The complete SMS marketing guide for 2025 campaign success
The complete SMS marketing guide for 2025 campaign success
Summary
What are SMS best practices?
SMS best practices are designed to help you with your long-term SMS strategy.
The SMS best practices you’ll find in this guide are based on thousands of successful Klaviyo customers, and were written to inspire new ideas for engaging with your customers and to empower you to grow your business with Klaviyo.
This guide will walk you through the 3 key goals you need to focus on to create strong, consistent, long-term revenue growth through SMS. Before you continue with this best practice guide, review our Getting started with SMS guide to ensure your sending numbers are activated and that your SMS settings are configured in your account.
Goal 1
Grow your SMS list to grow your revenue
Grow your SMS list by securing SMS marketing consent from new prospects browsing your site and existing customers who are already subscribed to your email list. The best practices outlined below will ensure you are capturing as many SMS subscribers as possible.
Set up your SMS compliance basics
Given the highly personal nature of text messages and phone numbers, it’s crucial to be explicit and direct about how you will use them for marketing. To build transparency and trust between your brand and your customers and cover your business from a legal standpoint, take these 3 steps if you haven’t already:
Create a mobile terms of service (TOS)
A mobile TOS is a legal outline of exactly how you plan to communicate with subscribers via mobile device. Klaviyo allows you to create and host your mobile TOS directly within the app so you do not have to create this page on your own site.
Your mobile TOS doesn’t need to be part of your normal TOS; it can be separate. What’s important is that you link to your mobile TOS anywhere you collect SMS consent, such as sign-up forms and at checkout. Learn how to create mobile terms of service in Klaviyo.
Update your privacy policy
You should already have a privacy policy published to your site that discloses how you handle customer data. Your privacy policy should be updated to include an accurate description of your SMS marketing program, along with how you store and use phone numbers and location data, and the types of messages you will be sending via SMS. Get more guidance on what to add to your privacy policy.
Create SMS disclosure language
Disclosure language is critical to SMS compliance. In the US, you need to include it anywhere you’re collecting SMS consent. On sign-up forms, it’s best practice to place your disclosure language above the submit button to make sure visitors see it. This clearly communicates what the visitor is opting in to and that messaging and data rates may apply. Disclosure language should also link to your privacy policy and mobile TOS.
You can configure your SMS disclosure language in your account settings, and it will be added automatically to any sign-up form you build to collect SMS consent.
Collect SMS consent at checkout on your website
Consent at checkout is one of the most streamlined ways of growing your SMS list. Refer to the guides below to see if Klaviyo supports SMS consent at checkout for your ecommerce integration:
• Shopify
• Magento 2
• BigCommerce
• WooCommerce
Don’t see your platform listed? You can still collect SMS consent at checkout using Zapier, a workflow automation software.
Stay compliant when you collect consent at checkout
To abide by SMS compliance laws, the opt-in checkbox should be unchecked by default. In the Shopify example below, the SMS disclosure notice appears once a customer checks the opt-in checkbox.
Target your visitors with different forms for maximum engagement
When you add SMS to your existing email program, you’ll have 2 distinct types of site visitors: those who are already subscribed to email marketing and brand-new visitors who are not subscribed to anything.
In order to gain SMS consent from as many people as possible, target each group differently with a sign-up form tailored to their current situation.
Encourage brand-new site visitors to sign up for both email and SMS
To collect SMS consent from brand-new site visitors, add a second step to your existing sign-up form. The first step is to collect email marketing consent, and the second step is for collecting SMS consent. On the second step, make sure to add your SMS disclosure language above the submit button.
SMS consent must be optional and cannot appear to be required under any circumstance. Using 2 separate steps to collect email and SMS consent helps your audience understand that SMS consent is not required in order to subscribe to email.
We recommend using a layered sign-up incentive to collect email and SMS consent. For example, offer 10% off for email sign-ups and an additional 5% off for SMS consent. This supports the idea that SMS is optional, but positions the channel as more valuable than email. We’ll cover how to deliver these stacked incentives later in the flows section of this guide.
Encourage existing email subscribers to opt in to SMS with a separate SMS-only form
Your existing email audience is already a highly qualified group of buyers. Create a new single-step sign-up form that specifically targets anyone who is already subscribed to email. You should also add a form teaser to this form. Form teasers are small clickable widgets that show up in the corner of your website screen. They can help increase form submit rate by giving site visitors the option to reopen a form and sign up.
