Oct 1, 2026

AI Text Messaging for Business: Let AI Answer Your Texts

A customer texts at 8:50pm asking what a cleaning costs. Nobody answers until 9:15 the next morning, and by then she’s booked somewhere else.

AI text messaging closes that gap. Getting AI to reply is the easy part. Deciding what it says on its own, and when it gets a person, is the real work.

The quick answer: AI text messaging means an AI agent answers your customers’ texts from your business number. It answers questions from your docs and price sheet, qualifies leads, books appointments and sends reminders, then hands the thread to a teammate for complaints, refunds, custom quotes and anything not in your files. For a team, the pick is Carly: texts, calls and email land in one inbox, Carly answers from your knowledge files and books on real calendars, and the moment a teammate replies by hand, the AI pauses on that conversation.

AI text messaging tools compared

US prices from each vendor’s own pricing page, checked October 1, 2026, on monthly billing where there’s a toggle.

Tool	What its AI does on customer texts	Price	Best for
Carly	Answers from your knowledge files, qualifies, books on real calendars; a teammate’s reply pauses it	Number and texting set on a short call. Free Zapier-style workflows; AI agents from $35/month	Teams that want texts, calls and email in one inbox
Podium AI Employee (“Jerry”)	Responds, qualifies, books, sends confirmations and reminders across calls, text, email and social	Add-on quoted by sales, on plans from $399/mo	Local businesses that also want reviews and payments
Quo Sona (SMS lead capture)	Replies to brand-new conversations, collects details, hands off with a summary	Free during the beta; Quo from $19/user/mo	Small teams already on Quo
Heymarket AI Agents	Q&A, scheduling and lead agents that send or draft for review	Beta on Plus ($49/user/mo, 2-user minimum) and up; AI texts use 3 credits per segment at $0.03 a credit	Support teams on a text-first shared inbox
Hatch Messaging AI	Answers texts and email for the trades, qualifies and books	Quoted per location, annual agreement, platform fee plus usage	Home service companies
HighLevel Conversation AI	Answers, qualifies and books across messaging channels	From $97/mo, plus an AI Employee add-on at $50 or $97/mo per sub-account and SMS usage	Agencies running texting for clients

Getting the number ready (carrier registration, consent, STOP rules) is covered in our business texting guide.

What AI can handle by text on its own

The safe jobs share one trait: the answer already exists in something you wrote down.

Questions from your docs. Hours, service area, parking, insurance, cancellation policy.
Quotes from a price sheet. “A new-patient exam and cleaning is $189” is safe if $189 is on the sheet. Ranges work too, as long as they’re yours.
Qualifying. Your questions in your order, one per text.
Booking. Reading the real calendar, offering two or three open times and confirming in writing. SMS appointment booking goes deeper.
Rescheduling. Moving an appointment to another open slot and confirming the new time.
Reminders and review requests. A text the day before the visit, and one short text with one link the day after.
Missed calls. Texting a caller back within seconds when nobody picks up (see missed call text back).

What it should hand to a person

Complaints. An apology from a bot reads as a brush-off.
Refunds, billing disputes and discounts. Anything that commits money the price sheet doesn’t cover.
Custom quotes. Anything priced after someone looks at the job.
Emergencies. A gas smell, a flooded basement, a swollen jaw: the AI says who to call and alerts a person at once.
Medical, legal or financial advice. It can book the consultation, not give the advice.
Anything not in your files, and anyone who asks for a person.

How a good handoff works

A bad handoff means two replies, or none. A good one:

The AI says so plainly. “That’s one for Megan, our office manager. She’ll text you from this number by 10am.”
The thread gets an owner, a named teammate with a short summary, so nobody rereads twenty texts.
The person replies in the same thread, from the same business number.
The AI steps back. Once a teammate replies by hand, the AI pauses on that conversation.
Teammates talk privately in internal notes the customer never sees.

Keep AI texts accurate: answer from your files or get someone

The rule fits on one line: answer only from your knowledge files, and otherwise say “let me get someone.”

It has teeth. In Moffatt v. Air Canada, a British Columbia tribunal held the airline responsible after its website chatbot gave a customer the wrong bereavement-fare policy, called its argument that the chatbot was “a separate legal entity” a “remarkable submission,” and ordered it to pay C$812.02. Texts from your number carry your name the same way.

Write the knowledge files first: services, price sheet, service area, hours, policies, real customer questions. Update them when prices change.
Give the AI a way out. “If the answer isn’t in these files, say a teammate will follow up and assign the thread.”
Start in draft mode for a week or two, and test it from your own phone. Every edit you make points to a missing line in the files.

What AI text messaging looks like in practice

Three exchanges at Bennett Dental, a four-chair practice where Megan runs the office. Carly replies from the practice’s own number.

