The short answer
SMS works for solar companies in conversational use: replying to enquiries, confirming appointments, recovering missed calls and asking for reviews. It works poorly as a broadcast channel. Response rates are far higher than email, which makes it valuable and also makes misuse expensive in opt-outs and complaints.
- 01Text is for conversation and logistics, not for newsletters.
- 02Consent and opt-out handling are not optional, and rules vary by jurisdiction.
- 03Under 160 characters, from a person, with one clear question or action.
- 04The best solar text campaigns are triggered by events, not by a calendar.
Text messages get opened and read within minutes, which is exactly why they are valuable and exactly why they are easy to abuse. The distinction that keeps a solar company on the right side of it is simple: text is a conversation channel and an operational one. It is not a broadcast channel.
Where does text actually work for solar?
| Use | Works? | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Replying to a new enquiry | Very well | They just contacted you. Expected and welcome |
| Missed call text-back | Very well | They dialled seconds ago. See the dedicated article |
| Appointment confirmations | Very well | Logistics, genuinely useful |
| Review requests | Very well | Far higher response than email |
| Install day updates | Very well | Reduces inbound calls to the office |
| Reactivating an old quote | Works with care | Needs consent and a real reason |
| Monthly newsletters | Badly | Reads as intrusion, produces opt-outs |
| Cold outreach | Badly, and often unlawful | Do not |
Consent and compliance
Rules differ by country and state and they do change, so take local advice if you are operating at any scale. The principles that hold up everywhere are these.
- 01Have a basis for contacting them. They enquired, they called, they are a customer, or they explicitly opted in.
- 02Identify yourself in the message. Every time, not just the first.
- 03Honour opt-outs immediately, including informal ones. Stop means stop, and so does please do not text me.
- 04Keep records. When consent was given, how, and what was sent.
- 05Respect quiet hours. Nothing before eight or after nine, whatever the local rule technically allows.
- 06Never buy a list. Texting purchased numbers is the fastest route to complaints and penalties.
How do you write one?
- Under 160 characters where possible. One message, not three fragments.
- From a named person. Hi Sarah, it is Dan at Volt Solar beats a brand name every time.
- One question or one action. Two questions in a text gets one answered.
- No links in a first message. They can trip carrier filtering and they read as promotional.
- Plain words. No capitals, no exclamation marks, nothing that looks like a blast.
Hi Sarah, it is Dan at Volt Solar. Your survey is booked for Thursday at 2pm, I will be the one coming. Reply C to confirm or R if you need a different time.
151 characters, one action, no link
The campaigns worth running
- 01
Utility rate change
To customers and consenting past enquirers, on the day of an announcement. The highest-response text a solar company can send, because it changes the arithmetic they already ran.
- 02
Appointment sequence
Confirmation, 24 hour reminder, one hour reminder. Pure logistics, pure benefit. See cutting the solar appointment no-show rate.
- 03
Review request and one reminder
Two to six weeks after commissioning. See how to get more reviews for solar installers.
- 04
Install week updates
Scaffolding tomorrow, crew arriving at eight, commissioning done. Reduces inbound calls and produces better reviews.
- 05
Quote follow-up
Two or three touches inside the active follow-up window, as part of the wider sequence rather than on their own.
The mistakes that cost you the channel
Text is easy to lose. Once somebody has opted out you have lost the highest-response route you had to them, permanently, and usually for a message that was never going to convert anyway.
- Texting too often. More than a few times a month outside an active conversation is too much.
- Sending at bad times. Evenings and weekends feel different on text than on email.
- Broadcasting. A message that is obviously going to hundreds of people gets treated as spam because it is.
- Not watching the replies. Sending texts from a system nobody monitors is worse than not sending them. See the all-in-one inbox.
Which number should you send from?
One detail decides whether any of this works: which number the message appears to come from.
- Use one number, consistently. The number on your van, your website and your texts should be the same one. Three different numbers means nobody recognises any of them.
- Local beats toll-free for this. A local area code reads as a neighbour; a toll-free prefix reads as a call centre.
- Make sure replies reach a person. A send-only number is the most common and most damaging setup, because a homeowner who replies and hears nothing concludes you are automated and stops.
- Register properly for business messaging where your carrier requires it. Unregistered business traffic increasingly gets filtered before it arrives, and you will never know.
That last point catches a lot of companies. Messages appear to send successfully and never arrive, so the channel looks ineffective when it is actually being blocked. If your text reply rate is near zero, check delivery before rewriting the message.
The single highest-return use of SMS in solar
Missed call text-back for solarStop reading, start booking
Volt builds and runs the system this article describes: the site, the follow-up, the inbox and the review funnel, for $297 a month.
No contracts. Cancel anytime.
Common questions
- Do I need consent to text a solar lead?
- You need a lawful basis, which an enquiry or a phone call to you usually provides for a direct response. Marketing broadcasts to a list generally require explicit consent, and the rules vary by jurisdiction, so take local advice before running campaigns.
- How often can I text solar customers?
- During an active job or conversation, as often as the conversation needs. Outside that, a few times a year at most, and only when there is something genuinely worth interrupting someone for.
- What response rate should I expect from SMS?
- Far higher than email, particularly for conversational messages and review requests. Response drops sharply the more a message looks like a broadcast, which is the whole argument for keeping text conversational.
