Customers are connected with several businesses for diverse needs, and so is the number of text messages they receive from various businesses in one day. Before the introduction of Google verified SMS, businesses used to send SMS from an unidentified random number, where recipients failed to understand and believe the credibility of an unsolicited message.  

Nevertheless, you should be careful to watch out for the criminals who might spoof caller IDs and reroute the messages for unnecessary actions. The messages can include links to the websites that might steal the personal information or credentials of the users, called phishing, which is highly dangerous. 

About 48% of the buyers have responded that they wish to have SMS messages to continuously receive the brand information and updates, which is followed by 22% for the email marketing. 

However, due to the unrecognized sources, phishing, spamming, spoofing, and other dangerous concerns, customers have greatly preferred to stay away from the messages from a random number, henceforth SMS campaigns fail due to unrecognized SMS sources. 

What is a Google Verified SMS? 

SMS or Short Messaging Service used to be the widely used kind of text messaging. Though it used to be an efficient tool for both personal and commercial communications, later the introduction of mobile applications like Whatsapp, Hike, Messenger, etc. have created opportunities for effortless communication among people.  

However, due to the proliferation of multiple messaging applications, the customers have now been spread into various applications, and this becomes difficult for businesses and marketers to communicate with them through a unified channel. Verified SMS is a new service that can include sender verification and brand awareness to the business SMS, therefore recipients can easily trust the messages they receive, at a glance. 

VSMS includes the sender verification and the brand identity to help the businesses send SMS so that end-users understand who contacts them. With these messages, your business can build trust, improve interactions, and prevent fraud with an unlimited messaging experience. 

You inform customers through texts that the messages you send are authentic. It lets you also add a brand logo, verification badge, and description giving customers a chance to open the added links. 

Regular SMS Vs Google Verified SMS 

Google Research reports state that about 77% of the US customers prefer the VSMS when compared to standard SMS, while 88% of respondents in Brazil favor verified SMS in Brazil. The Android smartphone users in India are currently 375 million, says Wikipedia, and this has clearly paved the way to increased possibilities for the businesses sending verified SMS to their customers. Here are the key differences between verified messages and regular text messages. 

• Standard SMS 

Standard SMS consists of simple text that includes no branding or major personalization elements. To use the standard SMS, there is no need to undergo any verification processes. Standard SMS is simplistic, and limited to only the character limit of 160, per message. 

• Verified SMS 

Verified SMS or VSMS is the consequent stage of A2P communications that can bring a user experience similar to the current chat applications. After activation, the users can get the enhanced business messaging experience automatically built with personalized experiences and improved brand credibility. 

Verified SMS Vs RCS 

Verified SMS is not to be confused with the term RCS, an acronym for Rich Communication Services. Some countries support the RCS, while some others support verified SMS. When the countries don’t support both, the messages reach them as a traditional and simple text message.  Though verified SMS is based upon the features of RCS, it does not cover everything that RCS can offer.  

Google verified SMS can accommodate text messages with link previews, verified badges, company logo, and business names. VSMS works well for text messages, however, it does not go with the MMS messages, hence if you share multimedia, images, or video, such messages will be visible as an unverified message in the transcript of the messages applications. 

RCS is feature-rich with live-action buttons, stickers, pictures, GIFs, etc. RCS can be used for more media-rich promotional campaigns and include images, videos, documents, audio, and so on, just the way Whatsapp or any other chat applications work. 

What does the Verified SMS look like? 

Once you initiate sending verified SMS to the Android devices with Vox CPaaS, the end-users can confirm your brand identity and ensure that the message is from a credible source. With VSMS, the messages you send will appear with the brand name on the top of the normal message application on the Android device. The logo will be displayed right aligned to the message, which makes sure that the message originates from your brand.  

Now there can be a dilemma between opting and not opting to VSMS due to the confusion of whether Google can read through and access your text messages. A big ‘No’ would be the perfect answer, Google never comes to know what message is being sent. Instead, it only recognizes the source from which the message is being sent and informs the source to the recipient, improving the credibility of your brand. 

How Google Verified SMS works? 

• When initiating sending a verified message with Vox CPaaS, we create an authentication key which is passed to Google. The authentication is a 1-way hash, hence Google can’t understand the content or message recipients.  

• Just like any other text message, your text messages are safely carried through mobile carriers. 

• Once the message application in the Android device receives the message, the device evaluates the authentication key and then sends this to Google, to ensure the authenticity of the message. 

