Humans with Agents drive customer success together.
Boost pipeline, win rate, and revenue with Sales Cloud.
Cut service costs with humans & AI agents on one platform.
Personalize every moment of engagement across the customer lifecycle with AI agents, actionable data, and workflows.
Increase revenue and deliver consistent customer experiences across online, in-store, and mobile channels with Commerce Cloud.
Empower every user, in every industry to transform trusted data into actionable insights, wherever they work.
Bring your people, agents data, apps and Salesforce solutions to where work happens in Slack.
Find more customers, win their business, and keep them happy with tools that help you work smarter, not harder.
Bring together, understand, and act on all your data, from any source.
Build and customize your Agentforce and Customer 360 with the Agentforce 360 Platform.
Sustainability, simplified with Agentforce.
Reach your goals with our customer success experts.
Get the most out of Salesforce with partners, agents, apps, and consultants.
Drive a lifetime of loyalty.
Deliver the connected future, faster.
Achieve operational excellence.
Deliver profitable growth.
Deliver connected education journeys for life on the #1 AI CRM.​
Lead the energy transition.
Empower your customers’ financial success with trusted AI.
Grow healthy relationships on the #1 AI CRM.
Connect the value chain.
Cultivate loyal audiences faster.
Build relationships that drive change.
Increase client trust.
Modernize government service.
Smarter retail starts with Salesforce.
Drive cost-efficient growth with intelligent automated processes.
Deliver connected experiences.
Explore success stories from customers of all sizes, in every industry.
Explore success stories of how Salesforce uses our own technology to run every part of our business.
Meet the innovators bettering their careers and communities with Salesforce.
Join us September 15-17 in San Francisco and on Salesforce+ to experience the Agentic Enterprise — powered by you, amplified by agents.
Hear from AI visionaries, learn through hands-on training, and explore real customer use cases — all in one place.
Explore 1,600+ sessions covering every industry, role, and product, designed to help you solve any business challenge.
Find answers to all your event questions about registration, travel, and onsite tips.
Relive the best of TDX 2025 with on-demand technical sessions, product deep dives, and community-led discussions.
Join the must-attend conference for Salesforce developers, admins, and architects — save your spot now.
Watch the keynote showcasing the latest innovations in AI agents, data, integration, automation, and more.
Catch the most impactful sessions, announcements, and community highlights from TDX 2025.
Revisit the most impactful moments from Connections 2025 and learn how marketers can lead the way with next-gen innovations.
Be part of the marketing and commerce event of the year. Mark your calendar and join us for more insights, innovation, and inspiration.
Watch the keynote that sets the stage for an agentic future where customer engagement will never be the same.
Explore the standout sessions, product demos, and takeaways.
Revisit the excitement of Tableau Conference 2025 with on-demand keynotes, trainings, and data stories from around the world.
Mark your calendar for the data event of the year — connect with the Tableau community and sharpen your analytics skills.
Watch the keynote that unveiled the future of data and analytics, featuring product innovations and inspiring customer stories.
See the top sessions, data visualizations, and takeaways from this year’s gathering of data enthusiasts.
Relive the future of education from Education Summit 2025, where humans with agents will drive learner and institution success.
Join education leaders, innovators, and Trailblazers. Save your spot for the next Education Summit.
Dive into groundbreaking education sessions on how to become agent-first in education.
Join education Agentblazers from leading universities to learn how to become agent-first in education.
Join us in cities around the world to experience the latest Salesforce innovations in apps, data, and agents. Connect with leaders and experts from your industry at an Agentforce World Tour near you.
Sign up today to be the first to know when Agentforce World Tour is coming to a city near you.
Fuel your professional growth and transform your company with our free live streaming and on-demand events.
Stream the world’s largest, most trusted technology event October 14-16.
Join us to learn how AI agents are driving customer success.
Explore data and AI demos, trainings, and release announcements.
Save inspiring content to watch later.
Dive into highlights from past events and explore on-demand content for every role and industry.
Join live webinars or listen to on-demand webinars at any time.
Learn from peers, build your Salesforce network, and give back to the community.
Build product knowledge and get implementation and adoption guidance from Salesforce experts.
Learn and get hands-on the with the latest product innovations.
Join groups to meet, collaborate, and learn new skills with Trailblazers.
Skill up for the future from anywhere with Trailhead, our free, online learning platform.
Explore guided learning paths to quickly learn in-demand skills.
Accelerate learning with access to Salesforce experts.
Earn resume-worthy Salesforce credentials.
Find your career in the Salesforce ecosystem.
