Using text messages to communicate is becoming more and more popular for business-to-consumer communications. Brands and other companies have been utilizing text messages to ensure their customers receive important and timely information.

According to research completed by Rebrandly, SMS open rates are nearly 5x higher than email. Now you can take advantage of this effective communication channel to directly connect with your participants.

Here are a few ways you can get started with the new SMS tool:

Enable SMS opt-in

SMS messages should only be sent to those who have given their consent. We’ve made it incredibly easy for you to collect consent by adding a quick-enable feature on your registration questions page. Utilizing this feature will ensure your participants are asked if they would like to opt-in to SMS messages during registration.

In case there are a number of participants who have already registered for your event, but were not asked to opt-in to SMS messages, you can alternatively send them a unique URL, allowing participants and other relevant individuals to opt-in to SMS after the fact, outside of registration.

Visit our knowledge base to learn how to collect SMS opt-ins during and outside of registration.

Purchase SMS credits and create credit pools

Credits are required to send out text message notifications to your participants, but we’ve ensured that purchasing SMS credits is a simple task. Using the Race Roster credit system, you can select the amount of credits you would like to purchase in order to send text messages through your Race Roster user account. The amount of credits you need will vary depending on the location of your participants. For example, the USA and Canada require 1 credit per 1 message. 

Visit our knowledge base for instructions on how to purchase SMS credits.

You can also create credit pools and add collaborators to share SMS credits across organizations. See our step-by-step instructions on how to share SMS credits across organizations.

Send important event information

We’ve introduced the Race Roster SMS tool to help you send important event information to a place your participants are most likely to see it. Easily create SMS campaigns to deliver your participants messages such as thank you notes, resources for training, notifications for upcoming broadcasts (e.g., your LIVE post-race party), reminders to submit their results, and more!

Visit our knowledge base for instructions on how to create and send an SMS campaign.

The SMS tool will provide you with another way to connect with your participants and deliver essential event information directly to their phone. As always, if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to resource us.

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Race Roster

At our core, we are event organizers and athletes serving event organizers and athletes. Race Roster was founded by a group of friends with combined interests in running, technology, and event management. After organizing their own 10K in 2010, it was very apparent that the running industry was in dire need of better technology. Since May of 2012, Race Roster has partnered with over 4,000 organizers to grow, manage and execute on race day!