How Our API Helped One Business Cut SMS Costs by 35%
When you’re sending hundreds of thousands of messages per month, every undelivered SMS is wasted spend. For one B2B company running large-scale marketing and transactional messaging, that cost was getting out of hand.
After integrating CheckThatPhone’s real-time phone validation API, they cut SMS waste, increased delivery rates, and saved over 35% on messaging costs — without changing their campaigns.
Here’s how it worked.
🏢 The Company
A national B2C financial services platform running SMS-based lead nurturing, transactional reminders, and customer engagement campaigns.
Sending 3M+ SMS messages per month
Using multiple vendors and regional shortcodes
Struggling with delivery issues, undelivered messages, and billing disputes
No phone validation prior to send — all numbers collected via web forms or 3rd-party partners
🚨 The Problem
Their SMS platform was reporting a 15–18% delivery failure rate. Many messages were being sent to:
Disconnected numbers
Recycled or ported lines
Landlines or VoIP numbers unable to receive SMS
Numbers flagged by carriers as high risk
They were also paying per attempt — whether the message landed or not.
🛠️ The Solution
The company implemented the CheckThatPhone API as a pre-send filter, validating every phone number in real time just before message delivery.
Each record was tagged with:
Line type (mobile, landline, VoIP)
Carrier name and status
Portability status
Deactivation or suspension indicator
Deliverability score and action recommendation
Messages were only sent if the API returned action = send.
💰 The Results
After 60 days in production, the impact was clear:
SMS delivery success rate increased by 12.6%
Message volume decreased by ~900,000 per month (filtered out unreachable contacts)
Total messaging cost dropped by 35% across vendors
No impact on conversion or engagement rates — in fact, those improved due to cleaner targeting
They also uncovered:
High volumes of VoIP numbers from certain lead sources
Suspended numbers in their own CRM database
Inaccurate area code targeting in past campaigns
✅ Final Thoughts
When businesses validate phone numbers before sending, they protect their budget, improve performance, and reduce noise in their metrics.