SMS Data Collection
SMS data collection allows you to collect data from your subscribers through 2-way SMS. By creating questions, you can collect data in the SMS replies to those questions.
What is the message flow of SMS data collection?
Subscribers will receive an SMS question in the form of an automatic response or scheduled message from your messaging campaign. Once the message is received, your subscribers will respond back with their answers via SMS. A secondary action can be triggered such as a message response or campaign opt-in.
Where is the collected data stored?
When subscribers respond to an SMS data collection question, their answers are saved as subscriber data under the ‘View Data’ column of the campaign’s Audience Manager page. Note that the subscriber data is only available within the campaign that a subscriber has responded to. If a subscriber is opted into multiple campaigns within the same account, their other campaigns will not receive the collected data.
How can I use the data that is collected?
Collected data can be used in future messages as dynamic merge tags within the text. Collected email addresses can be subscribed to an email campaign. You can also export the collected data and use it for your own analysis or segmentation.
SMS Messaging
Create an SMS Data Collection Question
To begin creating your data collection question, go to the SMS Data Collection page and click the ‘Add Data Collection Question’ button.
Setting | Description |
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Name | The internal name of the data collection question. A list of names will be shown when selecting a data collection question to include within your messages. |
Question | The question that will be sent to your subscribers. When you select an SMS data collection question to put into an SMS message, this question text will automatically be populated into the SMS body. Note that the question text will not appear when put into an MMS message. |
Answer Type | Set the answer type to multiple choice, open-ended, or PIN code. Multiple Choice Questions: Send subscribers a question with up to five answers to choose from. For each option you must include a key as well as a definition. When you select a multiple choice question to put into an SMS message, the question text as well as the keys and definitions will automatically be populated within the SMS body. Keys and definitions will be presented to the campaign subscribers in the format of ‘Text KEY1 for definition1, KEY2 for definition2, …’ For example, if you want to ask ‘What is your occupation?’ with the choices A) Professional B) Student or C) Retired, then you would enter A, B, and C as the keys, and ‘Professional’, ‘Student’, and ‘Retired’ as the corresponding definitions.
Open-Ended Questions: Send subscribers a question with an open ended answer. Open ended questions allow subscribers to respond with their own individual answers. The full answer is stored in the subscriber data for each audience member. Validation rules can be configured to ensure that subscriber responses are within set parameters. There are five validation rules:
Pin Code: Send subscribers a question with a PIN code as an answer. The PIN code will be validated against a database of personalized images. If a subscriber enters a valid PIN code, then the reply is collected and the phone number will be stored with the personalized image associated with the valid PIN code. Then the personalized image may be sent to the subscriber. |
Actions | Preset automatic events following a subscriber’s valid response. Some actions are available regardless of the settings above, while other actions are only available in response to specific settings
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Send an SMS Data Collection Message
SMS Data Collection messages can be sent out as an automatic response or as a scheduled message. You will have the option to select an SMS Data Collection question, and the question text will automatically be added into the SMS body. The SMS text can be adjusted or changed before it is submitted without interfering with the collection process.