1. Use a dedicated Android device
Do not make a team member's personal phone part of critical client infrastructure. A dedicated device reduces accidental app removal, battery drain, travel-related outages, personal notification conflicts, and number ownership confusion.
Choose a current budget or midrange Android device from a major manufacturer rather than the absolute cheapest obsolete handset you can find. Reliability and ongoing security updates matter more than camera quality or flagship performance.
2. Keep the gateway powered and connected
The device needs a dependable path to both the internet and the cellular network. For a permanent deployment, keep it on a quality charger in a ventilated location and verify that the companion app can continue running in the background.
- Stable Wi-Fi with mobile data available as appropriate.
- Reliable charger and cable.
- Battery/background settings configured so the gateway app is not aggressively suspended.
- Optional small UPS for locations where short power interruptions are common.
3. Choose the carrier plan for the use case—not just the lowest price
A cheap consumer plan may look attractive, but the carrier's acceptable-use policy is more important than the advertised monthly price. Business automation and higher-volume messaging can trigger restrictions even when a plan is marketed as “unlimited.”
Before standardizing a carrier, review its current terms, test representative message volume, and avoid promising unlimited throughput to clients.
4. Treat dual SIM as capacity, not an assumption
ASG's underlying platform supports dual-SIM Android devices and can select the SIM used for sending. That gives agencies additional number flexibility from one handset. However, exact SIM-to-GHL-location routing should be validated during onboarding before you sell a specific “two clients per phone” topology.
5. Create a device naming standard
Once an agency has more than two or three gateways, casual labels become confusing. Use a consistent convention such as:
Device owner: Agency
GHL location: Client Name
SIM/carrier: Carrier A
Purpose: Primary SMS gateway
Track the device, SIM number, carrier account, physical location, charger, deployment date, and assigned GHL location in your internal documentation.
6. Test before production
- Outbound SMS from GHL.
- Inbound reply into the correct Conversations inbox.
- Workflow-generated message.
- STOP and START behavior.
- Long message and link handling.
- Device reboot and reconnection.
- Wi-Fi loss / mobile-data recovery.
7. Warm up new numbers responsibly
Do not connect a fresh SIM and immediately push the maximum possible campaign volume. Use the platform's warm-up tools, begin with legitimate conversational traffic, and monitor delivery and opt-out behavior as volume increases.
8. Build a monitoring routine
At minimum, your agency should know whether each gateway is online, whether messages are delivering, whether replies are flowing back, and whether a carrier or device issue needs attention. A simple daily or weekly health check is far better than discovering an outage from a client complaint.
Recommended deployment checklist
| Area | Recommended practice |
|---|---|
| Phone | Dedicated Android 8.0+; newer supported hardware preferred |
| SIM | Real carrier SIM with a plan appropriate to expected business usage |
| Power | Continuous charger; optional UPS |
| Connectivity | Stable Wi-Fi/data and cellular signal |
| Device management | Consistent naming, documentation, and access control |
| Launch | Inbound/outbound/workflow/STOP tests before production |
| Volume | Warm up gradually and monitor carrier/opt-out behavior |
For the architecture itself, see How Agency SMS Gateway Works.