Messaging channels
Available channels
| Channel | Inbound | Outbound | AI participates |
|---|---|---|---|
| SMS | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Instagram DM | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Yes | Yes | No — deliberately |
Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Live Chat are supported by the CRM layer but not yet verified end-to-end in Avex.
Why the AI skips email
Email is excluded from AI classification on purpose. Inboxes are full of marketing replies, auto-responders, and out-of-office messages, and treating those as member intent produces bad decisions.
SMS and Instagram are high-signal — a person texting you means something. That’s where the AI works.
Instagram matters more than it looks
For most gyms, a meaningful share of inbound interest arrives as an Instagram DM, often outside business hours. Those messages fire the same AI pipeline as SMS — so a DM at 9pm gets a real reply, not a next-morning one.
Sending a message
From a member’s record, from the class roster, or by asking Avex AI in chat — “text everyone who missed last week’s class.”