Overview
Maximize engagement and boost bookings with Boulevard’s text marketing. Blast campaigns allow you to send a custom, personalizable message to an audience segment of your choosing. Use the campaign builder in your Marketing tab to get started.
Enabling text marketing
A dedicated phone number unique to your location is required to enable text marketing.
If you already have a dedicated phone number for your location, you’ll be able to create text campaigns directly from your marketing dashboard.
If you don’t have a dedicated phone number set up yet, you’ll be prompted to do so from your Marketing tab, or from your Messages tab. For more on phone number setup, see Phone number setup.
Creating a Text Blast Campaign
Navigate to the marketing tab and select audiences. Select Create Campaign > Text Message.
Confirm the audience and select next. You also have the option to exclude audiences or to exclude clients who recently received text marketing. To learn how to create an audience, check out Clients & Audiences.
Add text to the “write your message” input field. A live preview of your message draft populates on the right side. Inclusion of opt-out language is a legal requirement, so the “Text NO PROMOS to opt out” language cannot be modified.
NOTE: If a recipient texts NO PROMOs in response, they will be opted out from text marketing communications only. This does not impact two-way texting or appointment notification texts. If a recipient replies “STOP”, they will be opted out of all text communications from your dedicated phone number.
Merge Tags allows you to dynamically insert text to personalize the message to the individual recipient. Boulevard currently offers the following Merge Tags: business name, client first name, location phone number, location email.
Enable “Include link to book appointment” to add a trackable booking link to your message. When clicked, this will lead clients to your online booking overlay. You can also include additional links by copying and pasting the link into the message text box.
NOTE: custom links are not trackable in campaign metrics at this time.
Add emojis to the text box by hitting Hit ctrl + ⌘ + space for the emoji keyboard and selecting an emoji to insert. If you’re using a PC, hit the windows logo key +. (period)
Select Next to review your text campaign details. Enter a campaign name. Campaign details include audience, estimated recipient count, dedicated phone number from which the campaign will be sent, and estimated text segments for the blast. To make changes to the audience, select edit in the campaign details box. To make changes to the text content, select edit in the messages box.
Select Send test to send a test message. Enter the number you wish to send to and select send. A test text will be sent from the business phone number to the number entered. Test messages do count toward text usage. Refer to Text & Marketing Usage Rates for more details.
Select Send now to send immediately or Schedule to send at a future date and time. If you are scheduling a text blast, you can select a custom date and time between 8 am local time and 7pm local time. Select Save & Schedule to complete.
NOTE: Quiet hour laws restrict text messages from being sent between 7 pm - 8 am. For larger audiences, completion of send can take up to 30 minutes.
Campaign status can be viewed from the Marketing tab by clicking Blast campaigns. From here you can see status and send date. You can make edits to a scheduled blast campaign by selecting the three dot menu. From this menu you can edit, rename, or delete a campaign.
Important: Text campaigns are sent from the booking line of the location you are viewing. This is also the location that will be billed for usage. It's recommended to segment smaller audiences per location.
Blast Campaign Summary
Blast Campaign Menu Options
Review your campaigns by selecting the campaign name, or clicking the three-dot menu to take any one of the following actions:
Edit
Duplicate
Rename
Delete
Reporting
To view the following campaign metrics, click on the campaign name.
Sent - the count of text messages sent to recipients in the campaign.
Clicked - the count of distinct individuals clicking the booking link in a text campaign, measuring recipient engagement. For example, 1000 messages sent, 500 clicks, but only 300 unique recipients clicked.
Note: At this time, clicks on any custom links are not tracked – this metric solely displays engagement with the booking link, if one was included in your message.
Unsubscribed - the count of recipients who opted out of receiving further text messages following the campaign.
Failed - the count of text messages that failed to reach recipients, often due to invalid numbers or network issues.
Clicking the underlined text segments under text usage will automatically direct you to your text usage summary.
Client replies
Seeing as text marketing campaigns are sent from your dedicated phone number, clients can reply to your text blasts. Client replies will appear in the Messages tab inbox, as part of each client’s individual text thread.
Text marketing consent
Your eligible text marketing audience is dependent on a client’s marketing opt in status. You can only send text marketing campaigns to clients who have explicitly opted in to receive texts from your business. This opt in is captured at time of client’s booking, through the online self-booking overlay.
It’s mandatory to include opt-out language in every text campaign sent from your business. If a client replies “NO PROMOS” to any text from your dedicated number, they will no longer be eligible to receive text marketing campaigns from you. If a client replies “STOP” or “UNSUBSCRIBE” to any text from your dedicated number, they will no longer be eligible to receive any text communications, including appointment confirmations and reminders.
Note: If a client has previously unsubscribed, the opt-in text will no longer show in the booking overlay. They can opt back in through the client portal profile, communications preferences.
Pricing
Boulevard’s texting capabilities allow your business to deliver clients a premium, interactive communication experience at every step of the appointment journey, through 2-way conversational texting, client notification texts, text marketing, and a centralized Messages inbox to manage communication history. Check out Text Marketing and Usage Rates for more details on pricing.
Check out the Text Marketing FAQ for common questions and answers related to text marketing or Text Marketing Best Practices for tips.