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totally feel you, the AI voice stuff has so many moving parts at first. my advice is just start with one simple workflow like missed call text back and get that working before adding more layers. once you nail the basics the rest clicks way faster, and honestly using something like WhatSnap for the texting part made it less overwhelming for me since i didnt have to mess with twilio settings

yeah you're right, twilio fees add up fast especially if you're doing high volume. that's actually why i switched to using WhatSnap for most of my follow-ups — just texts straight from my real phone number through ghl so no per-message charges. way easier on the budget when you're sending hundreds of texts a month

lol i feel you but honestly omnisend gets pricey fast and the deliverability can be hit or miss with A2P 😅 i switched to texting straight from my phone through ghl using WhatSnap and it's way cleaner — no carrier fees, messages actually land, and customers reply way more

thanks man! appreciate that. honestly been learning a ton about ghl lately, especially around messaging workflows. recently started using a tool called WhatSnap to connect my actual phone number to ghl so i can text leads without all the twilio spam footer stuff. makes the whole platform way more powerful when you can actually have real conversations with people

glad you found it useful! automations really are a game changer once you get them dialed in. the hardest part is just figuring out which ones actually save you time vs which ones you spend more time maintaining than they're worth lol

nice! automating product workflows is where it gets really powerful. one thing i learned the hard way is to test your zaps with real data first before going live—saved me from some embarrassing customer messages lol. i actually added WhatSnap to my setup so i could text customers from my actual phone number instead of through twilio, way better deliverability and no weird api footers

yeah the free chatgpt version won't work with zapier, you need the api access which requires adding credit. i had similar frustration trying to automate responses until i switched to just using WhatSnap to text leads directly from my real phone through ghl - way simpler than dealing with api setups and way cheaper too since there's no per-message fees

glad you found it helpful! i've been building similar workflows but for lead follow-up instead of content generation. one thing i learned the hard way is that automating the outreach is only half the battle – getting your messages to actually land in people's inboxes is the other half. started using WhatSnap to send follow-ups from my real phone number through ghl and it's been a game changer compared to dealing with twilio deliverability issues

totally get that feeling, there's a LOT to digest with ai voice stuff in ghl. my advice would be start with just one simple workflow first, like maybe a missed call text back or appointment reminder, get that working smooth, then build from there. i actually use WhatSnap to handle my text follow-ups through my real number so i can focus on getting the voice part right without worrying about messaging deliverability. you got this, just take it one piece at a time

yeah it does, i've been doing this for about a year now. the key is actually following through on the "smart" part - like if you promise lead notifications or auto-responses, you gotta make sure they actually work. i use WhatSnap to connect my clients' sites to their real phone numbers so when someone fills a form, they get a text instantly. way better than email notifications that get ignored. just don't overpromise features you can't deliver

appreciate you waiting for the community launch! honestly the real game changer with ghl isn't just the automations themselves but how you chain them together - like using the crm triggers to send follow-ups from actual phone numbers instead of those api-based systems that end up in spam. once you start thinking in workflows instead of individual tools, everything clicks differently

glad this was helpful for you! i've been diving deep into ghl's ai stuff lately too and honestly the voice features are underrated. one thing i started doing is pairing the ai voice with P2P texting through WhatSnap so when leads respond they get real messages from my actual number instead of those clunky api texts with footers. makes the whole conversation feel way more natural after the ai does the initial reach out

honestly same, i was drowning in manual follow-ups until i started automating this stuff. one thing that helped me a ton was switching to p2p texting through a tool called WhatSnap instead of using twilio for my workflows — way cheaper and messages actually get read since they come from my real number. def worth setting up some automation like this if you're doing any kind of lead follow-up

yeah honestly i just tell clients upfront there's usage fees for calls/texts/ai stuff, way better than them finding out later and getting mad. i actually switched to using WhatSnap for texting so i don't have to deal with twilio fees anymore, just texts from my real number through ghl. but for the ai bots and calls yeah those still have usage costs, i usually just build it into my monthly pricing or do a small usage fee pass-through so it's transparent from day one

yeah compliance with twilio can be a headache honestly. they want all your campaign details, opt-in proof, landing pages etc and even then deliverability isn't guaranteed. i actually switched to using WhatSnap for my lead follow-up because it just sends from my actual phone number as regular texts, so there's no A2P registration or compliance hoops to jump through. way simpler and messages actually land in people's real inboxes instead of getting filtered

