Sending And Scheduling Texts #
To send a text, first log into Voodoo. You will need to add credits to your account and this should match the number of people in your contact list. Then select Send SMS from the main menu and next Web SMS.
You can either clone a previous text or create a new one by clicking the Create New button. If you are creating a new text, select Web SMS when it asks you to choose between this option or a quick SMS.
You will need to give the SMS a name, add your customer list as recipients and let them know who the text is from by including your business’s name. You will also need to decide what the text will include. Often the best texts let customers know what prizes are live on your site, when your draw is and a link to your site. It’s also important to include an opt-out message. See the screenshot below for an example.
You can schedule a text by adding the time and date for when you would like Voodoo to start sending texts. You’ll also need to turn on Advanced Features to add when you would like the texts to stop sending (i.e. before your live draws and competition closing times). To set an end time for your texts, scroll down to Batch Send, select Set End Time and enter the time for all the SMS to be sent by.
You will be asked to review the text before sending. After scheduling texts, you can cancel at any point before the start time. If you are cancelling in the middle of a send, please be aware that you will not be able to delete the texts which have already gone out. If you want to reschedule a text, clone it and add the new time before cancelling the original text.
Adding Current And New SMS Contacts #
DISCLAIMER: We recommend that you set up an additional opt-in form for your SMS marketing when exporting contacts from your site. Just using WebToffee alone is no longer GDPR compliant according to the most recent guidelines.
Before sending out a text using Voodoo, you can export an updated version of your contact list using the WebToffee plugin. To do this, first log into your site and select Export from WebToffee’s menu.
You do not need to change any of the settings in the third step, but in the fourth step you need to unselect all the columns and then re-select the following:
– first_name
– last_name
– billing_email
– billing_phone
For the fifth step, you will need to export the file. Simply download the file once the export is complete.
Next you will need to log into your Voodoo account. Click on the Contacts tab and then the eye icon which allows you to view contacts.
Select the Add Contacts icon and choose Upload File to add the file you just downloaded from WebToffee. It will ask you to match the columns from this file to the ones currently stored in Voodoo before updating your contact list.
We recommend updating your contact list with your new contacts before scheduling texts.
Opting Out SMS Contacts #
It is very important that you stop texting anyone who has opted out of SMS marketing.
Over in the Inbound SMS tab, you can access all incoming texts. Select all the contacts who have sent you an opt-out text and add them to the Blacklist. This stops any future texts being sent to the blacklisted number. You can also add numbers manually to the Blacklist by accessing the list from the Contacts tab.
