Use contact attributes to personalize your SMS messages with details specific to each recipient, such as their first name. This allows you to send one SMS campaign to multiple contacts while making each message feel individually tailored.

How does SMS personalization work?

SMS personalization works by adding variables to your SMS content. When the SMS is sent, these variables are automatically replaced with information relevant to each recipient.

SMS sent from Brevo	SMS received by John who made a $49.99 purchase

You can include different types of variables in your SMS messages:

• 👤 Contact attribute variables
  Personalize messages with contact details, such as first and last names.
• ⚡ Event data variables
  Personalize messages with data from the event that triggered an automation or the latest instance of an event, such as an order total.
• 🛢️ Data feed variables
  Personalize messages with API or external data, such as lists of products or items. 

Good to know

• If you are using a Brevo plugin to send SMS messages directly from your website (rather than through Brevo's interface), the process may differ from the one described here. To learn more, check your plugin-specific documentation.
• When using personalization in SMS messages, since variables are replaced with actual values at the time of sending, the final character count may vary from the one displayed in the SMS editor. For example, "Hi, FIRSTNAME" might be estimated as 33 characters, but it becomes 9 characters with "Hi, Paul" and 13 characters with "Hi, Alexander". 

👤 Personalize an SMS message with contact attributes

Use the contact attributes stored in your Brevo account to personalize your SMS messages. You can include details such as your recipients' first and last names, birthdays, or any other information stored in their contact attributes.

In what type of SMS messages can I use contact attribute variables?

Contact attribute variables can be used in:

• SMS campaigns sent from the Campaigns page
• Promotional SMS and transactional SMS sent from an automation created in the new editor.

About contact attribute variables formatting

Contact attribute variables are formatted using double curly brackets like this:

{{contact.ATTRIBUTE_NAME}}

The ATTRIBUTE_NAME part needs to be replaced with the exact name of your contact attribute, matching the spelling and case as it appears on the Contact Attributes page.

For example, if the contact attribute for the first name of your contacts is FIRSTNAME, the {{contact.FIRSTNAME}} placeholder is inserted into your SMS content.

Insert a contact attribute variable in an SMS message

In this use case, we want to display our recipient's first name. To insert contact attributes in your SMS messages: 

1. Create an SMS campaign or an automation that contains the Send an SMS step. 
2. In the Message or Content field, enter your SMS content and place your cursor where you want to insert your contact attribute.

3. From there, choose how you want to insert your contact attribute variable: 

   With the Add variable menu [Advanced] Manually

   1. Click the two curly brackets icon { } and select Contact variables from the list.
   2. Search through the list of contact attributes and click on the one you want to include in your SMS campaign. In our example, we will choose FIRSTNAME.
      When the contact attribute is correctly inserted, an orange placeholder with its name will appear.

   1. Copy the following placeholder and insert it into your SMS content: {{contact.ATTRIBUTE_NAME}}.
      We recommend adding the last two curly brackets only after replacing the values.
   2. Replace ATTRIBUTE_NAME with the exact name of your contact attribute, matching the spelling and case as it appears on the Contact Attributes page. In our example, it will be {{contact.FIRSTNAME}}. When the contact attribute is correctly inserted, an orange placeholder with its name will appear.
4. (Optional) Apply filters to use a default value if the contact attribute is empty, or apply uppercase to your text, for example. To learn more, check our dedicated article Modify the formatting of your placeholders with filters.
5. Finish the content of your SMS campaign and click Save.

You have personalized your SMS with a contact attribute. When the SMS is sent, the variable will automatically be replaced with information relevant to each recipient.

SMS sent from Brevo	SMS received by a recipient named John

⏩ What's next?

• Send an SMS campaign
• Is there a limit on the number of characters used in an SMS message?
• Include an unsubscribe option in your SMS messages

🤔 Have a question?

If you have a question, feel free to contact our support team by creating a ticket from your account. If you don't have an account yet, you can contact us here.

If you’re looking for help with a project using Brevo, we can match you with the right certified Brevo Agency partner.