You should offer this group an additional sign-up incentive to get their consent for SMS marketing, such as:
• 10% off your next order
• Free shipping on your next order
• Enrollment into an SMS loyalty program that comes with exclusive benefits
Streamline the SMS subscription experience with Smart Opt-in
Configure Smart Opt-in on Klaviyo sign-up forms to remove friction from the SMS consent collection process. When a site visitor enters their phone number into your form, a 6-digit authentication code will be sent to their device. They then enter that code into the form to confirm their SMS subscription.
This feature makes it easier to opt in to SMS marketing across both desktop and mobile devices. On mobile devices, the authentication code will auto-populate into the form. On desktop, the user simply needs to manually enter the code they received via text.
Smart Opt-in works for all sending number types you use (e.g., long code, short code, branded sender ID, etc.).
Goal 2
Send more SMS campaigns to hit your revenue goals
SMS campaigns are a high-impact way to generate more orders, boosting sales and revenue. Brands on Klaviyo that send at least 8 SMS campaigns per month see stronger revenue growth over time than those that don’t.
By sending targeted SMS campaigns to engaged customers who are likely to spend, you may draw more revenue per recipient with SMS than you do from email. Engaged customers are profiles in Klaviyo who have recently engaged with your brand either on site or through a marketing channel.
Keep SMS compliance in mind with Klaviyo
Prioritizing SMS compliance is essential to the success of your text message program. It’s about more than legal requirements: it’s about the best practices that help you grow your subscriber list, create a positive customer experience, and ultimately drive your revenue.
With Klaviyo, you have access to many tools and features that are designed to set you up for SMS compliance. You can use these as your foundation for your SMS strategies, optimizing and personalizing as you build your SMS program.
Plan your SMS campaign segmentation strategy
To get the most value from SMS, a best practice is to send at least 2 SMS campaigns per week. Follow the best practices outlined below to build your SMS campaign segmentation strategy.
Build segments you can use for campaign targeting
Similar to email, your SMS campaigns should target a variety of segments. In other words, you should not send every SMS campaign to every single SMS subscriber. If you continue to send messages to profiles who consistently do not click on them or take any action, your list will decay over time and you will waste money contacting profiles who are not likely to buy.
We recommend building the following SMS segments in Klaviyo (click the segment name for suggested segment criteria):
• All SMS subscribers
• Highly engaged SMS (includes recent subscribers)
• High-intent shoppers
• SMS VIPs
• Prefers SMS
Stagger the segments you send to on a regular basis
If you send 2 campaigns a week, aim to send 1 campaign per week to your segment of all active SMS subscribers, and 1 to your 90-day SMS engaged segment.
We recommend turning on Smart Sending for all of your SMS campaigns (except for time-sensitive campaigns like big sale announcements). This will prevent over-messaging subscribers who may have recently received an SMS from a flow.
Mix in additional SMS campaigns to high-interest segments
You can also target specific segments with tailored SMS campaigns based on previous purchase history, common behaviors, or churn risk to the business.
For example, SWAK Cosmetics built a segment of customers who previously viewed or purchased a specific lip gloss, then sent a targeted campaign to those customers highlighting that it is now available in new colors. Use similar context about your own audience to come up with ideas for content-targeted campaigns.
Build an SMS error segment to exclude from your campaign sends
Sometimes text messages can’t be delivered to your subscribers. There are a variety of reasons why, and the reasons are usually temporary.
In order to protect your SMS message delivery rate, it is a best practice to build an SMS error segment to group all the profiles that have logged a temporary SMS error in the last 30 days. Excluding this segment from all your campaign sends enables you to maintain a strong message delivery rate.
Don’t worry about excluding these profiles from flows. Due to the trigger-based nature of flows, sending 1-off messages to an individual recipient whose carrier throws an error is less harmful to your SMS deliverability than sending a large quantity of messages to a bunch of error profiles at the same time.
Send high-value content designed to drive clicks and conversions
Your SMS campaign content should be short and direct. Each campaign should have a clear call to action that drives recipients to your site to engage with content or make a purchase.
Types of campaign content to send
Your monthly SMS campaign calendar should support your key business initiatives while enticing subscribers to engage. SMS is the most personal channel you have for reaching subscribers, so you need to provide consistent perceived value that is greater than what you deliver through email.
