Frequently Asked Questions

What is bulk SMS? How do businesses use bulk SMS services?

‘Bulk SMS’ or ‘bulk messaging’ refers to businesses sending SMS to one or more recipients via bulk SMS service providers such as BharatBulkSMS. Bulk SMS can scale up to millions of recipients in the case of informational or promotional broadcasts. Alternatively, bulk SMS can also mean individual SMS sent to customers upon an action e.g. receiving an alert on credit card transaction. Both these activities can be easily carried out from bulk SMS service providers as they allow businesses to create, schedule, send and track bulk SMS campaigns.

Bulk SMS is used by SMBs, global enterprises, developers, educational institutes, NGOs and government agencies for product promotions, informational communications, transactional alerts, order updates, reminders, feedback and more. Check out how bulk SMS use cases for different industry verticals.

Why should businesses use bulk SMS?

In today’s mobile world, SMS beats all the other channels hands down with 97% open rates (vs 10%-30% open rates for email and social media channels) and ten times the response rate. By embedding actionable links within the message, bulk SMS can even help improve conversion rates across the customer lifecycle – acquisition, engagement and retention. Check out why you should include bulk SMS in your mobile strategy.

What is the difference between Promotional, Service and Transactional SMS?

TRAI has notified “The Telecom Commercial Communication Customer Preference Regulations, 2010” classifying text messages as per the intent or nature of content within the text messages. Here is an easy summary:

Promotional SMS Vs Service SMS Vs Transactional SMS

• Promotional SMS is used to send offers, discounts or promotions to new and existing customers. The messages may or may not be solicited by the recipients.
• Service Implicit SMS is used to send OTPs, informational messages, booking and order alerts to your registered customers. These should not be intended for marketing.
• Service Explicit SMS is used to send offers, discounts, or updates regarding services to existing customers.
• Transactional SMS can only be used by Banks to send OTPs and alerts.
• Promotional messages will be delivered to recipients after preference and consent scrubbing.
• Service Implicit SMS will be delivered to all recipients, irrespective of their consent preference.
• Service Explicit SMS will be delivered to customers who have provided explicit consent to receive SMS from your business.
• Transactional SMS will be delivered to all recipients, irrespective of their consent preference.
• Promotional SMS can be sent only between 10 AM and 9 PM
• Service Implicit SMS can be sent 24x7 with no time restriction.
• Service Explicit SMS can be sent 24x7 without any time restriction.
• Transactional SMS can be sent 24x7 with no time restriction.
• Promotional SMS will be delivered with a 6-digit numeric Header approved for your business in DLT platforms.
• Service Implicit SMS can be sent via 6-character alpha Header approved for your business in DLT platforms.
• Service Explicit SMS can be sent via 6-character alpha Header approved for your business in DLT platforms.
• Transactional SMS can be sent via 6-character alpha character Header corresponding to the Bank’s name.

How much does bulk SMS cost?

Our bulk SMS service and software are free to use, you simply pay for the texts that you send. You can buy BharatBulkSMS bulk SMS credits online and use these credits to send both promotional and transactional SMS (1 SMS credit = 1 single-part SMS of 160 characters). Check out our bulk SMS pricing.

Whatever your business SMS needs, BharatBulkSMS helps you maximize ROI with its multi-award-winning features, direct telecom partnerships and robust technology backend. Please watch out for any bulk SMS service provider offering insanely low prices as they generally come with low-quality delivery and fake delivery reports. Easily send SMS with our easy-to-use web SMS portal and plugins. For sales enquiry, please call us on +91-7208417941 or email us at sales@BharatBulkSMS.in, and we will get back to you.

What makes BharatBulkSMS India’s No. 1 bulk SMS service provider?

BharatBulkSMS offers easy, powerful & self–serve messaging platform which makes it extremely convenient to upload & maintain contacts, compose media-rich SMS, and send smarter bulk SMS. BharatBulkSMS also provides flexible and scalable free SMS APIs to integrate SMS with any application/CRM. Our direct integration with multiple telecom operators and smart SMS gateway technology ensure best-in-class delivery for your bulk SMS campaigns. BharatBulkSMS is the highest rated bulk SMS service provider, rated 4.8/5.0 on Trustpilot. Here are a few more reasons why SMEs & global enterprises love BharatBulkSMS.

How to send bulk SMS online?

Follow the below steps to send bulk SMS online using BharatBulkSMS:

• Sign up for a BharatBulkSMS account
• Buy SMS credits
• Add or upload contacts
• Compose your SMS in English or popular regional languages.
• Easily enrich your campaigns – personalize with merge fields, insert short links, attach files, send surveys and more! Schedule or send the message
• Track real-time delivery reports and advanced campaign click reports

How to receive SMS online?

Using an inbound long code (10-digit numbers), missed call number, or dual VMNS, you can receive SMS online in India from your customers. You can purchase either dedicated long codes or keywords on shared long codes to set up your SMS address and receive replies. It’s free for you to receive messages and only costs the customer their standard network cost. All messages will appear in your BharatBulkSMS account, so simply log in and view at your leisure. You can also choose to automatically forward all inbound messages to you via email for free.