A2P

Application-to-Person messaging (A2P) is any kind of communication coming from an application instead of a real person. Creating SMS/MMS/WhatsApp campaigns using Twilio is a type of A2P communication. Especially in the US and Canada, A2P is subject to strict regulation.

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Please familiarise yourself with A2P messaging and consider your use case to use the correct tools from the Twilio offering.

Create Account

Go to twilio.com.
Fill in the form and press the Continue button.
You will receive a verification code to the email address you provided in the sign up form.
Enter the code on the website.
On the next screen, enter the phone number you wish to use with Twilio.
Enter the code you received to your phone on the website and press the Verify button.
A recovery code will be presented to you.

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Save this code somewhere safe! In case you lose your phone or other means of verification, you can use this code to recover your account.
Press the Continue button.
Answer the questionnaire with information about your use case.

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We recommend selecting ‘Alerts & Notifications’ or ’Promotions’ in the first question, to receive personalised suggestions from Twilio. However, your answers do not limit your options.

Buy a Virtual Phone Number

You will be redirected to the dashboard of your Twilio console and requested to buy a phone number.

Press the Get a Twilio phone number button.

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You need a virtual phone number to be able to send and receive SMS messages with Twilio.
On the confirmation page about receiving a Twilio phone number, press the Next button.
Select the country where the phone number is from.
Select ‘SMS’ and ‘MMS’ capabilities.
You can further delimit your search results by setting additional search criteria.
Press the Search button.
Select a number from the table that satisfies your search criteria.
Press the Buy button.
Review the phone number, then tick the box that says ‘I agree to comply with the Emergency calling terms and conditions.’
Press the Buy [phone_number] button.
On the confirmation page, press the Next button.
At this stage you can decide to use a prebuilt app to send SMS notifications or build your own solution.
Press the Next button to invite your colleagues or upgrade your account.

📒 NOTE

A trial account provides a glimpse into Twilio’s capabilities, however, the account needs to be upgraded to use the full range of features. The upgrade starts at $20 and serves as credit to send SMS and WhatsApp messages. To upgrade, go to Billing > Upgrade in the top right corner of the Twilio console.

Create a Messaging Service

In your Twilio console, go to the Develop tab.
Select Messaging > Services.
Press the Create Messaging Service button.
Enter a name for your Messaging Service.
Select ‘Notify my users’ for the purpose of your Messaging Service.
Press the Create Messaging Service button.
Press the Add Senders button to select your sender number.

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You can select either the virtual phone number purchased during the account creation process, or add a list of phone numbers by selecting ‘Bulk-add Phone Number’.
Press the Add Phone Numbers button.
In the Integration step, select the ‘Drop the message’ option.
In the ‘Callback URL’ field, enter the following link: https://api.ventrata.com/twilio/webhook
Press the Add compliance information button.

📒 NOTE
Countries require certain information from businesses using Twilio to be able to send messages to their customers. Please follow Twilio’s guidelines on local country regulations to complete this step. This step cannot be completed with a trial account.
Press the Complete Messaging Service Setup button.
Continue to view the details of your new Messaging Service or try sending a message.

Autocreate Conversations

Open a two-way communication port with your customers and keep a log of all conversations.

On the Develop tab, go to Conversations > Addresses.
Select Configure addresses.
Your virtual phone number (or the number you set up as your sender number is listed on the screen. Press the pen icon to configure.
Press the toggle button to enable automatic conversations creation for new messages.
You have the option to select a conversation service in which new conversations are created.

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Conversations are message threads between your Twilio account and your customers’ phone numbers or WhatsApp accounts. For more information about Twilio Conversations read Twilio Docs.
You have the option to set up webhooks to receive events about auto-created Conversations or connect a new Conversation to a Studio Flow. You can however choose to do neither by selecting ‘No’.
Press the Create button to create address configuration.

When a customer responds to your message, a default Conversation is created in Conversations > Manage > Services.

Select your Default Conversations Service and navigate to Conversations in the left-hand navigation bar. Each new thread creates a new Conversation with a unique SID.

Select a Conversation by pressing the conversation SID and go to the Messages tab to view all incoming messages from your customers.