CiviCRM Community Forums (archive)

As part of a new fundraising effort, I'd like to set up some "pledge via SMS" functionality via CiviCRM. 

At our theatre performances, we'd ask patrons to send an SMS to our inbound SMS number with a message like "pledge 25" to indicate they'd like to donate $25.  If they show us their phone with the sent SMS on the way out, they'd get a small gift related to the show they just saw.  Later on, our staff would call them to get contact info and payment details for the pledge/donation.

Is this something that CiviSMS can handle -- or could handle with a small dev effort?  I don't want to reinvent the wheel if CiviSMS can do this or is close.

If not, I was planning to code this up using Twilio, which can do a GET/POST to a callback URL for each inbound SMS.  I'd have a bit of PHP at the callback URL to process the inbound SMS and do the following:

1) If the mobile number is associated with an existing contact, add that contact to a group like "Pledgers" and add a note to the contact record with the SMS content.
2) If the mobile number isn't associated with any contact, add a new contact record, and do the same re: group and note.

BTW, is it possible to have a contact record with no details other than a mobile number?

Later staff can go through all the contact records in the Pledgers group, contact them, process donations, and merge contact records if we discover that person already had a contact record, but without their mobile number.

Okay, I've got this completed now.  Two parts:

1) As of 4.2 at least, CiviSMS does not create new contact records for inbound SMS from unknown mobile numbers.  I've added support for that, along with improved support for SMS provider Twilio.  Opened CRM-11299 for this with patch attached.  Thanks to bpmccain for initial Twilio support patch he provided in CRM-11207.

2) I created an extension that implements hook_civicrm_post() to look for new "SMS Received" activities.  If the SMS body starts with the word "Pledge", then we add the contact to a group named "SMS Pledge" and send a "thanks for pledging" auto-response SMS.

If I have time (or collaborators) I'd like to flesh this out with an admin interface where you can create multiple rules/actions/auto-responses for inbound SMS messages.

Here's my hook for reference:

function inboundsms_civicrm_post( $op, $objectName, $id, &$params ) {
if (($objectName == 'Activity') && ($op == 'create') &&
(! strcmp($params->subject, 'SMS Received'))) {
// inbound SMS "rules"
$messageActions = Array ( 1 => Array (
'pattern' => '/^[Pp]led*ge/',
'group' => 'SMS Pledge',
'response' => "Thanks for your pledge to Bay Area Children's Theatre!  A staff member will contact you soon to complete your donation." ) );
// loop over pattern/action array
foreach ($messageActions as $key => $actions) {
if (preg_match($actions['pattern'], $params->details)) {
// check for existing group
$groupQueryParams = Array ( 'title' => $actions['group'] );
$messageActionGroup = CRM_Contact_BAO_Group::retrieve($groupQueryParams);
if (! $messageActionGroup) {
// create group if it doesn't exist
$groupQueryParams['description'] = $actions['group'];
$groupQueryParams['is_active'] = TRUE;
$messageActionGroup = CRM_Contact_BAO_Group::create($groupQueryParams);
}
$groupID = $messageActionGroup->id;
// add contact to group
$contacts = Array ( 1 => $params->source_contact_id );
$result = CRM_Contact_BAO_GroupContact::addContactsToGroup($contacts, $groupID);
// send SMS reply
$provider = CRM_SMS_Provider::singleton($_REQUEST);
$header = Array( 'To' => $params->phone_number,
'Contact' => $params->source_contact_id );
$recipients = Array();
$provider->send($recipients, $header, $actions['response']);
// return after first match
return;
}
}
}
}


how do you get around the fact that you don't know these contact's names / email addresses?

I make up a fake email address by appending "@mobile.sms" to the phone number, and leave the name empty.  In our use case, these are inbound "pledge by SMS" messages, and someone on our staff will call them back to fill out the rest of the contact details, or merge with an existing contact where we didn't have the mobile number on file.