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Brands

A brand is who is texting: the business name your messages come from, registered with the carriers. It is registered once, and every campaign underneath sends under that name.

The Brands view of a business lists the brands registered against that business. There is no business column and no picker, because the business is the page you are on.

Why brands exist separately from businesses​

The business answers "which legal entity is this?" The brand answers "what name will recipients see this traffic under?" Carriers keep them apart because the two questions have different audiences. The registration number and registered address matter to a reviewer checking records; the name matters to the person whose phone lights up.

In practice these are usually the same words. The brand name defaults to the business's legal name, and for most organizations that is exactly right. Change it only when recipients would genuinely not recognize the legal name — a practice that trades under a shorter name, say. If you do change it, keep it something a recipient would connect to the business they gave their number to. A name nobody recognizes reads as spam, and that judgement is made by the person receiving the message, not by a reviewer.

One brand per business​

Carriers allow one brand per business, and the app enforces that: a business that already has a brand says so instead of offering another. If you genuinely need to text under two different names, you need two businesses — which means two legal entities, each verified on its own. See Your businesses for when that is really the case and when it is not.

What you do not need a second brand for is sending different kinds of message. That is what campaigns are for: one brand, several campaigns.

What registering a brand requires​

An approved business. This is a hard prerequisite. The brand registration is filed as that legal entity, so the entity has to be verified first. If the business is not approved yet, the Add brand dialog tells you so and links straight to finishing it rather than leaving you to work out what "not eligible" meant.

Almost nothing else from you. The only field the dialog asks for is the brand name. Everything a carrier needs about the brand — legal name, registration number, business type, website, address, authorized representative — comes from the business details you already filled in. That is the payoff for having done that page carefully: you do not type any of it twice, and there is no second place for it to drift out of date.

Cost​

Registering a brand carries carrier fees: a one-time setup charge plus a recurring monthly charge. The exact amounts are shown in the dialog before you confirm, and again on the Brand registration row of the Status checklist.

Billing starts when registration starts — not when the brand is approved. That is worth knowing before you register a brand you are not ready to use. If a registration stops partway and has to be restarted, the setup fee is not charged again.

After you register​

The brand goes to carriers for verification. Expect a few days. The Status page's Brand registration row carries the live state, and its status pill reads:

StatusMeaning
Not startedRegistration has not been submitted.
In reviewCarriers are verifying the business identity behind the brand.
ApprovedCleared. Campaign review can proceed.
Needs changesSomething was rejected, or the registration stopped early.

Needs changes covers two different situations and the row's note tells you which:

  • "Registration needs updated information before it can continue" — carriers rejected something. Go back to the business details, correct what the banner names, and retry.
  • "Registration stopped before it finished" — nothing is wrong with your data. The run ended early and needs restarting. The row offers the restart, and it does not re-charge the setup fee.

Do not wait idle during the brand review. The campaign copy and opt-in evidence steps open as soon as brand registration starts, and they are the work that would otherwise happen after approval. Filling them in now is the difference between a fast setup and a slow one.

Inside a brand​

Opening a brand gives you two tabs:

  • Consent — the campaign copy and opt-in wording this brand's messages carry. Covered in Campaigns.
  • Enrollment — the published opt-in form recipients use, and the evidence link a reviewer opens. Also covered in Campaigns.

Both belong to the brand rather than to any one campaign, which is why they live here: the consent wording is a property of the name people are consenting to hear from.

Tips​

  1. Keep the brand name as close to the legal name as recognition allows. Divergence buys you nothing and costs you recipient trust.
  2. Register the brand when you are actually ready to move — billing starts at registration, not at approval.
  3. Use the review wait. Open the Consent tab and write the campaign copy while you wait.