Some examples that work well:
• Giveaways or challenges
• New product alerts
• Flash sales and promotion announcements
• Early access to sales and promotions
• Special SMS-exclusive promotions
• Opportunity to pre-order or join a waitlist for SMS subscribers only
• Advertising special events
Need more inspiration and real-life examples? Explore these use cases with 11 real brand examples.
Decide how SMS and email campaigns will work together
To hit your revenue goals, you’ll need to look at the promotions and marketing activities you plan to carry out, and then decide which channels are best for communicating those messages.
While you can decide to combine email and SMS however you see fit, we recommend starting out with this framework:
• Newsletter content or content-based updates: These are things like blog posts, general brand updates, and other passive information that is not squarely focused on driving purchases. Send this via email only to keep your email engagement rates healthy.
• Minor promotions and sales: You can choose to either lead with an email and follow up with an SMS, or lead with an SMS and follow up with an email. For these types of more frequent sales, SMS is a great way to alert subscribers that a sale is about to end (e.g., “Last chance to shop these deals!”).
• SMS-exclusive perks and offers: Send these via SMS only to reinforce the value of subscribing to SMS. This could include giving early sale access or pre-order privileges to SMS subscribers.
Bundle SMS and email together for major marketing moments
Think about the really impactful marketing initiatives your brand runs every year, or even every quarter. You might run a semi-annual sale, offer Black Friday discounts, or release new products.
These are what we call “major marketing moments,” and they require a lot more customer messaging than smaller day-to-day initiatives.
For your major marketing moments, leverage the combined power of email and SMS. SMS subscribers are more likely to see a text message before they see an email. Seeing the same message in both places will also help reinforce the importance of your message.
In the Klaviyo campaign builder, you can easily add an SMS message to your email campaign. This will allow you to reach subscribers via email and SMS at the same time to alert them of your big news.
By creating a combined campaign, you’ll also be able to analyze attributed revenue individually by channel, as well as in aggregate for the larger campaign.
Use emojis and MMS messages sparingly
SMS stands for short messaging service, while MMS stands for multimedia messaging service. We’ve found that SMS messages typically perform the same or better than MMS messages (texts that also contain an image, gif, or video). While this isn’t always the case, 95% of A/B tests run in Klaviyo show that SMS outperforms MMS.
Emojis and MMS can inflate the cost of SMS, and they don’t necessarily yield better results. MMS messages cost more to send than SMS. Emojis are not sent as MMS messages, but they do shorten the number of characters you can include in your message from 160 to 70. If you want to test and find out for yourself what works, A/B test your SMS message with and without media content or emojis to see what works best for your use case.
Format your SMS messages properly
Our analysis of top-performing Klaviyo brands shows that shorter messages tend to drive higher click rates and more ROI. So keep it simple in your SMS campaigns. Use the built-in SMS AI feature to help you generate concise copy that encourages recipients to take the desired action.
Use a shortened link so Klaviyo can attribute revenue
When you start creating SMS messages, Klaviyo automatically shortens links for you by default. Leave the Automatically shorten links box checked. This allows your link to be tracked in Klaviyo, and therefore allows Klaviyo to attribute revenue to the message. If you don’t use a Klaviyo shortened link for tracking, no revenue will be attributed to your message.
You can use 3 types of shortened links in SMS messages:
• A Klaviyo link (default): a shortened URL with a Klaviyo-branded root domain (e.g., klv3.io/382aNpW5)
• A branded Klaviyo link: a shortened URL with your own brand name appended to the front of the root domain. This is configurable in Klaviyo and can be used immediately (e.g., jblck.klv3.io/382aNpW5).
• A branded custom link: a shortened URL where the root domain is fully customized to your brand’s domain. Setup requires you to edit your DNS records and can take up to 14 days. (e.g., sms.jamesblack.com/382aNpW5).
Once you’ve launched your SMS program, we recommend transitioning from the default Klaviyo shortened link to a branded Klaviyo link, which you can configure in your SMS settings. Branded Klaviyo shortened links display your domain name in the shortened link, which can help build trust with recipients.
Don’t lead with a link
Think about your own experience as a consumer in the digital age. If you receive a text message that begins with a link, red flags will go off in your brain that the message is probably spam. Put short, concise copy at the beginning of your SMS messages, followed by a clear call to action. Finish with a link and then opt-out instructions.
