What is the value in prioritizing Conversation API channels?

At its core, the Sinch Conversation API is designed to increase the reach to your customer base with rich messaging across multiple channels.

A customer may have reached out to you both on Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp. How can you manage the way in which you contact that customer? You certainly do not want to send a duplicate message across two or more channels. What happens when customers you normally message on certain apps does not have access to data or Wi-Fi? Can you reach them via SMS instead?

You can manage the reach method by setting the order of the channels within each app in the Conversation API. Learn how to reorder channels within your Conversation API apps. 

The subsections below explore common reasons for managing message delivery on different channels using Conversation API:

Channel Popularity in Each Market

Let’s say you want to send messages to both customers in the US and Brazil. Your configured channels are SMS, WhatsApp, and RCS. In Brazil, WhatsApp is more popular (over RCS). By managing your channel priority, you may choose to send WhatsApp first and followed by RCS, then SMS. On the other hand, choosing SMS followed by RCS in the US might yield higher open rates.

Conversation API let's you manage channel-priority on both the app and message level, so you can make more granular decisions based on your needs.

Rich Content as the Priority

With the goal of sending as many rich of messages as possible, your channel priority may be set like this:

1. RCS
2. WhatsApp
3. Viber
4. SMS

In this example of channel priority, you start by sending the most rich, interactive content possible—via RCS.  However, not everyone can receive RCS messages. So, the Conversation API would then transcode that content down to the rich messaging features that are available on the channel that the recipient does have.

SMS would typically be last in priority because we know it’s the channel most likely to reach the recipient.

Flexibility in Bad Service Areas

Channel priority also aids in the selection of a fallback channel in the event a customer is in a bad service area. If a channel receives an error or if a certain amount of time had elapsed without a positive delivery event, the Conversation API can, dependent on your integrated solution, switch to the next available channel.

By setting channel priority,

• In the Contact record
• In the App Channel Configuration
• At time of dispatch

You choose the channel priority for fallback in the event of a permanent delivery failure.  

Customer Preference is Still Considered

Once the message is delivered on a channel, that channel could be set as the preferred channel for that customer. When sending a message, you can specify a preferred channel or a last-used channel.

As an example, some users may have given consent for WhatsApp while others have given consent for RCS.  So, during the delivery of messages to these users, the channel preference ought to be reordered so the correct channel will be used to deliver the message.

In setting the channel order, you are essentially telling the app the order you prefer on a generic basis. However, the Conversation API is intelligent enough to adjust for customer preference.

Learn how to reorder channels within your Conversation API apps. 

The key to the Conversation API channel reordering is allowing for flexibility to meet multiple demands.

Visit the Sinch Documentation site to learn more about how we support these channels.

Learn more about Sinch Conversation API.