Marketing Cloud India SMS: IMMEDIATE & MANDATORY LOCAL REGISTRATION

IF YOU ARE LOCAL ENTERPRISE:

What is a local enterprise? Any business that pays local taxes and has a local business license and physical presence.

What will change? For local enterprise businesses they will need to register themselves and their SMS programs to maintain service continuity and avoid any service disruption. Once that is complete it should be business as usual.

4-Step Registration Process for Phase I, each step is mandatory.

If client is currently sending and have already registered headers and informed Salesforce, move to Phase II.

STEP 1: Portal registration: Register using one of the carrier portals below.

• The process should take 20 mins
• There is a small one-time portal set up fee
• Expect up to 72 hours to get approval to complete portal sign up.

Carrier Portals: we highly recommend using the Vodafone portal as our partner is working closely with this carrier and it will be registered in the central database and be visible to all operators.

• Vodafone: https://www.vilpower.in/
• BSNL portal: https://www.ucc-bsnl.co.in/
• MTNL portal: https://www.ucc-mtnl.in/
• Airtel: https://www.airtel.in/business/commercial-communication/home
• Videocon: https://pingconnect.in/entity/register-with

Documentation: the following may need to be registered depending on the type of Enterprise/Business

• PAN Card
• GST Certificate
• Certificate of Incorporation
• TAN Certificate
• FSSAI License
• Import/Export Registration Certificate

Please note the following for portal registration:

• A one-time fee of 5000 INR ($70.67 USD) is required to register
• Selecting Telemarketer ID is optional and can be left blank
• Once submitted, enterprise registration should take 3 working days to be approved
• Once approved, you will receive a unique account ID number - save this!

Once the enterprise has received approval, SMS program registration can commence -> Move to STEP 2
 

STEP 2: Program Registration:

Once approved, Log in as an Enterprise user (not telemarketer) and provide program details.

• Headers: All 6 character FromNames must be reregistered and new ones added.
• Content templates: message templates and message type (transactional, promotional) must be registered and any new ones added. Also consent registration, describe the opt in path for marketing SMS. This may be via Web, SMS or application.

STEP 3: Portal/Program Registration, PART II: Sign up on the other Portals

In Step 3, the Enterprise will then need to sign up on the other portals, enter their unique ID and activate FromNames (Headers). The previous messaging information will then transfer over. For example, when the enterprise has registered on the Vodafone portal they will have to finalize and activate their account on BSNL, MTNL, Airtel, Videocon etc. to complete (see list in Step1).

STEP 4: Confirm Your Registration: Confirm your details with Salesforce

Clients must notify their Salesforce Marketing Cloud account/sales/success rep on the headers / sender IDs for transactional / promotional that have been approved and registered.
IF YOU HAVE NOT COMPLETED THE REGISTRATION PROCESS:
For customers unable to complete the registration process, they should notify their Salesforce Account Executive.
In this scenario, Salesforce will route their SMS traffic via the international service route known as ILDO to avoid blocking by the carriers.

• This service will deliver SMS messages with random Indian short codes as sender ID
• Messages with FromName (6 character alpha) will not be supported

3-Step Registration Process for Phase II, each step is mandatory.

To be Phase II compliant all registered Enterprise entities will need to complete the following steps within their respective carrier portals.

1. Add Consent Templates (if sending promotional or Service Explicit messages) and get approval
2. Add Content Templates and get approval
3. Share all registered SMS program details with Salesforce once approved.

When the above is complete clients can then deploy their messages.

Step 1: Consent Template Registration

Clients sending Promotional or Service Explicit messages are required to create Consent templates in the carrier portal before a Content template can be approved. A Consent template is the standard message that is sent to the Enterprise’s customers for their consent to receive communications from their brand/s. .
Steps to create Consent Templates

• Login to the carrier portal using your Enterprise credentials
• Select Content Template and select ADD to create a new Consent Template.
• Name the Consent Template with a unique identifier and provide the name/s of the associated Enterprise brand/s.
• In the field labelled ”Scope of Consent’ provide the opt in verbiage or something that describes what the subscriber is opting into (not to be confused with the message content). Eg
  • ABC Ltd would like to send marketing communication on all relevant products and services offers and events to all registered customers.
  • ABC Ltd needs your consent in order to serve you better. We may send you messages about your account activity and our best offers
  • ABC Ltd wishes to send you updates, transactions, recommendations of our services or products being a registered customer with us.

