Learn How to Get a Text Number for Business and Set Up a Business Text Line
67% of people prefer texting with businesses. Business texting makes it easy to schedule appointments, send reminders, deliver updates, and so much more.
But how can you get a text number for your business or organization?
In this article I cover:
- What a business text number is
- How businesses send text messages
- 4 reasons why you should set up a text line for business
- Types of phone numbers you can send business texts from
- How to get a business text number
- 3 ways to set up business text numbers to collect information
- Answers to frequently asked business text number questions
Read on for more.
What is a Business Text Number?
A business text number is a text-enabled 5/6-digit, 10-digit, or toll-free phone number that businesses and organizations use to text. This is a dedicated business number that separates business communications from personal communications. Teams often use business text numbers for shared access to texting on one or many business phone lines.
How Do Businesses Send Text Messages?
Business texting software is how businesses and organizations send and receive texts. Business texting software makes it easy to connect and text-enable a new or existing business number. Once you connect your business SMS number, texting services like MessageDesk help you get approved for business texting through a carrier registration process.
4 Reasons Why You Should Set Up a Text Line for Business
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1. A dedicated business text number creates transparency, consistency, and credibility
Business text lines help you separate business communication from personal communication.
You and your team can now text contacts, customers, clients, or employees from a business text number - not personal numbers.
This helps with transparency, consistency and credibility.
A dedicated text line also ensures all texts come from a single, recognizable number. People are more likely to trust and respond to texts from a known business line compared to a personal number.
2. Using a text number for business equals time-savings and efficiency
Business text messaging software like MessageDesk can help you centralize your texts with a shared team SMS inbox. This unlocks time-savings and efficiencies, especially for teams.
An inbox marks it easier to manage and track text conversations with contacts on a single platform. A shared inbox also makes it possible for multiple team members to access and respond to messages. This means no message goes unread or un-responded to, improving customer experience and customer support.
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3. You get automations, integrations, and advanced features with business texting software
Texting as a business from a dedicated text line with business texting software unlocks advanced texting capabilities.
Many business texting services, like MessageDesk offer a range of automations. These features range from automatic out-of-office texts and autoresponders to SMS campaigns and automation.
Additionally, many texting providers offer SMS integrations with third-party services like Zapier. You can also add SMS integrations with CRMs, appointment and meeting schedulers, email marketing platforms and much more.
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4. There’s no need to worry about carrier compliance and opt-in
A2P 10DLC carrier compliance is important. Starting in September 2024, carriers will require every business or organization that texts to complete campaign registration. The only way to do this is through a business text messaging provider.
Using a dedicated text number with a texting software like MessageDesk makes compliance with carrier regulations easy. It also ensures your messages will get delivered and not get blocked or flagged as spam.
Additionally, opt-In and opt-out management per TCPA requirements is important for business texting. Having a dedicated business text line with business texting software helps you manage this without headache.
Types of Phone Numbers You Can Send Business Texts From
There are several types of SMS phone numbers for texting that businesses and organizations can use.
These include:
- 10-digit local phone numbers and landlines
- Digital voice-over-IP (VoIP) phone numbers
- 800 text-enabled (tool-free) phone numbers
- 5-6 digit SMS short codes
Below I’ve added examples of each and provided some guidance on which number is best for you.
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1. 10-digit local phone numbers (10DLC) and landlines
Example: 1 (775) 313-9465
10-digit local phone numbers (10DLC) are similar to personal cell phone numbers. They’re ten digits long and come with a local area code.
10DLC numbers are also known as business landline numbers. The only difference is that a landline number is often hardwired and not tied to a mobile device.
Most texting providers can get you a new business text number or add texting to your existing business landline.
These numbers are best for local small businesses because they come with a recognizable area code. You can also get these types of numbers approved through a texting provider for carrier registration.
2. Digital voice-over-IP (VoIP) phone numbers
Digital phone numbers or voice-over-IP (VoIP) numbers are a fancy way of saying “calls and texts over the internet”.