Personalize your messages to increase engagement
Using personal details in messages, like first name, tends to yield higher click rates for your SMS messages. If you collect first-party data in your sign-up form or elsewhere, such as preferences about products, shopping categories, or shopping intention, use that data to inform your segmentation and personalization strategy.
For instance, if Beantown Coffee collects coffee preference data on their form, they can send a targeted SMS campaign to iced coffee lovers when they launch a new coffee concentrate product.
Goal 3
Convert and retain more customers with SMS flows
Flows are automations triggered by direct customer actions. Because of the highly relevant nature of flows, they tend to outperform campaigns in both engagement and attributed revenue. Based on thousands of Klaviyo accounts using SMS, we’ve found that SMS messages included in flows tend to yield a higher revenue per recipient than email. Bolster your revenue growth by adding SMS into your flow strategy.
When it comes to adding SMS into flows, you should focus first on adding SMS to flows where it will have the biggest impact on driving more revenue. In this section, we’ll walk through SMS best practices for each of these core flows. Once you’ve got those covered, you can add SMS to nurture flows that typically see lower engagement, but still help build loyalty and customer relationships.
Make sure that Smart Sending is turned on for all SMS messages in your flows (exceptions to this are outlined below). This feature helps you avoid over-messaging subscribers with texts, which in turn helps you control your unsubscribe rate.
Launch an SMS-specific welcome series
Create a virtual contact card
Virtual contact cards build trust with SMS recipients and can reduce unsubscribe rates by 3x. Build your virtual contact card under Settings > SMS. Note that virtual contact cards are sent as MMS messages, which means they will only be delivered through number types that support MMS.
If you add a virtual contact card to a flow and the flow message is sent using a number that doesn’t support MMS, the virtual contact card will be removed automatically. Only the copy of the message will be sent as an SMS.
Build your welcome series paths and content
Your SMS welcome series should accomplish 2 objectives: deliver the appropriate sign-up incentive you promised to the recipient and prompt the subscriber to add your number to their contacts. If you used an incentive to attract subscribers on your sign-up form, deliver that reward in the first message of your welcome flow.
If you followed our recommended sign-up form incentive strategy, you’ll have 3 different incentives that you have to deliver:
1. A 10% discount to new email-only subscribers
2. A 15% discount to new subscribers who joined email and SMS
3. A special incentive to existing email subscribers who joined SMS
In order to deliver the right incentives to the right recipients, you’ll need to edit the first part of both your email welcome series and your SMS welcome series to coordinate your incentive delivery.
Email welcome series
- Trigger: Someone is added to your main email list. Since your email list should be set to double opt-in, this flow will trigger once someone clicks Confirm in the subscription confirmation email.
- Time delay: None
- Conditional split: Can receive SMS
- YES path: Deliver a discount code for 15% off via email because the recipient is subscribed to both channels. You can deliver this code via email.
- NO path: Deliver a discount code for 10% off because the recipient is only subscribed to email.
SMS welcome series
- Trigger: Someone Subscribed to SMS Marketing
- Conditional split: Split the flow by the $source profile property to account for any difference in incentives that you might have between your “new visitor” form and “existing email” form. For instance, you may offer 15% off to new visitors for SMS consent, but free shipping to existing email subscribers if they sign up for SMS. Branching based on sign-up form source allows you to deliver on these different incentives within a single flow.
- Time delay: None
- First message: Deliver the appropriate incentive to each path. The YES path will receive the incentive for existing email subscribers who join your SMS list, and the NO path will deliver that same 15% discount code that you included in the new subscriber email welcome series.
After you deliver the promised incentives in both flows, you can add as many messages as you want. We recommend limiting each flow to 3 or 4 messages. In your SMS welcome series, use the second message in the series to deliver your virtual contact card.
Turn Smart Sending and quiet hours off for the first message in the series
The first message in a welcome series, regardless of channel, should be sent immediately upon sign-up. When someone signs up for email or SMS, they expect a definitive confirmation that they have successfully been added to your list. More often than not, you also owe them an incentive which they expect to receive right away.
In order to ensure immediate delivery, turn both quiet hours and Smart Sending off for this message only. Leave Smart Sending and quiet hours on for the rest of the messages in the series.