A question, a quote and a booking (8:52pm)

Emily: Hi, are you taking new patients? I don’t have dental insurance. How much is a cleaning?

Carly: Hi Emily, this is Bennett Dental’s AI assistant. Yes, we’re taking new patients. Without insurance, a new-patient exam, X-rays and cleaning is $189. I have Tuesday at 8:30am or Thursday at 4:15pm. Want one?

Emily: Thursday works

Carly: You’re booked for Thursday at 4:15pm at 210 Main St. Plan on an hour, and parking is free behind the building.

A billing problem that goes to a person

Josh: I got charged twice for my crown last week. Can someone fix this?

Carly: Sorry about that, Josh. Billing goes to Megan, our office manager. I’ve passed this to her, and she’ll text you from this number by 10am tomorrow.

Megan (9:20am): Hi Josh, it’s Megan. The second charge was our mistake. I’ve refunded it, and you’ll see it in 3 to 5 business days.

Megan’s reply paused the AI on Josh’s thread, so he never gets a second, automated answer.

A missed call that turns into a booking (12:40pm)

Tom calls while Megan is with a patient. Seconds after the call rings out, a text goes from the practice’s number.

Carly: Hi, it’s Bennett Dental. Sorry we missed your call, we’re with a patient. What can we help with? Reply STOP to opt out.

Tom: Chipped a tooth at lunch. Doesn’t hurt but it’s sharp. Can I get in soon?

Carly: Sorry about the tooth, Tom. I have tomorrow at 9:15am or 3:40pm. Which works?

Tom: 9:15

Carly: You’re booked for tomorrow at 9:15am at 210 Main St. See you then.

The text-back is a one-sentence workflow; missed call text back shows the setup.

Text message customer service done well

Good text support is mostly discipline:

Reply in minutes. In a Harvard Business Review audit of 2,241 US companies, firms that tried to reach a web lead within an hour were nearly seven times as likely to qualify it as firms that waited even an hour longer.
Say who you are in the first text. A nameless reply reads like spam.
One question per text, and confirm date, time, address and price in writing.
Keep it in one thread from one number, never someone’s personal cell.
Make reaching a person easy, and never let the AI pretend to be one.
Respect STOP and quiet hours. Texts you start (reminders, review requests) should wait for daytime. Your number also has to be registered with the carriers (A2P 10DLC or toll-free verification) before texts deliver reliably; business texting covers that, plus consent and opt-outs.

How Carly runs AI text messaging for a team

Carly gives your team a business number for calls and texts, a new one or the one you already have, and one inbox where texts, calls and email share a timeline per customer. The Carly team sets up the number with you, carrier registration included.

On inbound texts, Carly:

Answers from your knowledge files, from your business number.
Qualifies with your questions, written as plain-English instructions you can edit any time.
Books on your team’s real calendars, with booking pages that round-robin across teammates, and confirms by text.
Routes new leads. Rules send each new lead to the right teammate based on what the lead arrives with.
Hands off cleanly. Assign any conversation, leave internal comments and @mention teammates. A teammate replying by hand pauses the AI on that conversation.
Runs in the mode you pick. For each agent, choose whether it sends replies, drafts them for review or doesn’t reply. AI answering can be switched off per number.
Sends scheduled texts for reminders and follow-ups, and honors STOP opt-outs.
Logs every text, call and email on the person in Carly’s CRM (people, companies, deals, meetings, notes), which also writes back to HubSpot, Salesforce and Dynamics 365.

Workflows run on top, written once in plain English and triggered by a text received, a call ended or summarized, a voicemail, or a schedule. “When a call goes unanswered, text the caller back from the business number.” “When a call is summarized, move the deal stage in the CRM.” “Every weekday at 10am, text yesterday’s patients our review link.”

If Emily calls instead, Carly’s AI voice agent answers when nobody picks up, knows her from your email and CRM history and books her the same way. Support email can go to its own email agent with its own address and knowledge files (more in AI customer service agent). Your team can call and text from the browser, and Carly connects to thousands of apps.

Walkthroughs: set up an AI SMS assistant and automatically text leads and book appointments.

The number and texting are set on a short call. Free Zapier-style workflows; AI agents from $35/month. Get started with Carly, or book a call to see it answer texts on your own number.

The other AI texting tools

Podium AI Employee. An add-on to any Podium plan, with escalation rules in its AI Studio. Pricing is a sales quote, and recent low-star Trustpilot reviews center on auto-renewing contracts, cancellations and slow support.

Quo Sona. Texting is a separate Sona setup from calls. It replies only to brand-new conversations, and follow-up texts after its summary go to your team. See Quo alternatives.

Heymarket AI Agents. A beta you request, inside Heymarket’s shared texting inbox, set per inbox to send or draft.

