The correct answer isA, because:
InMobileConnectandJourney BuilderSMS activities,phone number normalizationensures that mobile numbers are automatically formatted to include the appropriate country code (such as "+1" for the United States) based on a selected default country.
If the phone numbers coming from Salesforce (or any source) do not include a country code, enabling
"Normalize Phone Number"in the Journey settings corrects this by automatically appending the country code according to the selected settings.
Salesforce official documentation states:
"Normalize Phone Numberensures that phone numbers missing a country code are automatically formatted based on a selected default country. This improves message deliverability in SMS activities within Journey Builder." (Source: Salesforce Help - MobileConnect and Journey SMS Send Configuration)
#In this case:
* Without normalization, SMS providers expect numbers inE.164 format(which requires the country code, e.g., +1 for US numbers).
* If the number is missing the "+1", the message fails to send.
* EnablingNormalize Phone Numberin theJourney SMS settingsfixes the issue without needing to reformat Salesforce records manually.
Why the other options are incorrect:
* #B. Format the phone field in Salesforce as +1[phonenumber]:
* While correct formatting helps, it requiresmanual mass updateof existing records and doesn't automatically handle new ones, making it inefficient.
* #C. Select 'US' as the sending country in SMS activity:
* Selecting the sending country affectsshort code usage, not the normalization of incoming phone numbers.
* #D. Configure the phone field in Salesforce as US locale:
* Locale settings don't automatically add a "+1" country code to phone numbers; normalization is still needed.
Reference Extract from Salesforce MobileConnect documentation:
"Use Normalize Phone Number to correct phone number formatting errors for Journey Builder SMS sends.
Automatically prepends country codes based on the specified country when absent." (Source: Salesforce Marketing Cloud MobileConnect User Guide) Thus, the correct answer isA.