Guide to SMS conversations

Find out about Conversations in Klaviyo, which allows you to instantly communicate with your SMS subscribers via text message. 

With Conversations, also called two-way messaging, it’s easy to provide support to customers, building trust and loyalty along the way. 

Use cases for Conversations

The main purpose of Conversations is to offer SMS support to customers.This is good for businesses:

• With a dedicated support team. 
• Looking to offer support, either for the first time or during peak seasons. 
• Wanting to use SMS for support. 

How Conversations works in Klaviyo

A new conversation starts when someone texts your SMS number and does not include a keyword. 

If that person is an SMS subscriber, you can reply, answering their question or following up another way.  

You cannot: 

• Start a conversation with a customer: they must text you first.
• Text anyone who isn’t currently consented to SMS. 
• Use Conversations with a branded sender ID (also called alphanumeric sender ID), as this type of number cannot receive inbound text messages. 

View your Conversations

To view your conversations: 

1. Select Conversations in the left-hand sidebar. 
2. Review the inbox for any inbound conversations.
   • A blue dot indicates a new message. 
     

Once you click into a conversation, you can:

• The last 50 messages between you and the profile, including any flow, campaign, and auto-responder messages that you sent
• See information about the profile, including: 
  • Whether they’re an SMS subscriber. 
  • Location, if available. 
  • Recent activity. 
  • Recent orders (Shopify only).
    

Inbound MMS (i.e., images and videos the subscriber texted to you) do not appear in the text thread; however, you can see any MMS you sent out. 

Activity

If you click the Activity button on the right, you’ll see a list of recent activity. You can filter this activity based on the metric you want to see.

This can help you see what the subscriber has done recently. For instance, did a message fail or bounce? Did they recently enter a certain flow or receive a campaign? This can help inform your conversation. 

If you need more information than what’s shown, you can also go to that subscriber’s profile. There, you can get more details about a specific event

Orders (Shopify only)

If Shopify is your ecommerce platform, you can also see someone’s recent orders. 

After you click Orders, you can view details about that customer’s purchases, include what products they ordered, how much it cost, and more. 

Conversation statuses  

A conversation can have 1 of 3 statuses:

• Open
  Status for ongoing conversations, such as when you haven’t responded or are waiting for the subscriber to reply. 
• Snoozed
  Status to hide a conversation and remind you of it later today, tomorrow, or in 1 week. 
• Closed (also called archived)
  Status for when a conversation is complete and you no longer want to see it in your inbox. Closed conversations can be reopened, either from within Klaviyo or by the profile sending another message. 

In addition, a conversation can be either read or unread. The unread indicator appears as a blue dot next to a conversation. 

Learn how to change the status of a conversation [LINK]. 

Blocking a profile

If you no longer want to receive messages from a profile, you can block them. 

Once you block a profile: 

• Klaviyo closes the conversation from this profile.
• You will no longer be notified about new messages from this profile. 

Key settings for Conversations

There are 3 key settings for Conversations: 

• Auto-responder 
• Automatically shorten links 
• Notifications about new messages

To access these settings: 

1. Navigate to the Inbox tab. 
2. Click the gear icon.
   
3. A modal will appear, where you can access all these settings. 

Auto-responder

Your auto-responder is an automatic reply when someone texts your number and doesn’t use a recognized subscribe or compliance keyword (such as STOP, JOIN, or HELP). 

Recommendations: 

• For those who want to use Conversations for support:
  • Change the auto-responder to send only to non-consented profiles. 
  • Update the message to be something like: “{{Organization prefix}}: We are unable to respond as you have not consented to receive SMS. For help, reach us at {{email}}.” 
• For those who don’t want to use Conversations for support: 
  • No change is needed, as the default is to send the message to all profiles. 

Automatically shorten links

This setting, which is on by default, automatically shortens any link in your outbound messages. Shortening links is beneficial because it: 

• Uses fewer characters in any outbound SMS messages. 
• Allows revenue to be attributed within Klaviyo. 

Recommendation: keep this setting turned on.

Learn about the different types of shortened link that are available. 

Notifications about new messages

There are 2 options for conversation notifications: 

• Email notifications (off by default). 
  • Sends an email to any number of email addresses when you receive a new message in the inbox. 
  • Recommendation: turn on this setting if you plan to Conversations to provide customer support; otherwise, leave this setting off. 
• Unread message indicator (on by default) 
  • Shows how many unread Conversations you have (i.e., this is by the number of profiles who have texted, not by the number of unique messages). 
  • Recommendation: leave this setting turned on so you can monitor the number of messages coming in.

Filters for Conversations

You can filter your conversations by: 

• Status (open, closed, or snoozed)
• Unread vs. read 
• Responses attributed to certain campaigns or flows

Replying to subscribers

1. Click the conversation that you want to respond to.
2. Click into the text box below the message history.
   • If the person has not yet consented, this response field is grayed out and you will not be able to respond until they opt into SMS marketing. 
   • If the profile is subscribed to SMS marketing, you can respond in the space.
     

In your message, you can include images, GIFs, emojis, and coupons just like you can in any other SMS. You can also send multiple messages in a row

Best practices for two-way messaging

2 important things to remember when using two-way messaging are:

• Respond quickly
• Check recipient’s local time (if not responding immediately)

Respond to messages quickly

People expect a quick response when they text, much faster than when they send you an email or fill out a customer support form. Thus, ensure that you have the resources to reply quickly and meet demand.

When it comes to SMS support, quicker response times are key. Aim to text back within the hour, and make sure that you are responding to all incoming messages. 

Check recipient’s local time (if not responding immediately)

If someone texts you outside of your regular support hours, make sure you check their timezone before texting back. 

If a profile’s location is available, you can see this by clicking the name or number within the conversation. Then, look up the timezone for that location. 

Avoid sending during the following hours in the recipient’s local time:

• Before 8 a.m.  
• After 8 p.m.  

Additional resources

• How to change the status of a conversation
• Writing SMS and MMS copy
• Understanding how Klaviyo billing works