With ProTexting, you do not have to add single contacts one at a time or have them text your KEYWORD to your sender number (short code, TFN, 10DLC, etc.), but you can add bulk contacts at once.  Under the Contacts tab, click on “Import Contacts.”   The best way to collect contact information is to ask your participants to text your keyword. This way your contacts are opting in to join your list and you are compliant with the FTC regulations. You can view and manage your contacts’ information in the Contacts Tab. You can also add contact via your ProTexting account: 1) To add a single contact from the Contacts tab click on “Add Contact”. Enter the contact information and choose a group if applicable. Click “Submit” to save. 2) To add contacts in bulk from the Contacts tab click on “Import Contacts”. i. First select the group that the new contacts will be added to. ii. There are two ways you can upload contacts – a) Through Excel as shown in the example in the import contacts page. b) Typing the information in the textbox as shown in the example. Contact's first and last name are limited to 20 characters each. Also, the system will intelligently remove all special and invalid characters, to prepare the contact for text messaging campaigns and avoid any possible issues with data tags. When uploading contacts, you can do it 3 ways: 1) Write the contacts information using the format “NUMBER, FIRST NAME, LAST NAME, EMAIL, DATE OF BIRTH, ZIP” (Or any other information you may have, remember Phone number is the only required field).  This way is one of the two ways of uploading contacts. 2) Another way is if you have your contacts on an excel spreadsheet in the order “NUMBER,FIRST NAME,LAST NAME,EMAIL,DATE OF BIRTH,ZIP” just copy and paste the information, and paste it into the field given. 3) Or just simpy upload or drag/drop excel or CSV file with contacts' data. You will be able to easily map the fields from your file to ProTexting's fields. This feature is under section "Import From File". Importing contacts using data file (excel or CSV): First row must be the titles of the columns, please do not add contact’s data in the first row.  If first row contains contact’s data, this contact will not be imported.  Invalid characters will be removed.   First and last name fields, system will add only the first word, if more than 1 word contained in the field.