To someone who is unfamiliar to business text messaging, completing carrier registration is often one of the more shocking parts of text messaging.

We hear these types of things a lot:

"Why do I need to register my text messages, isn't it just like texting on a personal phone?"

The reality is, texting through software like MessageDesk isn't exactly like texting from your personal phone.

One of the key differences is you need to register your traffic. Though, this isn't as scary as it seems.

With your registration you are communicating to wireless carriers a few different things:

In this article, we'll take you through the benefits of registering and how to do so.

A2P (application-to-person) messaging refers to texts that get sent using text messaging software.

A2P is a fancy way of saying that the text did not come from a personal phone.

These types of text messages are regulated much more than your personal messages.

Many of these regulations serve one overall purpose, to prevent SPAM messages from being delivered.

Carrier registration is a way for the major telecommunications carriers (AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, etc.) to verify that your business is not sending malicious or SPAM messages.

Additionally, this allows for the carriers to make sure that you are receiving the proper opt-in/consent from your contacts to message them.

They do this by collecting some key pieces of information about you business such as:

This is all in an effort to reduce the amount of SPAM messages so that your text messages are more effective when they reach your contact's inbox.

Registering your text messaging traffic prevents carriers from blocking your texts for SPAM.

Otherwise, you may see that the delivery rate of your broadcasts or other texts will drop.

Remember, even if you aren't texting for malicious purposes, your texts could still be blocked.

Registration also affords you better throughput.

Throughput is how quickly your messages could be sent out.

For example, if I send out a Broadcast to 100 people, those people will not receive the message right after you hit 'Send'. It will take a few minutes for those messages to be delivered to the recipient.

Carriers regulate how many messages can be sent out in a certain time period. Registering your traffic could afford you a better throughput rate so your messages get delivered faster.

Said simply, you need 3 things in order to register with the carriers:

We go over these briefly below and include links to full guides on each of these three items to give you the best possible overview.

First, you need permission to text your contacts.

Specifically, you need opt-in/consent in order to send texts to someone.

This consent cannot be hidden in fine print either, it needs to be clear and evident when someone is opting into receiving messages from you.

For example:

This may seem like a tall order, but it's easier than it seems. Check out the below article for a full walkthrough on how to do so.

Your STOP and HELP keywords are required for Registration.

Here's the good news, MessageDesk already has these set up for you! You can find all of your compliance messages in your Compliance Settings.

When either of these words are texted into your MessageDesk account the person sending them will receive an automatic response.

Read more about your compliance keywords and messages below.

The final step is submitting your Carrier Registration.

It's required that you provide proof of the previous two steps in order for your registration to be accepted.

As long as you are collecting opt-ins/consent to text your contacts you're all set to start your registration.

Read the guide on completing the registration form below.