Message formatting tips

Message Formatting tips

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Messaging on entrance is a powerful tool. 

When you are crafting a message it is recommended that you review your spreadsheet since it is the data that entrance is using to generate your outgoing message.

Ensuring your message comes out coherently is an important task

This can be done by checking the spreadsheet column or {variable} name matches the information in the rows of user information.

For example if you have a column that contains the last time you did business with a particular customer it would be critical to ensure that data is formatted uniformly.

Hey {name}, Ernesto from Ernesto’s Home and Yard Repair here. I know I repaired your {repair type} in {month} but I just wanted to wish you happy holidays and make sure you knew about our holiday special - any repairs scheduled before new years will be 20 percent off. Take Care! - Ernesto.

This is an example of uniform data - however - if a "repair type" for a customer said anything but what was repaired or “multiple” or was blank; the message would be incoherent and would likely not lead to effective marketing.

A bad example - with poorly formatted data - if repair type was “multiple” and “month” was “June 3, 2021”:

Hey Elsie, Ernesto from Ernesto’s Home and Yard Repair here. I know I repaired your multiple in June 3, 2021 but I just wanted to wish you happy holidays and make sure you knew about our holiday special - any repairs scheduled before new years will be 20 percent off. Take Care! - Ernesto.

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Always test your messages

These types of mistakes can be prevented by ensuring uniformity of your data and will lead to proper use of the customization tools on Entrance.

On a campaign's setup page, under the message body, there is a field marked “Test your message”. Entering your number into this field and selecting "send" triggers a custom message to be sent to your phone. This way you can be certain the message is formatted correctly and will send correctly once you send a campaign.