShops Texting Service

Reach out to us via chat, email at support@loyalshops.com or 949-614-5650 if you need further help.