Add SMS to your high-engagement purchase consideration flows
Once you’ve laid the groundwork for collecting SMS consent and welcoming subscribers, you should prioritize adding SMS into flows that target high-intent purchaser because these flows tend to have high click rates and conversion rates. Since SMS is immediate and more likely to be seen than an email, you can generate even more revenue from your existing flows simply by adding an SMS branch. Our customer Linksoul increased their overall revenue from flows by 82% after adding SMS. Add SMS to these flows:
• Abandoned cart
• Browse abandonment
• Back in stock
• Price drop
• Order updates (Shopify only)
• Is there a link here to a list of other things/best practices use cases that we can point to and inspire customers either direct, via community and/or partners?
Add conditional splits to these flows to separate SMS subscribers from email subscribers. When you add a conditional split for SMS to existing email flows, all of your existing email content will be grouped under the YES path by default. For this reason, we recommend using the negative condition person cannot receive SMS in the split logic so that all of your email content can stay in place.
If you prefer to use the positive condition person can receive SMS marketing, you will need to flip the split in order to get your email messages in the correct pathway.
Abandoned cart flow
Adding SMS to your abandoned cart flow is a great way to nudge conversions for high-intent shoppers who have left something in their cart. If you are sending this flow to recipients in the US, you must adhere to a few requirements:
- You must use double opt-in when collecting SMS consent if you plan to send abandoned cart reminders.
- You can only send 1 SMS message to each recipient per abandoned cart flow. Klaviyo lets you easily rejoin the SMS flow branch to continue messaging recipients via email.
- You have to send the SMS within 48 hours of the cart abandonment.
Browse abandonment flow
Bring more window shoppers back to your site by adding SMS to your browse abandonment flow. Subscribers who are consented to receive SMS will receive their reminder via text, while email subscribers will receive their reminder via email.
You can also choose a different approach where you lead with an email and then follow up with a text if no action is taken within a few hours of receiving the email.
Back-in-stock flow
Back-in-stock flows automatically notify people who specifically subscribe to updates for when a particular product is back in stock. Sending these contacts an SMS message in addition to an email can help increase conversion rates because of the time-sensitive nature.
If a product has already sold out once, interested buyers have an incentive to purchase as soon as the product is back in stock to avoid another waiting period.
Price drop flow
When the price of a product drops, this flow automatically alerts customers who recently interacted with the product. It automatically filters out anyone who actually purchased the product.
Similar to the back-in-stock flow, this touchpoint has some urgency behind it because price drops are a powerful lever for conversions. Drive more revenue by adding an SMS message to this flow.
Order updates (Shopify only)
If you use Shopify or Shopify Plus for ecommerce, you can send transactional order updates via Klaviyo SMS. This feature allows customers to consent to order updates on an order-by-order basis.
While this is not a method for collecting SMS marketing consent, it is a great way to build trust and rapport with customers through SMS. It also helps you clearly and proactively communicate with customers, which can drive down customer support inquiries.
Use SMS in your retention flows to build brand loyalty
Although retention flows don’t typically have the same conversion rates as the flows mentioned above, they are extremely important for maintaining relationships with customers and priming them to make another purchase in the future. Consider adding SMS to these retention flows:
• Post-purchase thank you flow
• Replenishment flow
• Upsell or cross-sell flow
• Bespoke flows based on retention programs you run, such as rewards, referrals, or product reviews
Keep the customer experience in mind and use SMS for time-sensitive messages that encourage subscribers to take a clear action. For these retention flows, you should test different configurations of email and SMS to see what works best with your customers. A/B test 2 flow branches: 1 where you lead with SMS and follow up via email, and 1 where you lead with email and follow up with an SMS.
Key takeaways
Your SMS strategy and marketing tactics will evolve over time
The best practices we’ve outlined in this guide have helped thousands of businesses accelerate revenue growth. As you pick up momentum, your SMS strategy and marketing tactics will evolve over time. To achieve long-term SMS success, keep your ongoing focus on 3 major goals:
1. Maintain consistent month-over-month SMS list growth.
2. Use SMS campaigns to hit your revenue targets.
3. Nurture and retain more customers using SMS in flows.
A growing percentage of shoppers prefer to communicate with brands via text, with 33% of Gen Z shoppers preferring SMS over other channels. Our SMS trend research shows that the way to keep customers engaged through SMS is to offer exclusive deals and perks, and to reward your subscribers frequently.
By making SMS a key communication channel and ramping up your SMS sending volume, you can build stronger relationships with your customers and grow your revenue like the best brands on Klaviyo.
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