• Google compares the message hash and finds a match, to confirm the message was sent by the business, to show the information like the business logo and verification badge along with the message. 

• Google identifies the identifier numbers of SIM (iSIM) to recognize the phone number that received the SMS to build authenticity codes. 

• If verified SMS settings are enabled in the messaging applications of the Android devices, then the participating businesses can track and analyze whether the phone number linked with the particular device is eligible to view the verified SMS.  

Also keep in mind that in case the devices don’t have verified SMS settings enabled, still the messages reach them as a standard SMS. 

Use cases of Google verified SMS 

1. User account verification  

Verified messages can be sent in case your business needs to send an OTP to the users as a part of the 2FA process, ie. two-factor authentication. When the OTP appears to be from a recognizable source, customers need not worry about account security. 

2. Fraud and spam alerts 

Several phishing alerts and scams have been prevalent about which people are scared of opening or interacting with the messages. Instead of having a URL embedded with the message, a legit verified message can let the customers realize that the fraud alerts sent by your brand are completely genuine. 

3. Order confirmations 

Once a customer places an order, it is great to follow up with them through verified SMS. The business logo and verification badge give an impression to the consumers that the business is highly established.  

4. Personalization of Marketing campaigns 

You can also make marketing communications like best offers, discounts, flash sales, customer rewards, product reviews, and abandoned cart reminders. Branding can be helpful to develop engagement, trust, and an improved rate of conversions when businesses or marketers start to personalize the campaign with verified messages. 

5. Sending Payment reminders 

When your businesses use VSMS to send payment reminders, alerts, and online payment notifications, then this can help them enhance the customer trust with sender verification and brand logo, thereby paving the way to an increase in the number of online payments made. 

Benefits of Google Verified SMS 

Businesses have many benefits while using verified SMS for messaging customers. 

• A unique brand logo that amplifies your brand identity 
• Information about the brand profile and verification by Google  
• Enhance the customer trust and experience 

• You can stay compliant across the globe  
• Spam messages can be eliminated 
• Can control and detect the fraudulent practices 
• You get detailed information about the spam, delivered, and unverified messages 

The benefits that customers gain while switching to receiving the verified messages are: 

• Can be sure about the authenticity of the brand 
• Easily identify the brand while receiving notifications 
• Receive interactive messages sent by businesses 
• High-end experience and enhanced conversations  
• Feature to report SMS as SPAM 

How to get your brand officially Google verified? 

Currently, vSMS is accessible in the ten major countries like the US, Brazil, Canada, UK, Italy, Spain, Mexico, France, Philippines, and India. Vox CPaaS is one of the leading service providers facilitating the ease of communication between businesses and customers with the power of Google verified SMS.  

If you are stuck at how to kickstart sending the safer and credible business SMS communication to the end-users, here are the steps to get started with vSMS: 

1. Before sending verified messages to your customers, you are required to register for verified SMS as a Google cloud SMS partner. 

2. Vox CPaaS collects your brand/business information and initiates the submission to Google for registration. The data collected include: 

• Name of the Company or business  
• URL of the Business Website 
• Brand logo to be displayed on the top of messages to be sent 
• Business Name or Brand Name  

• Company description that appears in the header part of VSMS, which is usually 100 characters in length. 
• Unique Sender ID 

3. The Whitelisting process and Google verification process are done on the behalf of the business. 

4. Our team takes care of the important technical aspects that cover the vSMS account. 

5. Finally, the testing is carried out to ensure that things are perfectly working before the implementation of vSMS. 

Wrap Up 

It is quite difficult to trust the business identity when you send the SMS to the recipients through an unidentified or random number. Certain messages can be misleading and deceive the customers by pretending to be your business. It is worst when these messages mislead them to share their personal information or provide links to harmful websites, called phishing. 

Using verified messages, you can add brand awareness and credibility to make the messages more trustworthy to the end-users. So far, this feature is not supported in iOS devices. They are available only to the Android device users, who have updated the message application to the latest version, and the function is turned on to receive the messages.  

Despite verifying the brand that sends messages to the customer, spam filtration is also available in verified messaging. It can warn the customer about the possibility of receiving a suspected or unsafe message. Users can also report these sources and enhance the spam detection system. They can also block the conversations and stop receiving such messages again.   

Google in partnership with Vox CPaaS has introduced verified SMS with the ultimate experience of chat applications and interactive messaging functions that can be utilized by businesses while sending messages to the customer. To know further and explore how Google verified SMS works, start with a free trial.