SMS deliverability guide
Overview
SMS marketing is a powerful way to connect with your audience, but it comes with stricter rules than email. This guide covers best practices, compliance requirements, and tips for resolving delivery issues.
Learn more about SMS non-delivery and complaints.
SMS best practices
Goal metrics
While engagement rates can vary by industry, audience, and content type, here are general benchmarks for a healthy SMS campaign:
- Click rate: > 7.5%
- Bounce rate: < 1.5%
- Unsubscribe rate: < 1%
NOTE: If your SMS campaigns aren’t meeting expectations, it may be due to issues with your strategy, opt-in process, or technical setup. Reviewing these areas can help identify areas for improvement.
Compliance requirements
Ortto’s SMS feature is supported by Twilio. The below compliance requirements are in alignment with Twilio’s Messaging Policy which are in place to protect your SMS deliverability.
IMPORTANT: These requirements exist due to strict carrier regulations. Failing to follow them may lead to SMS deliverability issues.
Consent:
- All recipients must have explicitly opted in to receiving SMS communications from you.
Sender identification:
- You must clearly identify yourself as a sender in all messages.
Ability to revoke consent:
- All initial contact via SMS should include clear instructions for the recipient on how to opt out (For example: Reply “STOP” etc).
NOTE: Ortto requires an opt-out link or a reply to opt-out option in all SMS messages, even if this is not mandated in certain regions.
Content restrictions:
- For US/Canada traffic, none of these industries/content-types are allowed.
- Please refer to this link for further content which is not permitted.
Ensure that you follow all regional-specific requirements (including delivery time and content restrictions, for messages):
- SMS deliverability may vary based on your country, the recipient's country, and additional requirements may apply.
- Ensure that all messages follow the rules of the recipient's country. Twilio provides country-specific requirements for select regions, which should be reviewed before sending messages to recipients in / from those countries.
CAUTION: You should not enact sending practices that attempt to evade and sneak past abuse-monitoring/reporting measures.
Best practice guidelines
Your SMS campaign performance is influenced by everything from technical setup to messaging strategy. To improve deliverability and engagement, follow these best practices:
Choose a recognizable sender ID for your audience.
- Learn more about Ortto’s sender ID feature.
Keep content focused and natural:
- Stay under 320 characters to avoid carrier issues.
- Use your own personalized domain for link shortening (avoid public link shorteners like bit.ly).
- Limit the use of emojis, capitalization, and punctuation.
- Keep the tone friendly and engaging, not overly promotional.
- Use SMS for personalized, relevant messages—save general outreach for other channels.
NOTE: Some countries do not allow two-way messaging, particularly when sending from outside the recipient country.
TIP: SMS works best for transactional messages, like order confirmations or delivery updates, as they are timely and relevant.
With SMS seeing a 90% open rate, low click rates may suggest it's time to refine your strategy using best practices.
SMS delivery troubleshooting
SMS deliverability depends on several factors, and messages may bounce for various reasons. Understanding the causes and taking the right steps can help prevent persistent issues.
Learn more about SMS delivery troubleshooting.