A business SMS should fit in 160 characters to go out as a single message, or in 70 if it contains an emoji or a character outside the SMS alphabet. A Muzau agent writes its replies to incoming SMS to fit in 160 characters, AI notice included: if they run too long, it shortens them once, then cuts them at the last complete sentence. They go out on their own or after your approval.
An SMS is read at a glance, often on the phone's lock screen. Past 160 characters, it goes out in several pieces, each billed as one SMS. And the limit can drop far lower without anyone seeing it: a single emoji, or a curly apostrophe pasted from a word processor, moves the whole message into another alphabet, where one SMS carries only 70 characters. A 150-character text then goes out as three SMS.
A customer who writes by SMS asks a short question and expects an answer in the same format. A ten-line reply is an email sent to the wrong place. The SMS agent handles these short replies; when it does not know the answer, it hands over to your team.
Muzau's SMS agent replies to SMS received on your business's 09 number, using the public part of what the Brain knows about your business. It writes plain text, with no formatting or bullet lists, to fit in a single 160-character SMS. The agent's first SMS in each conversation starts with “Hello, this is the AI assistant of” your business: that sentence counts toward the total. What it can answer, and when it hands over, is detailed on the page on AI that answers your customers' SMS.
When its reply runs past one SMS, the agent rewrites it once, shorter. If it still overflows, it cuts it at the last complete sentence: the customer receives whole sentences. Sentences that confirm a fact, such as a booked appointment, are never cut. If even its first sentence does not fit in 160 characters, it goes out anyway, in two SMS.
Every SMS that goes out is adapted to the SMS alphabet, to fit in one message and cost less. Typographic quotes and apostrophes become straight, “€” becomes “EUR”, and emojis are removed. The accents é, è, à and ù stay; ê, ç or î lose theirs. In the agent's replies, a list becomes a sentence. Only a text in a non-Latin alphabet goes out as it is, in 70-character SMS.
When the agent hands over, it prepares a reply for your team on the conversation card, written to fit in one SMS: one or two short sentences, with no polite closing or signature. The team reviews it, edits it and sends it from the agent's number. A counter under the field shows how many SMS it will go out as; beyond 3 SMS, sending is refused. See also replying to your customers' SMS from a computer.
With or without an agent, a business SMS is written like a headline: keep what helps the customer, cut the rest.
Before. “Hello Madam, further to your message this morning, I confirm that we have received your complete file. We will get back to you as soon as possible with our proposal. Kind regards, the sales team.” 228 characters, and a single “ç”: four SMS.
After. “Hello, your file is complete, thank you. Our proposal goes out Thursday by email. Any question until then?” 106 characters, in the SMS alphabet: a single SMS.
What does not fit in one SMS is better said elsewhere: see whether to reply to a customer by SMS or by email.
Autonomous does not mean unchecked. You set the level of autonomy of every agent, its limits cannot be crossed, everything it does is recorded in a plain-language log, and one gesture stops it all.
For the tasks you don't have time for. You give the address of your website, then describe the work in your own words. Nothing to install.