This guide explains how text messaging works in CapBloom: the one idea behind all the rules, what powers it, who you can text, the ways to send, what a text costs, your daily limit and how it grows, how to read a failed text, why sending can stop, the Texas rule, and how to write texts people answer.
If your messages stopped sending, skip to What to do if your sending stops.
Texting runs on reputation, the same way email does.
With email, the inbox providers decide whether you reach the inbox. Send to people who do not want to hear from you and your complaints and bounces go up, your sender reputation goes down, and more of your email lands in spam or nowhere.
SMS works the same way, with the phone carriers as the gatekeepers. They set the rules. If your texts fail a lot, or people opt out a lot, or your content looks like spam, the carriers can slow you down or block you.
To keep you out of that hole, CapBloom puts limits on your sending. The system slows you down or pauses you before the carriers do something harsher. It is built to be your first line of defense, not a punishment.
The payoff is simple: send better texts and you get to send more of them.
CapBloom sends texts and makes calls through a built-in phone system. There is no separate Twilio account to set up. Texting and calling work from inside your account, in the Conversations area and in your automations.
Because it is built in, a few things are handled for you: opt-out handling (STOP), do-not-disturb rules, real-time usage and billing, and error monitoring that watches your delivery and protects your number. Your account also starts with a small daily sending limit that grows over time, called the Messaging Ramp (section 5).
Texts only reach mobile phones. Landlines, office desk lines, and many VoIP numbers cannot receive a text, so a message to one fails.
You cannot tell a landline from a mobile by looking at the number. The system can check it for you. CapBloom can turn on number checking so the system looks up each number before it sends and skips the ones that cannot receive texts. If you are not sure whether that is on for your account, ask your CapBloom team. When a text fails because of the number, it shows up as error 30006 (section 6), and you can move that contact to email.
Some countries and regions are not enabled for texting on your account. A text to one of those fails with a country or region error. If you need a region turned on, contact CapBloom.
You also need consent. Only text people who gave you permission, and make your first message say who you are and how to opt out. Texting people who never opted in is both a delivery problem and a legal one. For opt-in language and forms, see the A2P guide at the bottom.