Send the invitation by SMS
The invitation SMS is a short message followed by a link to the attendee’s invitation page. On that page, they open and download their PDF ticket, and can add it to their wallet. Each SMS sent uses one SMS credit.
What you need before sending
Section titled “What you need before sending”- Phone numbers in a required field. For a ticketed event, add a required custom field for the phone number to the checkout form: see Choose the information asked of attendees. For an imported event, you need a required column holding the numbers.
- The PDF ticket ready and saved: see Design the PDF ticket.
- Enough SMS credits.
The SMS is never sent automatically after a purchase: you always send it manually.
Set up the SMS
Section titled “Set up the SMS”-
Open your event, Invitation tab. In the Sending settings card, choose SMS with the switch in the top right corner.
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In Participant phone number, choose the field that holds the numbers. Only required fields are listed.
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In Sms message, write your message. The link to the invitation page is added automatically at the end: do not type it.
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Click Save. The message “Invitation settings saved successfully!” appears and the Send button shows up.
Length and allowed characters
Section titled “Length and allowed characters”The invitation SMS, link included, must fit in a single SMS. Its maximum length depends on the characters you use:
- 160 characters if the message only uses the standard SMS alphabet: unaccented letters, digits, common punctuation, line breaks and a few accented letters (é, è, à, ù, ì, ò, É, Ç, ä, ö, ü, ñ). The characters
€^{}[]~|and\each count as two. - 70 characters as soon as the message contains any other character: an emoji, lowercase ç, ê, â, î, ô, û, á, í, ó, ú, the curly apostrophe ’, curly quotes “ ”, « » quotes or the … ellipsis.
The counter above the field shows the characters actually billed and the limit that applies (160 or 70). It starts at 21 because the link added at the end counts as 20 characters, plus the space before it. A link you write yourself in the message also counts as 20 characters, whatever its length.
When the limit is reached, typing stops with the message “Limit reached: this message is sent as a single SMS, it cannot be longer.”. If the message contains a character that lowers the limit to 70, the text below the field says so: “A special character (emoji, ç) caps this SMS at 70 characters instead of 160. Remove it to get the full length back.”.
Variables (first name, event name…) are not accepted in the invitation SMS: the message is the same for every attendee. If you type one, the message “Variables are not supported here, the recipient would see them as text” appears.
Send the SMS
Section titled “Send the SMS”Send to all your attendees with Send, then Send to all, Not sent or Sent, or to one attendee from the gear icon on their row in the Participants tab, with Send invitation by sms. Details are in Send invitations.
- One credit per SMS sent.
- Before a bulk send, Sweescape checks that you have at least as many credits as recipients. Otherwise, nothing is sent and the message “Insufficient SMS credits. Please add more credits to the account that owns this event” appears.
- Number format: preferably store numbers in international format (+33 6 12 34 56 78, +44 7700 900123). A number without a country code is treated as a French number.
- A number that asked to stop receiving SMS does not receive the invitation. When sending to a single attendee, the message “This participant has opted out of SMS (STOP), the invitation was not sent.” says so.
Buy SMS credits
Section titled “Buy SMS credits”Credits belong to your account and are used for all your SMS: invitations, campaigns and automations. For an event where you are a collaborator, the credits of the event owner’s account are used.
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Open your account menu in the top right corner, then click SMS Credits. The window title shows your balance: “Your SMS credits :” followed by the number of credits.
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Under Add SMS credits, type the number of SMS to buy in the field: a whole number, at least 1. The right side shows the unit price, stating whether VAT is included or added at checkout, then the total.
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Click To proceed with payment. Stripe’s secure payment page opens: pay by card and enter your billing address, and your VAT number if needed.
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Once the payment is accepted, Stripe takes you back to a Payment confirmed page on Sweescape. The credits are added to your balance within a few moments. The Back to dashboard button takes you back to the dashboard.
If you go back from the Stripe payment page without paying, a Payment cancelled page on Sweescape says that no payment was taken.
The unit price depends on the quantity, in tiers: from 65,000 SMS, then from 186,000 SMS. The prices shown are the ones Stripe applies at checkout. Stripe issues an invoice for each purchase.
If the number entered is not a whole number of at least 1, the message “Enter a whole number of SMS credits, at least 1.” appears below the field and the To proceed with payment button stays greyed out. If the prices do not load, or the payment page cannot open, a message asks you to try again later.