Onboarding with Apple Messages for Business

Before you create your Apple Messages for Business account, review the following Apple Messages for Business onboarding overview.

Messages for Business onboarding end-to-end flow
The Apple Messages for Business onboarding end-to-end flow

Register Your Account

Registering your Apple Messages for Business account requires the following actions.

Register your organization. Register your organization at Apple Business Register.
Create your Apple Messages for Business account. Create your Apple Messages for Business account, upload your branding, and select your Messaging Service Provider (MSP).
Approval. The Apple approval process can take few days. Be sure to account for the time needed and submit your account for approval as soon as possible.
Team members. Provide backup contacts for your Apple Messages for Business account by adding any additional team members to the account.
Connection. Testing your ability to send and receive messages may require you to connect your CRM with your Messaging Service Providers (MSPs) console.

For a more in-depth guide, see Register Your Account.

Plan for Your Customer's Journey

Using the Use Case template, define your most common use cases.

Channel goals. Define channel goals by completing and returning the Readiness Assessment.
Use cases. Determine the top contact drivers for customers or benchmark use cases that you want to support in the channel and meet the defined goals.
Interactive features. Consider how you currently address the defined use cases, then implement interactive features to support your customer's journey.
Entry points. Plan for entry points that can drive customer engagement, such as adding Messages buttons or using Message Suggest.

For more information, see Plan Your Customers's Journey.

Design Your User Experience and Implement

Once you complete filling out your Use Case template, work with your MSP to apply Best Practices and design and implement solutions for each use case.

Automated messages. Support an automated welcome message to greet customers, including an off-hours message. For more information on Design and Implement your User Experience.
Triage customers. Design a welcome Quick Reply or List Picker menu to triage customer intents and route appropriately. For more information on intents and routing, see About Intent, Group, and Body Values
Satisfaction surveys. Design a customer satisfaction survey list picker. Refer to CSAT survey design and code samples for ideas.
Authentication and Apple Pay. Configure Authentication and Apple Pay, if needed. Align with your MSP to get the full set of instructions.

For more information, see Design and Implement Your User Experience.

Prepare Operations and Marketing

Tracking. Plan to track defined channel goals with your MSP to measure your Apple Messages for Business success.
Training agents. Update agent scripts and train agents, in console, for Apple Messages for Business messaging and features.
Register for Message Suggest. Register your phone numbers for Message Suggest.
Marketing preparedness. Prepare your marketing plans for launch and include press releases.

For more information, see Preparing Your Teams for Launch.

Pass the Experience Review

Refer to the use case template you worked on during your planning phase to help you to set up a use case for the review. The following actions may take anywhere from 1-2 weeks:

  • Coordinate the use experience with your MSP platform or your internal team.
  • Prepare recordings of the customer experience using an Apple device.
  • Share the recordings with Apple.
  • Apple signs-off on automated agent interaction.
  • Implement feedback provided by Apple before launch.

For more information, see Experience Review.

Go Live

On your selected go-live date, you or your MSP need to activate your account and entry points. You need to schedule a performance review with your MSP.

For more information, see Go Live!.

Analyze Metrics and Grow

The following actions may take anywhere from 3-5 weeks to gather and analyze the data:

  • Review channel performance 30 days after launch.
  • Increase discoverability by adding additional entry points.
  • Review how current intents are being supported and plan for optimization.
  • Consider adding more customer intents to add more value to the channel.
  • Review metrics every 30 days to continuously improve channel.

For more information, see Optimize Your Customer’s Apple Messages for Business Experience.