April 26, 2024 // Product
Whether you’re locked in a long-term contract you’re starting to regret or paying exorbitant monthly rates, here are eight signs it may be time to switch your SMS provider.
Do you resonate with any of these signs? If so, let’s talk.
1. Lack of transparency
Does it feel like your messaging provider, and your relationship with them, exists inside a mysterious black box? For instance, you recently onboarded a new account who is eagerly waiting to start sending SMS messages from their landline, but the approval process seems to be taking forever… do you have a clear understanding as to what’s going on and how you might be able to address the issue?
Is there even a person at your current provider who you could contact to give you a quick, reliable answer? They may point you to a pile of documentation, but without a ton of external research on your part (and being able to understand the current state of your registration), it can feel impossible to find the answers you’re looking for.
This lack of transparency problem is a common issue among major communications providers, like the Twilios of the world. The 10DLC process can already be laborious and confusing – what does your current provider have to gain by obfuscating what should be easy answers?
Could it be that they want you to believe that switching providers would be more difficult and more painful than it actually is?
2. You don’t have the tools you need to support your customers
Are your devs spending an excessive amount of time and effort building internal tools just to try to work around your communication provider’s confusing UI?
It is really difficult to support a customer when you don't have the necessary tools and, to top it off, you don’t have any support from your provider to help fill in the gaps. They believe the tools are the tools, and unless you’re a top-tier client, you may not be worth their time to help you address your customers’ problems.
For example, you just heard from one of your concerned account managers that their large customer isn’t delivering appointment reminders as of this morning. This kind of issue can be a massive challenge to try to troubleshoot. Many times you’re left to pull expensive resources away from making improvements to your product to try to help figure out what’s going on - even when you suspect this is an issue with your communications provider!
It doesn’t have to be that way.
3. Your SMS cost-per-message is too high
Your monthly SMS bill is bloated. You may or may not have a contract with your provider, and you’re paying based on usage. That may have worked for a while, but as you scale and start to get pricing pressure from your big accounts, you are looking for SMS volume discounts — and your attempts at negotiating a better rate are falling on deaf ears.
We get it.
4. Customer support costs extra
In a world where customer experience is paramount, your communication provider has the gall to charge you extra for basic support by phone — in some cases, upwards of 6% more of your monthly bill. And, if you would like to receive technical support, you’ll have to pay even more — that might cost you 8% more monthly.
At Voxology, support is included for all customers, at no extra cost.
5. You don’t know your customer success manager’s name
Quick, name your customer success manager at your existing provider. If that feels like a trick question, you’re not alone. But isn’t it strange that the industry has moved so far away from providing true customer support that you would not be surprised if we told you we know of a company spending $20k/mo without a customer care connection?
So, again, what’s your customer success manager’s name? ;)
6. The topic of switching providers comes up often
It’s a domino effect, really. Major messaging providers don’t provide the support you need to, in turn, support your customers, which means your high-paid devs are required to handle basic support requests. What does this lead to? Some of your highest-priced resources are now dealing with tier 1 and tier 2 support requests, meaning they can’t spend their time enhancing your product.
How many times will you hear complaints from your team before taking action?
7. You can’t get the scale or throughput you need to succeed
Are you struggling to scale and get the kind of throughput you need? Or, are your customers’ demands outpacing your throughput capabilities? There are potentially a lot of places for optimization, from batch messaging APIs to better campaign registration and vetting, to selecting the right messaging type, your communications provider should be able to help you achieve the scale and throughput you need.
We offer a variety of tools and solutions, including batch, to better help you assess and address the challenges you are facing.
8. You’re not happy, but you feel stuck
TLDR? The barriers to making the switch feel too high to overcome. You’re unhappy with your current provider but the perceived reality of what it would take to make the switch has you feeling stuck in this bad relationship.
We can help make switching easy.