Messaging - Overview

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NOTE:

To add this product to your account, contact a Telesign expert. This product is available for full-service accounts only.

Telesign Messaging is an omnichannel engagement product that allows you to enrich your messages with the advanced features provided by various channels. This helps you create rich and reliable communications flows with your end users using the channels they are most comfortable with and which they use daily. You can include images, GIFs, videos, surveys, link buttons, and more. Choose delivery channels in a cascading order, and if the send to one channel fails, the service sends the message using the next channel.

Available channels include:

  • Rich communication services (RCS)
  • WhatsApp
  • Viber
  • MMS
  • SMS
  • Email

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NOTE:

Although this product can be used purely to send SMS-messages, without even attempting to send on another channel, you may find our SMS product more convenient and streamlined for that use case.

Common use cases

  • Rich media - You can include photos, GIFs, and video in messages.

  • Trusted messages - You can include branded messaging using customizable colors and logos and a verified business checkmark.

  • Message templates - Create a template for a campaign's messages in advance, making it easier to send requests.

  • Email - You can send transactional emails such as Password Reset Notifications, Account onboarding notifications, appointment reminders, shipping confirmations, sign-in attempt confirmations, newsletters, or follow up surveys.

General requirements

  • Resource: rest-ww.telesign.com/v1/omnichannel

  • Protocols: https

  • Authentication: Basic (easiest to implement) or Digest

  • Encoding: Accepts only UTF-8 unicode characters as inputs.

  • Accepts: application/json

  • Responds With: application/json

  • Required Headers: Content-Type - json

Basic usage

  1. Set up a Transaction Callback Service to receive notifications about messages sent through this API.
  2. Select the primary channel you want to use: RCS, MMS, Viber, WhatsApp, or Email.

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CAUTION:

Although the SMS channel is technically usable with any template, we recommend only using it for a fallback message, not as the primary channel. Rendering of advanced features is most reliable on other channels.

  1. If you have not already done so, work with our Customer Support Team to set up an account for any channels you plan to use (such as RCS or WhatsApp) Detailed instructions for those channels that require an external app or account can be found on these pages:

  2. Select a template from the tables below based on your desired primary channel and use case. If there is a feature of the channel you want to use that you don't see covered by these templates, see our how-to guide Add Custom Template. Contact Customer Support Team to select a template for email.

RCS: Templates by use case

Use caseTemplates
Just Texttext
Imagemedia
Video Player (embedded)media
Audio Player (embedded)media
File Attachmentfile
Location Coordinateslocation
Question with Suggested Answers2_suggested_replies 3_suggested_replies
Link Buttonurl_action
Click-to-call Buttondial_action
Link Button in Rich Cardrc_url_action_vertical rc_url_action_horizontal
Click-to-call Button in Rich Cardrc_dial_action_vertical rc_dial_action_horizontal

WhatsApp: Templates by use case

Use caseTemplate
Just Texttext
Imageimage
Video Player (embedded)video
Audio Player (embedded)audio
File Attachmentfile
Location Coordinateslocation

MMS: Templates by use case

Use caseTemplate
Imageimage
Video Player (embedded)video
Audio Player (embedded)audio

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CAUTION:

You can only send MMS messages from US sender IDs and only with short codes.

Viber: Templates by use case

Use caseTemplate
Just Texttext text_2way text_session
Imageimage image_2way image_session
Link Buttonurl_action

Some Viber templates can only be used with certain account types:

Account typeSupported templates
one-way chattext image url_action
two-way chattext_2way image_2way
session chattext_session image_session

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NOTE:

If you are using SMS as a backup channel, we recommend using text for a text-only template. Advanced features may not render as expected on SMS.

  1. (Optional) Select one or more backup channels, if desired.
  2. Send a request to the API, referring to the documentation pages below for your primary channel and use case as needed.

Documentation by category

Reference

Callbacks

How-to guides