• Save the Consent template for carrier approval.

There is no limitation on the number of consent templates. After approval, the Enterprise can link these consent template to their content templates in the Promotional or Service Explicit category accordingly. Allow at least 48 hours for template approvals.

Once approved the user can proceed to create Content templates for Service Explicit and Promotional content.

Consent Template Do’s and Don’ts
DO

• Provide name to a template which is relevant. This helps in choosing right consent template while creating content templates in promotional or service explicit categories.
• Brand name chosen should be relevant to details mentioned in scope of content

Scope of content should be relevant to mentioned brand & intent of the consent to be mentioned.

DON’T

• Use generic names for templates like “template1”. Etc..
• Mention invalid or irrelevant names under brand. This will be treated as invalid template.
• Send actual message content nor a short message with little meaning like ”consent, SMS” to customers; etc...”
• No variable to be used in scope of consent, as variable applicable to content templates only.

Multiple consents not required by entity unless it is required by enterprise, like example mentioned explaining brand name field.

Step 2: Content Template Registration

Clients will have to log into the carrier portal where they have registered their Enterprise ID and create message templates for approval. Once approved a template ID will be given which must be shared with Salesforce.
Steps to create Content Templates

1. Login to the portal using your Enterprise credentials
2. Navigate to the Content Template option and select ADD to create a new Content Template.
3. Select the template type from the four options: Transactional (for banking / finance businesses), Service Implicit, Service Explicit or Promotional. (See appendix for more details about these message categories.)
4. Select all the sender ids with which you want to link to the Content template.
5. For Promotional and Service Explicit messages select the approved Consent template associated to this message.
6. Enter template name (use a unique identifier to manage multiple templates).
7. Select template message type such as Text or Unicode.
8. Enter the template content, use “Insert Variable” function to insert custom values or variables (1 variable is of 30 characters accordingly choose no of variables required).
9. Save the template for carrier review and approval.

When approved a unique Template ID will be provided which must be shared with Salesforce.

Enterprises must therefore factor in the time for approval before their planned deployment date.

Content templates need to be exact and actual messages deployed must be 100% compliant with the template with no room for any discrepancy. Template content is furthermore case sensitive and the same character case must be used in the actual message. A missing full stop or wrong case can render the message non-compliant and can be blocked.

Content Template Do’s and Don’ts

DO

• Choose a relevant/recognizable name for templates.
• Use message type as “TEXT” for all general messages & “Unicode” for regional/local messages.

Use the Variable insertion function for message personalisation to include details such as date, amounts, specific numbers, names, etc

DON’T

• Use generic names for templates identifiers like “template1”. etc.
• Use more than one space between words or character strings.
• Include actual personalised values such as dates, names, custom URLs, etc, but use the variable insertion function.
• Use content that Is irrelevant to the brand and business or content the end user did not consent to receive.

Step 3: Share SMS Program Details To Salesforce

This is a vital step to complete before message deployment. When all Consent and Content Templates are approved the following details must be given to Salesforce in order to registered on the Salesforce side.

• Enterprise Name (exactly as registered in the portal)
• Enterprise Entity ID
• All registered FromName (Header) values, ID numbers and associated content category
• All approved Content Templates and IDs

Enterprises maybe able to download a data file will all the above information. If not a completed 'India Program Registration Form' should be sent to the client’s Salesforce Account or Success Manager for processing as soon as Content templates have been approved. Failure to pass this information will result in messages getting blocked even if they have been approved in the portal.

IF YOU ARE AN INTERNATIONAL ENTERPRISE:
Customers that do not or are unable to register as local will need to notify their Salesforce Account Executive that they do not have a local Indian entity.

In this scenario, Salesforce will route their SMS traffic via the international service route known as ILDO to avoid blocking by the carriers.

• This service will deliver SMS messages with random Indian short codes as sender ID..
• Messages with FromName (6 character alpha) will not be supported

For questions, queries or concerns, clients are advised to reach out to their Salesforce Account Executive.