Discover free curriculum and resources for students and educators.
Explore free and trial offers for Salesforce data, analytics, and CRM products — for any size business, in any industry.
The free CRM suite with sales, service, marketing, and Slack for a maximum of 2 users.
The marketing, sales, service, and commerce tools you need to succeed — all in a single CRM suite.
Build enterprise-quality apps fast and get hands-on with Agentforce and Data Cloud.
Salesforce is the #1 AI CRM, with AI agents, data, and CRM apps on a single, unified platform.
Learn all about what CRM is, what it does, and how it can improve customer relationships.
Salesforce’s category-leading apps for sales, service, marketing, commerce, IT, and more.
Learn more about AI agents and how they can help your business.
It’s always-on digital labor augmenting every employee, department, and business process to improve customer experiences.
Discover tips and insights from experts to supercharge your digital journey.
Get the latest on AI, data, digital labor, and more.
Keep up with Salesforce’s AI research team and stay on the cutting edge of technology.
Get the latest tooling innovation news, insights, and inspiration.
Grow your career with the latest in sales content, training, and events — all part of the world’s leading sales community.
Find free articles, guides, best practices, research, and more.
Read the latest studies and reports from the world’s best-known business analysts.
Explore industry-leading Salesforce partner apps and experts.
Get developer guides, tutorials, sample code, and API references.
Sign up to receive the latest Salesforce tips and insights, tailored just for you.
Need help? Ask Agentforce. Find documentation, access learning resources, log cases, and more – all the support you need, wherever you need it.
Find up-to-date information and status about our technology bugs and workarounds.
Find tutorials, sample code, developer guides, and API references.
Explore diagrams, decision guides, and resources to build trusted, easy, and adaptable solutions.
Meet people, learn skills, find apps and experts, and share feedback by joining Salesforce communities.
Connect with peers to learn skills and grow.
Connect with Slack end users, admins, and developers.
Connect with MuleSoft developers, architects and business users.
Connect with Tableau analysts, admins, developers and business users.
Collaborate, learn, and manage your partner business.
Help us build the Salesforce roadmap by sharing your feedback.
Reach your goals with our customer success experts.
Get the right level of support and guidance to grow your business.
Implement, innovate, and transform your enterprise with help from Salesforce experts.
Manage your Salesforce subscriptions and contracts.
Make payments, buy products, and manage renewals (Salesforce login required).
Access invoices and make payments (Trailblazer ID login required).
Track and manage consumption with near-real time usage data.
Learn about our history, products, and values.
We know business is the greatest platform for change. See how we build a better future.
Start a new journey with us – a career here at Salesforce.
Stay informed with the latest news and announcements, fresh off the press.
Explore the Salesforce brands delivering success now.
Share the story
By Cassandra Salcedo , Product Marketing Director, Marketing Cloud
Text messaging gives businesses a direct and immediate line to their audience. Because almost everyone carries a smartphone, mobile notifications capture attention faster than almost any other medium. When marketing teams design these campaigns thoughtfully, the channel cuts through the digital noise to offer genuine value.
However, this direct access requires strict discipline and strategic planning. Since smartphones represent an intensely personal space, companies must follow clear regulations to protect consumer trust. If brands ignore these rules, they risk alienating their buyers, damaging their reputation, and facing severe legal fines.
Consumer behaviour leans heavily towards mobile-first interactions. While email inboxes often overflow with promotional clutter and social media algorithms hide organic posts, text messages trigger a physical notification on a device the user checks dozens of times a day. By integrating direct messaging into your broader mobile marketing strategy, you create a reliable pathway to reach buyers exactly where they spend their time.
Despite this potential, many companies still struggle to scale their conversational efforts. According to the Tenth Edition State of Marketing , only 55% of marketers say they frequently reply to customer responses via email and SMS, a process that is currently manual. By adopting clear standards and workflows, teams can automate these touchpoints and unlock the channel’s full potential.
The primary advantages of texting include:
>>> End “do not reply” marketing.
Watch the demo to see how emails and messages become two-way conversations, letting customers respond, get answers, and take action without starting over.
Before hitting send on a mass text, marketing teams need a bulletproof strategy in place. Because phones are highly personal devices, consumers have zero tolerance for spam or irrelevant pings. By following established industry standards, brands protect their sender reputation while maximising the return on every message. Establishing this strong foundation requires a deliberate mix of legal compliance, precise timing, and ruthless editing.
