Messages & SMS

Your dialnote inbox isn't just for calls—you can send and receive SMS text messages directly from your business phone numbers. Messages appear alongside calls in your conversation timeline, giving you a complete view of every customer interaction.

Enabling SMS on a Phone Number#

Before you can send messages, you'll need to enable SMS on at least one phone number:

1. Go to Settings → Phone Numbers
2. Click on the number you want to configure
3. Scroll to the Messaging section
4. Toggle Enable SMS on

Sending Messages#

You can send SMS messages in two ways:

From a Conversation#

If you already have an ongoing conversation with a contact:

1. Open the conversation from your inbox
2. Make sure the Message tab (next to the Note tab) is selected at the bottom of the chat view
3. Type your message and press Enter or click the send button

The message input shows a character counter—SMS messages can be up to 1,600 characters. Messages over 160 characters get split into multiple segments by carriers, but they'll still appear as one message to your recipient. The counter turns amber at 80% of the limit and red at 95%.

Starting a New Conversation#

To message someone you haven't talked to yet:

1. Click the New message button (the message-plus icon) at the top of your conversation list
2. In the Compose SMS window, pick which phone number to send from
3. Search for a contact or enter a phone number directly
4. Type your message and click Send Message

The New message button is grayed out if the selected phone number doesn't have SMS enabled. See Messages & SMS for more on the messaging side of things.

Viewing Message Status#

Outbound messages show delivery status with small icons:

• Clock (spinning): Message is sending
• Single checkmark: Sent to carrier
• Double checkmark (gray): Delivered to recipient's phone
• Double checkmark (blue): Message was read (when supported by carrier)
• Warning triangle (red): Delivery failed

If a message fails, you'll see an error code explaining why—common reasons include invalid phone numbers, carrier filtering, or the recipient opting out.

Receiving Messages#

Incoming messages appear automatically in your inbox. When a customer texts your dialnote number:

• The message shows up in the conversation timeline
• You'll see it marked as an inbound message with a gray bubble
• If real-time updates are enabled, messages appear instantly without refreshing

Messages from new contacts create a new conversation automatically. The contact's phone number appears in the conversation until you add them to your contacts with a name.

MMS and Attachments#

You can both send and receive picture messages (MMS). To attach a file while composing a message, click the paperclip icon in the message toolbar, or just drag and drop a file onto the input. You can also attach a file in the Compose SMS window when starting a new conversation.

Supported attachment types:

• Images: JPEG, PNG, and GIF (display inline, click to view full-size)
• Documents: PDF (shows as a downloadable file)

Messages vs. Notes#

The message input has two modes—Message and Note:

Notes appear in the conversation timeline with an amber background and a document icon, so you can easily tell them apart from actual messages. Use notes to leave context for teammates who might handle the next interaction. You can @-mention a teammate inside a note to flag them. For more, see Internal Notes.

Canned Responses#

If you find yourself typing the same replies over and over, canned responses can save you time. These are pre-written message templates your team can insert with a couple of clicks.

To use a canned response while typing a message, click the lightning bolt icon in the message toolbar. A searchable list of saved templates pops up—each one shows its title, an optional keyboard shortcut, and a preview of the body. Type in the search box to filter by title, body, or shortcut, then pick a template and it drops in at your cursor. You can edit it before sending if you need to personalize it.

Set up canned responses in Settings → Canned Responses. Each template has a title, body, and optional shortcut and category. See Canned Responses for the full setup.

Scheduling Messages#

Need to send a message later? dialnote lets you schedule SMS messages to go out at a specific time:

1. Type your message in the conversation
2. Click the clock icon next to the send button
3. Pick a preset (In 1 hour, Tomorrow at 9:00 AM, Tomorrow at 2:00 PM) or set a custom date and time
4. Click Schedule to queue the message

Scheduled messages can be sent between 15 minutes and 7 days in the future. You can cancel a scheduled message before it sends—look for the Scheduled status tag on the message.

Character Limits and Segmentation#

SMS has a few technical limits to keep in mind:

• Standard SMS: 160 characters per segment
• Unicode SMS (emojis, non-Latin characters): 70 characters per segment
• Max length: 1,600 characters total

dialnote's message input shows your character count and warns you when approaching the limit. Carriers charge per segment, so shorter messages can save on costs.

What's Next#

• Conversations — manage and filter your inbox threads
• Internal Notes — leave private context for your team
• Messages & SMS — the full messaging guide, segments, and scheduling
• Auto-Replies — send automatic replies to missed calls and texts
• Canned Responses — build reusable message templates
• A2P 10DLC Registration — register so US carriers deliver your texts