How much time do we spend with our smartphones in our hands? This device has long ceased to be just a means of communication – it is literally an extension of ourselves. Among other things, we use this single pocket-sized object for our entertainment, our learning, earning money, sharing our experiences, documenting our lives, and managing other devices.
Still, back to communication… In particular, I want to emphasize the importance of SMS. Yes, SMS! If you’re thinking no one uses it these days, think again. It’s especially useful in business because it’s an incredibly effective way of communicating with customers.
Are you a Microsoft Teams user who longs to be able to send SMS messages – to customers, partners, or employees? Microsoft doesn’t provide this capability itself. But that doesn’t mean you can’t do it, which is why we’re developing a much-needed, easy-to-use solution. Processica Apps suite can help you with sending emails and pre-filling forms and collecting feedback and now sending SMS automatically without having to leave Microsoft Teams – and all with no coding skills necessary (but there’s nothing to stop you from using code if you want to).
Here are just a few of the use cases for SMS Blast with Processica Apps.
- Appointment reminders (automatically sent at a preset time leading up to the event)
- Notifications with a user response
- Sending a follow-up SMS if there’s no response to an email
- Sending SMS for marketing purposes (automatic notification of accumulated bonuses, promotions, etc.)
We’ve discussed the problem and outlined the solution. Now let's see how we put it to use.
How to Send SMS Directly from Microsoft Teams Using Processica Apps
1. Create a Twilio account (or log in) and connect it to your Azure Logic Apps
Find your account ID and authentication token on your Twilio dashboard. Go to Azure Logic Apps, start building a workflow with a selected action, and provide all the necessary details for your connection – the name to use, your Twilio account ID, and access token.
2. Connect it with Processica Apps
The Processica SMS blast app uses Twilio connector to send SMS. Go to the Logic Apps portal, open a workflow, authorize Twilio block with your Twilio account. After configuring in Logic Apps, SMS blast is ready to use in Microsoft Teams.
3. Prepare your message text in Teams
After installation, start creating SMS messages. Choose SMS Blast App in your Microsoft Teams application list from Processica Apps. Write the text, attach a link if necessary. To prepare your message text, select the contact list from your SharePoint Online Contacts or Outlook Contacts, and schedule a time to send (or send right away). You can also set messages to be sent automatically in response to a trigger.
4. Monitor statistics in real time
Once you’ve started sending messages, whoever’s responsible will be able to monitor the statistics in real time and see how many people opened the message, how many followed the links, and so on. All of this is available right here, in Teams.
5. Upload statistics to Power BI
You can also upload complete statistics – for example, to Power BI. Just click the appropriate button in the application, and within seconds, you will receive a full report on the campaign.
As you can see, with Processica Apps, implement SMS blasts in Microsoft Teams is quick and easy. And, once it’s up and running, it’s a highly flexible, effective, multipurpose tool, and the main thing is it takes care of all that time-consuming manual work: by setting the workflow to send messages on a trigger, you can be sure that all of your recipients will receive the message.
Please share your thoughts. How often do you use SMS? In what areas will this type of communication be most useful for you? Are there any other interesting or challenging use cases for SMS blasts that we missed? Your feedback helps us design and develop useful no-code solutions for everyone.