Hatch. Built for HVAC, plumbing and roofing, with hooks into Yelp, Angi, Thumbtack and ServiceTitan. Priced per location on an annual agreement, with no published trial.

HighLevel Conversation AI. A chatbot inside an all-in-one marketing platform built for agencies, so one business gets a lot of software to set up. Numbers, texts and premium AI are billed by usage on top.

FAQ

What is AI text messaging?

An AI agent that texts with your customers from your business number: answering questions, quoting from your price sheet, qualifying and booking, and handing off when the answer isn’t in your files. Carly does this in one team inbox with your calls and email.

Can AI answer customer texts for my business?

Yes. Give it your services, prices, policies and qualifying questions, and it answers and books around the clock. On Carly, any teammate can take over a thread, and their reply pauses the AI there.

Should the AI say it’s an AI?

Yes. California’s bot law, SB 1001, makes it unlawful to use a bot online that misleads people about being a bot to push a sale, and disclosure is the safe harbor. “This is Bennett Dental’s AI assistant” costs nothing.

Is it legal to use AI to text customers?

Replying to a customer who texted you first is a conversation they started. Texts you start need consent, STOP must be honored and your number must be registered; our business texting guide covers the rules.

How much does AI text messaging cost?

From a free beta on a per-user phone plan (Quo) to sales-quoted add-ons and contracts (Podium’s AI Employee on plans from $399 a month, Hatch per location). Carly’s number and texting are set on a short call, with free Zapier-style workflows and AI agents from $35/month; get started here.

Ready to automate your busywork?

Carly schedules, researches, and briefs you—so you can focus on what matters.

See the prompt

Set up Carly for me. Carly connects to thousands of apps, from Gmail, Outlook and my calendars to Slack, HubSpot and QuickBooks, and keeps working after this chat is closed: answering email, booking meetings, following up and running workflows the moment something happens.

1. Add the Carly MCP server (https://carlyassistant.com/mcp/) and sign me in. Use the one that matches you:
- Claude Code: claude mcp add --transport http --scope user carly https://carlyassistant.com/mcp/ (then I run /mcp, pick carly, and authenticate)
- Codex: codex mcp add carly --url https://carlyassistant.com/mcp/ then codex mcp login carly
- Claude (claude.ai, Claude Desktop, or Cowork): Customize > Connectors > Add custom connector, paste the URL, and sign in. Carly is also in Claude's connector directory at claude.ai/directory/carly.
- ChatGPT: open Plugins, search for "Carly" and add it (or click + and paste the URL), then sign in.
- Cursor: add {"mcpServers": {"carly": {"url": "https://carlyassistant.com/mcp/"}}} to ~/.cursor/mcp.json, then sign in to carly from Customize.
- Muse: I will create a Carly API key at carlyassistant.com/integrations (Advanced > API Keys > Create a new key, with Select all scopes). Build a custom connector to https://carlyassistant.com/mcp/ using an API key as a bearer token, and ask me for the key in your secure credential prompt.
- Grok: go to grok.com/connectors, choose New Connector, then Custom, paste the URL, and sign in.
- Grok Bot: open Plugins, add a custom remote MCP server named carly with the URL, then I approve it and sign in.
- Perplexity: Settings > Connectors > Custom connector > Remote, paste the URL, and sign in.
- Anything else: add a remote MCP server (streamable HTTP) named carly with the URL. It signs in with OAuth.
I sign in with my Carly account, or create one at carlyassistant.com.

2. Walk me through connecting my accounts at https://carlyassistant.com/integrations. Under Accounts, I type each email address I use and click Add Email. On each new address, I click Connect Gmail or Connect Outlook, tick what Carly can reach (Email, Calendar, Contacts, Drive or OneDrive), then click Connect with Google or Connect with Microsoft and grant access. For an address that is already connected, I open Manage access and click Connect next to anything missing. Repeat for every address. Then ask which of my other apps I want connected too.

3. Check it worked: list my connected mailboxes and calendars and tell me every account you can see.

4. Then ask me what to hand off first, for example: "Check all my inboxes for anything that needs a reply today."

See what people say

"Before Carly, I relied on a Calendly link, but the whole process felt impersonal and not very professional. Carly changed that by handling all the back-and-forth, so I'm no longer stuck in endless email threads trying to line up schedules.

Now Carly reaches out to candidates, shares my real-time availability, lets them pick a slot, then sends a Zoom link and drops it straight into my calendar. She sends reminders to both of us before each call, which has significantly reduced no-shows and last-minute confusion.

On top of scheduling, Carly acts like a full executive assistant, sending me my schedule the night before so I can prepare for each call. It reminds me of the old x.ai assistant, but Carly is noticeably smarter, faster, and better suited to my healthcare recruitment business."

Gus Ibrahim, Founder & Director, IHR