Gathering express written consent stands as the foundational rule of any messaging programme. Before a business sends a single text, the recipient must explicitly agree to receive those specific communications. Legal frameworks like the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) and Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association (CTIA) guidelines in the United States – alongside the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in Europe – strictly govern how companies collect and manage these phone numbers.
To maintain compliance, teams must clearly separate transactional consent from promotional consent. If a shopper provides a phone number to receive a shipping update, marketers cannot legally use that number to send marketing blasts. Furthermore, companies must avoid pre-checked opt-in boxes during the checkout process. The customer must take an active, deliberate step to subscribe.
Implementing a double opt-in process provides an extra layer of security and ensures a highly engaged list. Under this system, after a user signs up online, the platform immediately sends a confirmation text. The user must then reply with a keyword like “YES” to finalise their subscription. By verifying the number, SMS marketing campaigns experience fewer bounced messages and lower spam complaints.
Making it easy for subscribers to leave your list is just as important as encouraging them to join. When consumers feel trapped in a messaging sequence, they often report the number as spam. If mobile carriers detect a high volume of spam complaints, they will block the sender entirely.
Industry standards dictate that businesses must support standard opt-out keywords like “STOP,” “CANCEL,” and “UNSUBSCRIBE.” Whenever a platform receives one of these prompts, the system must automatically and immediately remove the user from the active roster. Beyond processing the request, the platform should trigger a single, final automated reply confirming the cancellation. Marketers must never attempt to argue with the user or send follow-up promotional material after an opt-out request occurs.
Standard text alerts limit marketers to 160 characters per segment. If a draft exceeds this limit, carriers split the text into multiple parts, which doubles or triples the sending cost. Because every character impacts the budget, writers must eliminate unnecessary adjectives and get straight to the point.
Beyond cost implications, brevity respects the reader’s time. Consumers glance at texts while commuting, working, or running errands. If a message contains a wall of text, the recipient will likely swipe it away without reading the offer.
Because text alerts create an immediate physical interruption, sending them at the wrong hour causes significant frustration. Unlike an email that sits quietly in an inbox until the morning, a phone buzzing at three in the morning wakes people up.
To avoid annoying subscribers, marketers must enforce strict ‘quiet hours.’ Industry regulations generally prohibit promotional texts between 9 PM and 8 AM in the recipient’s local time zone. When managing a national or global database, marketing teams must segment their lists by geography so a morning blast in New York does not disturb a customer in California.
Optimal send windows often depend on the specific audience and the nature of the offer:
Recipients should never have to guess who is contacting them. When an unknown string of numbers pops up on a lock screen, consumers naturally treat it with suspicion. By consistently stating the brand name at the very beginning of the copy, companies establish immediate recognition and trust.
This transparency is especially critical in an era of digital impersonation. According to Deloitte , to combat rising fraud and maintain consumer trust in direct communications, best practices now include strict sender verification; for example, pilot SMS Sender ID Registries are being actively utilised to verify message headers from legitimate businesses and block impersonation. By clearly owning your identity in every send, you protect your audience from phishing attempts.
Every text needs a clear, singular purpose. Without a direct instruction, the audience will read the alert and move on without taking action. Marketers must map out the exact next step they want the user to take on the broader customer journey before hitting send.
To drive clicks, replace passive language with strong, urgent verbs. Keep the instruction as close to the hyperlink as possible.
Effective CTA phrases include:
Read The Forrester Wave™: Revenue Marketing Platforms For B2B, Q1 2026 to evaluate 10 top platforms and see how Salesforce earned its status as a Leader.
Once a marketing team masters the basic rules of compliance and timing, they can push their campaigns further. Moving beyond simple promotional blasts requires a deeper integration of customer data and behavioural triggers. By leaning into sophisticated segmentation and automated workflows, companies can transform a basic notification channel into a high-converting revenue engine.
Modern consumers ignore generic mass broadcasts. To hold a subscriber’s attention over time, teams must move beyond opening with “Dear Customer” and leverage the data they have collected. By dynamically inserting first names, referencing past purchase history, or tailoring offers based on regional weather patterns, brands make their alerts feel highly relevant.
This level of detail significantly reduces unsubscribe rates and drives deeper loyalty. In fact, the State of Marketing report notes that marketers are focussing their deepest personalisation efforts on high-engagement, high-frequency channels like mobile messaging and paid search.
When teams apply advanced technology to this effort, the results scale dramatically. According to McKinsey & Company , using generative AI to create hyperpersonalised marketing messages and microsegments for direct channels like SMS can improve conversion rates by up to 40% compared to traditional segmentation. By analysing browsing habits, teams can send a targeted text about a specific product category the user was just researching, turning a casual browser into a committed buyer. Integrating these tactics effectively upgrades your entire approach to marketing personalisation and ensures every send adds distinct value.