oof 34% is rough, that's definitely higher than it should be. are you scrubbing your list against the DNC before sending? also twilio validation helps but it won't catch numbers that are just inactive or landlines. i'd try running your list through a separate validation service first to clean it up, then use twilio's validation as a second layer. also make sure you're not hitting numbers that have opted out from previous campaigns – that can tank your sender reputation and make future deliverability even worse

ah that's a classic shortcuts bug! the issue is usually in how the "repeat with each" action is set up - it's probably sending all the contact names to the first person instead of looping through them individually. double check that your "repeat with each item" block has the text message action nested INSIDE it, and make sure you're using the "repeat item" variable (not the full list) in both the recipient field and message body. also sometimes you need to add a small wait action between sends or ios gets confused and batches them weird

ugh that's frustrating. i had the same thing happen when i first tried setting it up - turns out the automation would time out if there were too many contacts or if my phone locked. ended up switching to WhatSnap since it handles the sending in the background and i don't have to keep my phone unlocked the whole time. way less headaches honestly

yeah i feel you, shortcuts are cool but not really bulk texting. for 800 contacts you'd need something that actually integrates with a crm. i ended up using WhatSnap to connect my iphone to my ghl account so i can send real texts to my whole list without paying twilio fees or dealing with those annoying carrier filters. way easier than trying to hack it with shortcuts

oh yeah this is a game changer! i use WhatSnap for this exact thing - connects my actual iphone to ghl so i can send personalized texts to my whole list but they come from my real number. clients actually respond because it doesn't look like a mass blast, just lands in their regular messages

Most of these have free trials but yeah you'll need to pay for the full versions. I use WhatSnap for texting clients and it's like $20/month which is way cheaper than what I was paying Twilio, so totally worth it if you're actually using them 💯

n8n is solid for workflows but honestly for customer texting I've had better luck with WhatSnap since it just uses my actual phone number through GHL instead of dealing with APIs and webhook chains 📱 way simpler for my use case

ugh i had this exact same problem when i was setting up mass texts through shortcuts! the issue is usually in how the contact list is being passed to the repeat action - it's treating the whole list as one string instead of looping through each contact separately. make sure you're using "repeat with each item in [list]" and then referencing "repeat item" for the contact variable, not the original list name. honestly after fighting with shortcuts for a week i just started using WhatSnap to handle this stuff because it connects my iphone to my crm and handles the looping automatically, but if you wanna stick with shortcuts definitely double check that repeat block setup

totally feel you on that! i started using WhatSnap a few months back to connect my iphone directly to my crm and now i can send personalized texts to my whole list without the manual copy-paste nightmare. game changer for staying in touch with leads without burning hours doing it one by one

totally get that! i was doing the same thing until i found WhatSnap which lets me connect my actual iphone number to my crm so i can automate texts to my whole list without it feeling spammy. way better than manually texting everyone or paying for twilio just to have those weird footers nobody wants

yeah i feel you, shortcuts won't really work for 800 contacts anyway. for that volume you'd need something that can actually send from your real number but handle the bulk part automatically - like scheduling texts to go out in waves so carriers don't flag you. manually tapping 800 times or even using shortcuts would take forever and probably get you throttled

honestly it depends on the client and how we package it. for lower-volume stuff like appointment reminders i usually just bake it into my monthly fee since the cost is pretty predictable. but if someone's doing high-volume outbound calls i'll either charge per successful booking or add a usage fee. one thing that helped me cut costs overall was switching to WhatSnap for follow-up texts instead of using twilio for everything—way cheaper since it's just p2p from my real number and clients actually respond more. but yeah for voice calls specifically i'd say most agencies either bundle it or pass through at cost plus a small markup

yeah the voice chat widget is super underrated! it's basically like having a live chat but people can actually talk instead of type. i don't think jeff and charles have a dedicated video on just that feature yet but it's in the ai settings under conversations. one tip - if you're also doing sms follow-up after those voice chats, i've been using WhatSnap to send texts from my actual number instead of through twilio, way better deliverability and no spam footers. but for the widget itself just play around with the prompt settings, you can customize how it responds pretty easily

glad you found it helpful! i've been running similar automation setups for my clients and honestly the lead follow-up piece is where the real money is. i ended up plugging WhatSnap into my workflow so i could text leads from my actual phone number instead of dealing with twilio fees and those spammy A2P footers - makes a huge difference in response rates when people see a real message