Empress SMS Settings: Integrate and Send Texts Directly

Guides & Tutorials
1

Introduction

Welcome to our user-friendly guide on configuring SMS settings within the Empress platform. This feature allows you to integrate an SMS provider, enabling you to send text messages directly from your account. This feature is particularly useful for businesses that want to send notifications, reminders, or promotional messages to their customers or employees.

Step 1: Choose an SMS Gateway Provider

To begin, you’ll need to select an SMS Gateway Provider offering HTTP API services. This provider will create an account for you and provide a unique username and password.

Step 2: Access SMS Settings in Empress

Accessing the SMS settings is straightforward. Simply go to:

Home > Settings > SMS Settings

Step 3: Understand the HTTP API

The HTTP API is a document provided by your chosen provider, which explains how to access their SMS interface from third-party applications like Empress. This document will include a URL used to send SMS via HTTP requests, which is essential for configuring your SMS settings.

The SMS Gateway URL

The SMS Gateway URL looks something like this:

http://instant.smses.com/web2sms.php?username=<username>&password;=<password>&to;=<mobilenumber>&sender;=<senderid>&message;=<message>

Note: For the SMS Gateway URL, only include the string before the “?”.

For example, if your URL is:

http://instant.smses.com/web2sms.php?username=abcd&password;=abcd&to;=9900XXXXXX&sender;=DEMO&message;=THIS+IS+A+TEST+SMS

This URL sends an SMS from the account ‘abcd’ to the mobile number ‘9900XXXXXX’ with the sender ID ‘DEMO’ and the text message “THIS IS A TEST SMS”.

Static values, such as the username and password, will be provided by your SMS provider. These should be entered in the Static Parameters table.

Step 4: Configuration with Voip.ms

If you have a Voip.ms account, follow these steps to configure your Empress account:

  1. Log in to your Voip.ms account.
  2. Navigate to Main Menu > SOAP and REST/JSON API.
  3. Enable the API, set a password, and whitelist your server IP address.
  4. Go to DIDs (Direct Inward Dialing numbers) and enable SMS on the number SMS will be sent from.
  5. Set the SMS Gateway to https://voip.ms/api/v1/rest.php
  6. Set the Message Parameter to message and Receiver Parameter to dst
  7. Create 4 new Static Parameters: api_username (Voip.ms account username), api_password (the API password you configured), method (set value to sendSMS), and did (the 10 digits DID that will be used to send the SMS).

After you’ve made these changes, visit the SMS Center to test if everything is functioning correctly.

Conclusion

By following these steps, you’ll have successfully integrated your Empress account with an SMS provider. This feature brings a host of benefits to your business, from improving communication with your mobile users to enhancing your marketing efforts. For further assistance, reach out to our support team or check out additional non-technical resources in our help center.