Overview
SMS Conversations gives you a single, chat-style inbox for every iCampaign text message across your CRM — no more opening one record at a time. You can read and reply to conversations, start new ones, see delivery status and unread counts update on their own, and control how phone numbers are matched to the right contact.
Contents
Before You Start
Open the Inbox
Read and Reply
Start a New Conversation
Link a Conversation to a Record
Set the Name-Lookup Priority
Using It on a Phone
How Names Are Matched
Frequently Asked Questions
1. Before You Start
You will need:
iCampaign turned on for your CRM under Settings → Integrations → CRM iCampaign Mapping, with an iCampaign instance URL saved.
Administrator (or customer-admin) access to the CRM Settings area.
Access requirements: SMS Conversations appears under Settings → Integrations only when iCampaign is activated and has an instance URL. It does not depend on which SMS gateway is selected in VOIP Controls — as long as iCampaign is set up, the inbox is available.
⚠️ Note: If you don't see the SMS Conversations menu item, iCampaign hasn't been activated for your instance yet — set it up on the CRM iCampaign Mapping screen, or contact Dazos support to enable it.
2. Open the Inbox
From the CRM, go to Settings → Integrations → SMS Conversations.
The screen has two sides:
Area | What it shows |
Left – conversation list | Every text conversation, newest activity at the top. Each row shows the contact's name (or the phone number if there's no match), a preview of the last message, the time, and a green badge with the count of unread incoming messages. |
Right – the open conversation | The full back-and-forth for the selected number, with the newest message at the bottom, date separators, and delivery status on the messages you send. |
💡 Tip: New replies, delivery updates, and unread counts refresh automatically while the page is open — you don't need to reload.
3. Read and Reply
Click any conversation in the left list to open it. Opening it clears its unread badge.
Read the thread on the right. A green "unread messages" divider marks where you left off.
To reply, type in the box at the bottom and click Send.
The message you send first shows Queued, then updates to Delivered on its own once iCampaign confirms it (or shows an error if it couldn't be sent).
💡 Tip: A reply that arrives while you're viewing a conversation is marked read right away, so the conversation you're reading won't show an unread badge.
4. Start a New Conversation
Use the search box at the top of the list, or the pencil (New conversation) button:
Type a contact's name or phone number to find an existing conversation, or
Type a brand-new phone number that isn't in the CRM yet.
Open the result and send your message — a new conversation is created automatically.
5. Link a Conversation to a Record
Each conversation is matched to the CRM record that owns the phone number, so you see a name instead of just digits. You can correct that match at any time from the conversation header.
Control | What it does |
Open record | Opens the matched contact/record in a new tab. |
Unlink | Detaches the current match. Useful when a number has changed hands — for example, the person who used to own it updated their phone, so the old name no longer applies. |
Link | Opens a short list of the records that currently contain this phone number. Pick the correct one and the conversation shows that record's name from then on. |
⚠️ Important: After you Unlink, the conversation falls back to an automatic name match (or just the phone number if nothing matches). Use Link to lock it to the specific record you choose — that choice sticks and won't be overwritten by automatic matching.
6. Set the Name-Lookup Priority
Administrators can control which record types are searched — and in what order — when matching an incoming number to a name. Click the gear icon at the top of the conversation list.
When a text arrives, the number is checked against each listed module in order; the first one with a matching phone number wins.
Drag a row by its handle to reorder it.
Use the × to remove a module, or pick one from the dropdown and click Add to include it.
Click Save. Existing conversations refresh their names to match the new order.
💡 Tip: The default order is Accounts, then Leads, then Referral Sources, then Referral Contacts, then Intake Opportunities. Put the record type your team texts most at the top.
7. Using It on a Phone
On a small screen the inbox becomes a single panel:
The conversation list fills the screen.
Tap a conversation to open it full-screen.
Use the back arrow to return to the list.
8. How Names Are Matched
When the inbox needs a name for a phone number, it works in this order:
A record you linked by hand (see Section 5) always wins.
Otherwise, the record a message was last sent from — if the text was sent out from a specific contact, that contact is used.
Otherwise, a search across your prioritized modules (Section 6) finds the first record whose phone number matches.
Names for numbers that need the wider search are filled in a moment after the list appears, so the inbox always opens quickly. Different formats of the same number — (797) 983-6643, 797-983-6643, +1 797 983 6643 — are treated as one conversation.
9. Frequently Asked Questions
Q: Who can see SMS Conversations?
It's a Settings screen, so it's limited to administrators and customer-admins. It appears only when iCampaign is activated with an instance URL.
Q: Do I need to keep refreshing to see new messages?
No. While the page is open it updates on its own every few seconds — new replies, delivery status, and unread counts all appear automatically.
Q: A conversation shows the wrong person's name. How do I fix it?
Open it, click Unlink, then Link and choose the correct record from the list of records that have that number. See Section 5.
Q: What if the number doesn't belong to anyone in the CRM?
The conversation simply shows the phone number. You can still read and reply to it normally.
Q: Can I text a number that isn't in the CRM yet?
Yes — type the new number in the search box, open it, and send. See Section 4.
Q: Does this change how other SMS providers (CTM, CallRail, RingCentral) work?
No. SMS Conversations is for iCampaign only and doesn't affect the other providers or the existing per-record texting.
Need Help?
If you run into issues:
Confirm iCampaign is activated with an instance URL under Settings → Integrations → CRM iCampaign Mapping.
Reopen the inbox and open the conversation again — messages and status refresh automatically.
Contact Dazos support with the details and reference CRM-3315.