Do you use a provider like RingCentral, Dialpad, or even Google Voice? If the answer is yes, then your phone number is a VoIP number.
The advantage of a VoIP number is that you can port or host it with other texting providers. This is because it’s accessible through the internet.
This portability also means your voice provider can manage your voice and call features. But a separate texting provider can manage just the texting portion of your number.
In this case, you get the best of both worlds. You can make the most of dedicated calling platforms for their voice features. And you can use advanced texting provider features at the same time.
VoIP numbers work best for most every business. Their biggest advantage is their portability and internet accessibility. This makes it easy to call and text from a computer and integrate with other software.
2. 800 text-enabled (tool-free) phone numbers
Example: 1 (855) 233-9922
These numbers are less common and typically meant for use as high-volume customer service lines. However, some larger businesses and organizations use toll-free numbers for mass text message marketing campaigns
Toll-free area codes include:
- 800
- 888
- 877
- 866
- 855
- 844
- 833
3. 5-6 digit SMS short codes
Example: 555-22
Short codes are a legacy phone number format. They were originally designed for mass texting and first popularized by the TV show, American Idol back in 2003.
These numbers are highly regulated by the federal communications commission (FCC). Short codes are also costly to obtain and often aren’t ideal for most businesses. Some business text messaging providers, like SimpleTexting do still offer these as a texting option, primarily for marketing purposes.
How to Get a Business Text Number
1. Research and choose a business text messaging provider
The first step to getting a text number for your business is choosing a business text messaging provider.
There are many great business texting services out there, including MessageDesk. But you’ll want to find one that has the SMS tools that suit your needs.
If you’re looking to get your whole team texting, then you’ll want a service with a shared team inbox.
Doing large-scale SMS marketing campaigns? You’ll want an SMS marketing service or mass text app that supports text message broadcasts.
MessageDesk offers a range of features designed to suit both of these business texting needs.
2. Configure your business texting number
Your second step is configuring your phone number. You have three options for this.
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Option 1: Get a new business text number
Is your business or organization just getting started? Don’t already have a business phone number? Most business text messaging providers can provide you with a text-enabled SMS phone number.
Additionally, providers like MessageDesk can get you a local 10-digit phone number with any area code of your choosing. We can even provide you with a toll-free 800 number for texting.
Option 2: Text-enable an existing business landline or VoIP number
Already have a business phone line? No problem. Most providers (including MessageDesk) can text-enable your existing landline or VoIP service phone number. This is all without disrupting your existing voice calling functionality or service.
To text-enable an existing number, you’ll need to submit a number hosting request. A number hosting request gives a new platform access to the texting capability of your number.
This process also requires you to submit a formal letter to your current phone number carrier.
At MessageDesk, we make this process easy. Just submit a form and we’ll automatically generate the letter for you and then submit it to carriers.
The whole process typically takes 3-5 business days. We’ll then let you know once everything is good to go and you can start texting.
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Option 3: Port your cell phone number to a VoIP provider and then host it with a texting provider
Carriers restrict business texting providers from hosting your personal cell phone number for texting. This is a technical limitation with the number type and carrier services.
However, you can port your cell phone number to a VoIP provider.
Once you port your cell phone number, your new VoIP provider will become your voice provider as well. I personally recommend RingCentral for this.
Once you’ve ported your phone number you can then set up hosting for business SMS with any texting service like MessageDesk.
3. Get approved by carriers for business text messaging
All telecom carriers in the United States require businesses and organizations that text to complete A2P 10DLC carrier registration.
They do this to prevent phishing scams and SPAM messaging from bad actors.
To register with carriers you have to use a business text messaging service, like MessageDesk. You also have to adhere to various standards like opt-in and TCPA regulations.
But the good news is that most business texting providers come with features that help you manage opt-in, compliance, and registration for you.
Every business texting service has their own way of managing opt-in and carrier registration.
