Direct Starter Registration Overview

Twilio offers a lightweight Starter Brand A2P 10DLC option for low-volume customers. Starter Brand registration is free and you only need to provide your name and contact information to get registered.

This guide provides an overview for direct customers who want to register their own business for A2P 10DLC messaging capabilities as a Starter Brand. It also covers the many benefits of making use of this registration package. We’ll show how Starter Brands compare to Standard Brands, and how to determine which tier is best for individual customers’ use cases.

Learn more about Direct Brand A2P 10DLC here.

How to determine your registration package

Twilio offers three options for registering your business for US A2P 10DLC messaging: Starter Brand, Low-Volume Standard Brand, and Standard Brand registration. To determine which of these is best for you, you should primarily consider your current and expected messaging traffic volume.

Your business would be better suited for the Starter Brand if:

• You do not have a Tax ID/EIN
• You send fewer than 3,000 messages per day to the US
• You use at most five US 10DLC phone numbers to send messages to the US

If your business does have a tax registration ID (such as EIN), you are not eligible for a Starter Brand. A Low-Volume Standard Brand would be best if:

• You send fewer than 6,000 message segments per day to the US
• You only need low message throughput

If your business needs surpass these limits, you should register for a Standard Brand.

Starter Package Benefits

The Starter Package has a simplified verification process that requires less vetting and verification than the Standard Package. The first step of creating a Starter Package is to create a Starter Customer Profile. To do this, you will only need to provide your:

• Full name (first and last)
• Email address
• Billing address
• Phone number

After you've created a Starter Profile, you will also need to register for a Starter Brand and a Starter Campaign. Twilio will cover all Starter Brand and Campaign registration fees, effectively making the Starter Package registration free. Additionally, Starter Packages are allowed one Campaign that can have five or fewer US 10-digit long code numbers. It also supports Mixed Campaign use cases.

Here, at a glance, are the Starter Package specifications:

Why should you register for a Starter Package?

Twilio is working on a streamlined Starter Brand registration for hobbyists, independent developers, and small businesses whose messaging volume never exceeds the thresholds listed above. If you do not exceed the thresholds of a Starter Profile, you are not required to take action. However, this streamlined registration is not yet available to customers, and some customers might wish to have a registered A2P profile sooner.

If you are looking to benefit from the increased messaging throughput and deliverability that having an A2P Profile Registration provides, you can follow the steps outlined below to complete the process yourself.

Register for a Starter Package with the Trust Hub

You can register for a Starter Package in the Twilio Console. In the Console you will:

1. Create your Starter Business Profile to represent your business.
2. Register a Starter Brand and review A2P registration limits for Starter Brands.
3. Register a Starter Campaign Use Case and link it to a Messaging Service.

1. Create a Starter Business Profile

To create a Starter Business Profile, you will need to provide information about yourself and your business.

On the A2P Landing Page within the Trust Hub, click Register for A2P.

You'll then begin the profile registration flow. Start by selecting "Starter customer profile" as the profile type. Note that Starter profiles are recommended for customers sending less than 3,000 messages per day.

Next you will need to provide the following information to complete your Starter Business profile:

• Profile Name: This can be the business name or your own name if you are not registering for a business/organization.
• Your contact information: The contact information you provide should be for you or for anyone who can answer questions about this customer profile if needed.
  • First and Last Name
  • Email Address
  • Country Code
  • Phone number

Then, click Save and Continue at the bottom of the page.

Next, you'll add a business address to your profile. You may enter a new address or you can select from an existing address if you have registered any previously. If entering a new address, you will need to provide your:

• Country
• City
• Street address
• City
• State/Province/Region
• Postal Code

Click Save and Continue at the bottom of the page when you are ready to move on.

You will then see a page where you can review the information you've submitted for this Customer Profile. You will be asked to confirm the information, and then can continue to the next step, registering for a US A2P Brand. Click Submit for review when you are ready to proceed.

2. Register a Starter Brand and review A2P registration limits

You will see two pages that list the A2P registration limits associated with Starter Brands. You will not need to pay A2P brand registration fees for a Starter Brand. Revisit the Starter Brand Benefits section of this guide for a refresher on the limits of this tier.

Click Continue when you’ve reviewed the limits and are ready to continue.

3. Register a Starter Campaign Use Case

Finally, you will create a Messaging Service or select an existing Messaging Service and link it to a campaign use case. As noted earlier, Starter Brands support a Mixed campaign use-case.

If you would like to register an existing Messaging Service, you can select Use an existing Messaging Service and select that Service from the list. Otherwise, select Create a new Messaging Service.

If you are creating a Messaging Service, you will complete two more steps to create a new Service. If you selected an existing Messaging Service, you will skip to the final step, "Register Campaign Use Case".

To create a new Messaging Service, provide a "Friendly Name" and select what you will be using the Service for from the dropdown (notifying users, marketing services, verifying users, etc). Then, click Save and Continue. Your Messaging Service is now created.

Next, you can add Senders to this new Messaging Service. You can associate a maximum of five US 10DLC phone numbers with this Starter Campaign. Note that you can leave the senders empty at this stage and add them later in the Messaging Services section of the Console.

If you already have available numbers (unattached to other Messaging Services) you can select them under Numbers Available for association.

If you do not have any available numbers, click the link to Buy a new number, which will take you to the Phone Numbers section of the Twilio Console to purchase one. Once you have purchased a phone number, you can return to the Trust Hub and reload the page.

When you’ve finished adding Senders to your Messaging Service, hit the Save and continue button.

Finally, you will confirm and register your campaign use case. If you did not create a new Messaging Service and instead selected an existing Messaging Service to link to this profile, you will have skipped to this final step.

You will see a summary of all the information you provided about the A2P Campaign and the attached Messaging Service. Verify this information and click the Register campaign use case button at the bottom of the page. You will then see an additional popup asking you to confirm additional information about the campaign use case, such as the terms and conditions. Click Confirm to finalize the reigstration.

Once you've clicked Register campaign use case and Confirm, the campaign use case registration will enter the approval process. The process takes a few seconds. You will see an on-screen message indicating that your registration flow is complete when the use case has been approved.

What's next?

When you are ready to make the leap to higher messaging volume, increased throughput, and phone number limits, please see the onboarding guide for an outline of the Standard Brand registration process.