What is a widget?
A widget is a power packed version of your SuperPhone® form with a big difference - there's only one field. This allows subscribers to just enter their phone number and get added to your text list. Every SuperPhone® account comes with a default widget and you can configure the responses that people receive when they join via your widget.
Because of their low barrier-to-entry (all your subscriber needs to do is enter their phone number), widgets are a great first step for SuperPhone users looking to build and organize separate lists quickly.
Keep in mind that you can only send an update to subscribers that have filled out the contact form. So - use your widget to collect numbers and then it's your job to make sure they fill out the contact form. Okay, let's get started.
Widgets add tremendous value in the following ways:
Simple info capture
Widgets eliminate the need for a subscriber to open their messaging app, type in your SuperPhone number, compose a text and press send. They literally just have to enter their phone number and you get to start the conversation.
Apply a tag to every new subscriber
When a subscriber enters their number in the widget, SuperPhone handles the heavy lifting by tagging them and then automatically sending a welcome message. You can use this message to redirect them to a form of your choice.
Replace your email signup with text
You can embed your widget anywhere on the web. Just copy and paste the code. Many sites have an email sign-up form. You can replace that form with the widget and be texting instead of emailing with people who come to your site. We've written an article on how to embed your widget on Squarespace here. You can see another example of an embedded widget here.
Multiple widgets: different strokes for different folks
You can have as many widgets as you want and apply a different tag to each one of them. Our CEO is currently running three different widgets applying three different tags. You can check out his widgets at the following links:
textRyan.com for general subscribers
wealthplan.co for subscribers interested in his financial literacy newsletter
30calls.com for subscribers interested his relationship building masterclass
He uses three different tags to differentiate who came in through each widget: "textRyan", "WealthPlan", and "30 Calls". This way, when he wants to send a message to his general list he can use the tag "textRyan". When he wants to just send a message to his financial subscribers he can use the tag "WealthPlan".
We get a good number of requests to learn how to make a widget look like Ryan's widgets. You can get the basic code and read step by step instructions in this article.
Automatic number assignment (for more than 500 subscribers)
When a user enters their number in your widget, they will automatically get assigned whichever number is available in your SuperPhone pool. Once they get assigned that number, the number you text them on will never change. This eliminates the confusion that can be created by the multiple phone numbers that get assigned once you have more than 500 subscribers. More on that here.