But here’s how we do it at MessageDesk:
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Step 1: Submit and validate your organization’s info with carriers through MessageDesk
We start the carrier registration process by validating that your organization is legitimate. We do this simply by submitting a form that collects the following information:
- Business identification: You need to provide proof of your business's existence and legality. This includes your Employer Identification Number (EIN) or other tax identification numbers.
- Business address: The official address registered with your organization.
- Contact Information: A primary contact within the business, including name, phone number, email address, and website.
- Messaging purpose and examples: Explain why and how your business uses SMS messaging. This involves providing message examples.
- Opt-in and opt-out processes: Describe how your contacts opt in and out of receiving messages. This includes how you collect consent and how you manage and honor opt-out requests.
- Message content and volume: Carriers need to know about the volume and content of the messages you’ll send. This helps carriers understand your messaging patterns. It also ensures that your messages align with anti-spam policies.
Step 2: Publish a carrier-compliant business text messaging policy on your website
You submitted and validated your organization information. Next, the compliance team at MessageDesk will work with you or your web developer.
Carriers require that you have a website and that you publish a business text messaging privacy policy on it.
Your privacy policy must explain the following:
- The type of contact and personal information your organization collects
- How your organization collects information from contacts
- How your organization uses any information collected
- How your organization protects contact data
- That your organization does not share information
- How contacts can opt-out of receiving text messages
Note: having a website with a privacy policy is an absolute must for business text messaging. Without it, carriers will not approve your organization for texting.
3 Ways to Set Up Business Text Numbers to Collect Information
You’ve got a text-enabled business number and you’re registered with carriers. Now, what are some other ways to text from your business phone number and start text conversations?
Here’s how to set up a text number for information collection purposes.
1. Advertise “text us” with a keyword
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You’ll often find businesses and organizations advertising “text-us” on billboards, signage, print materials and websites. To take this a step further, consider configuring keyword-based autoresponders for:
- Running promotions
- Generating leads
- Booking estimates
- Completing quotes
- Scheduling appointments
- Gathering feedback
- Curating online reviews
- And more
When someone texts the keyword to your text line, your business texting software will automatically send them a text message. You can even set up multiple keywords and use them to send a string of automatic text messages.
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2. Add a click-to-text button to your website
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Another way to collect information is with a click-to-text button on your website.
This makes it easy for your customers to start conversations directly with your business text number.
What is click-to-text? It’s a button or clickable phone number on your website. It simply pops a dial-pad or messaging app from the web visitor’s computer.
3. Install a text-based website chatbot
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A third option for collecting information and starting conversations is installing a text-based chatbot on your website.
An example of this is MessageDesk’s chatbot. It’s a simple line of code that anyone can install.
Once you have it installed, it works like this:
When a visitor clicks on the chat button or icon a dialog appears. This dialog contains customizable form fields that ask for mobile phone number and additional information.
Once the visitor submits their information, MessageDesk automatically sends them a text to start the conversation.
Frequently Asked Business Text Number Questions
Can a business text a customer?
It’s legal in the U.S. for your business to text customers, so long as you have consent.
The Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), and carriers require businesses to obtain written consent from contacts before sending texts.
This consent must be deliberate. You can’t assume consent from a pre-ticked box that automatically opts someone in.
Can you text a business number?
Yes, you can text a business number if the business is able to receive texts at that number.
If the business phone number is not text-enabled then they will not receive your text message. Many businesses and organizations advertise their business text number.
They often include callouts to “text-us” from their website and other printed collateral.
Is it possible to get a free text number for business?
Yes, it’s possible to get a free text number for business. But there are some important considerations and limitations to keep in mind.
Free texting providers are only meant for personal use, not business use. These services limit the amount of texting you can do and come with limited functionality.
Free text number providers are also unable to get your business registered with carriers for guaranteed message delivery.
Ready to start texting?
Ready to start texting? Your next step is to meet with a MessageDesk messaging expert.
MessageDesk is here to help you configure your business phone number. We make carrier registration simple, easy and transparent.
Start texting with MessageDesk today!