Manual batch-and-blast campaigns require immense effort and often miss critical windows of opportunity. By setting up automated, triggered messages based on specific user behaviours, companies can engage prospects exactly when their interest peaks. Another study from the same firm found that by using AI-powered predictive analytics to sequence touchpoints and time direct messages, companies see a 15-20% boost in customer satisfaction and a 5-8% increase in revenue.
Common automation use cases include:
Texting should never operate in an isolated silo. When marketers align their mobile alerts with other channels, they create a cohesive, frictionless experience for the buyer. For instance, a B2B software provider might use email to deliver a long-form newsletter about a new product update, but reserve text alerts for urgent webinar starting links.
By tying these tools together through sophisticated marketing automation software, teams can sequence messages intelligently. If a subscriber ignores a promotional email for two days, the system can automatically trigger a text reminder. Conversely, if the user clicks the email link and makes a purchase, the system suppresses the text alert to avoid redundant messaging. This synchronised approach forms the backbone of successful omnichannel marketing efforts.
Even experienced teams stumble when adapting to the nuances of direct messaging. To protect your sender reputation, eliminate these frequent errors from your strategy.
You cannot improve a strategy without analysing the results. By monitoring core metrics after every broadcast, teams can refine their copywriting, adjust their timing, and clean their subscriber lists.
Trust acts as the fundamental currency of direct messaging. By strictly following best practices regarding consent, clear value, and respectful timing, brands build lasting, profitable relationships on the most personal channel available. The State of Marketing report confirms this advantage, revealing that high-performing marketing teams are 1.5x more likely to frequently reply to customers via email and text compared with underperforming teams. Ultimately, disciplined execution separates the leaders from the laggards in customer engagement programmes.
Looking ahead, the landscape continues to evolve rapidly. The widespread adoption of Rich Communication Services (RCS) will soon allow brands to send high-resolution images, read receipts, and interactive carousels natively within the default messaging app. As conversational commerce takes hold, consumers will increasingly expect to browse catalogues and complete purchases directly within a text thread. By mastering the fundamentals today, teams build the infrastructure required to capitalise on tomorrow’s innovations.
Marketing is transforming once again, and this time it’s thanks to agentic AI. In this year’s Agentforce Marketing keynote, we explored how AI agents can help you spark conversations with your customers, acting on every message and interaction in real time.
Join our Agentforce Marketing champions as they explore the latest platform capabilities that help marketers work smarter, not harder, to drive measurable business results.
In this webinar, discover what sets top-performing marketing teams apart. Based on insights from 4,500+ global leaders, industry Trailblazers unpack the trends shaping growth and how to apply them.
Launch and personalise campaigns in minutes. See how Agentforce Marketing helps you move faster than ever, while making every interaction more personal.
Move from broadcast messaging to conversational engagement. Learn how customers can reply, get instant answers, and reach the right person in the same channel.
See the latest trends in AI, data, and personalisation, based on insights from nearly 4,500 marketers worldwide. Learn how top brands are navigating the era of agentic marketing and what they see as their biggest priorities and challenges.
See why Gartner® named Salesforce a Leader for the eighth year in a row, and placed furthest for Completeness of Vision.
Get started with agentic marketing. See how AI agents help you plan, launch, and optimise campaigns faster with unified data and real-time engagement.
The most critical rule is obtaining express written consent before sending any messages. Without explicit permission from the recipient, sending promotional texts violates federal regulations like the TCPA and damages consumer trust.
Frequency depends entirely on your industry and the expectations set during the opt-in process. Generally, sending two to four promotional texts per month keeps the brand top-of-mind without annoying the subscriber. Always monitor your opt-out rates to gauge if you are sending too frequently.
SMS (Short Message Service) refers to standard, text-only alerts limited to 160 characters. MMS (Multimedia Messaging Service) allows marketers to embed visual media, such as images, GIFs, or audio clips, and offers a much higher character limit, though it costs more to send.
High-volume senders typically require a dedicated five- or six-digit short code to bypass carrier filtering and send thousands of messages per second. Smaller businesses or regional brands can often use a 10DLC (10-digit long code) registered for business use, which is more affordable but processes sends at a slower rate.
Because text alerts trigger push notifications on lock screens, the format boasts exceptionally high visibility. While exact open rates remain difficult to track perfectly due to carrier reporting limitations, industry benchmarks consistently estimate that consumers open up to 98% of the text messages they receive.

source