The short answer
When a merchant returns your call and the rep is on another line, the CRM should text them within seconds — before the rep has even seen the missed call — with the rep’s name, the shop, and an offer to call back in a few minutes or reply with a better time. A merchant who calls back and reaches voicemail usually rings the next broker in their phone. In GoHighLevel it is one toggle; in Salesforce or HubSpot it is a short workflow.
The merchant was busy all day. At 7pm they finally return the call, and the rep is on another one. What happens in the next few seconds decides whether that merchant is still yours, because they have other brokers’ numbers in the same call log and yours just went to voicemail.
![Whiteboard diagram. 7:12pm — Marcus calls the rep back; rep’s on another call; missed. An arrow marked “8 seconds” leads to a text: “hey Marcus, just missed your call — this is Dan with [shop]. calling you back in a couple minutes, or reply here with a time that works.” — sent by the system, the rep hasn’t looked at his phone yet. Then 7:14pm: “after 8 is good” — he’s still yours. Below: a merchant who calls you back and gets voicemail calls the next guy. In GHL: Settings → Phone → missed call text-back. One toggle, write the message once.](/_next/image?url=%2Fvideos%2Fcrm-features-top-mca-brokerages%2Fmissed-call-text-back.png&w=3840&q=75)
What the merchant sees
| Time | What happens | Who did it |
|---|---|---|
| 7:12pm | Marcus calls the rep back. The rep is on another call. | The merchant |
| 7:12pm, +8 seconds | A text: just missed your call, this is Dan with the shop, calling back in a couple of minutes or reply with a time that works | The CRM |
| 7:14pm | Marcus replies: after 8 is good | The merchant |
| After the call ends | The rep sees the thread and calls at 8, or confirms 9 | The rep |
Nothing on that timeline needed the rep. The text went out before he knew the phone had rung, and by the time he looked, the merchant had already picked a time. The alternative is the merchant hearing a voicemail greeting, hanging up, and scrolling to the next MCA number in their recent calls — which, in Alex’s experience, is what most of them do.
What the text should say
- The rep’s first name and the shop’s name. It turns an unknown number into a person, the same reason you text first before a cold call.
- That you missed them, not that you are busy. It is an apology, not an excuse.
- A specific promise — a couple of minutes — and an alternative: reply with a time that works.
- Nothing else. No link, no pitch, no application. The only job is to keep the conversation with you.
Setting it up
| CRM | Where it lives |
|---|---|
| GoHighLevel | Settings → Phone → missed call text-back. One toggle, and the message. |
| Salesforce, HubSpot and others | A workflow triggered by a missed inbound call on a tracked number that sends an SMS from the rep’s line |
Alex’s advice for anything other than GoHighLevel is to ask Claude or another AI assistant for the exact steps in your CRM; it is a simple workflow and every major CRM can do it. The text still goes out under the same rules as any other message you send, so it belongs inside your SMS consent set-up rather than beside it.
It is the first of six automations the top brokerages run. The second covers the other direction — the lead nobody has called yet — and moves it to the next rep after five minutes.