2 answers
Yes, Without enabling marketing cloud you can send SMS but I have a few suggestions before you setup sending SMS.
In 3 ways you can send SMS from Salesforce.
1. Salesforce default SMS sending
A. Very expensive.
B. Some places you have to put your development efforts to make the process automatic.
C. support only for 5 countries for now.
2. Integrate SMS gateway.
N number of gateways in a online where you can choose and integrate.
Pros:
A. SMS prices are low.
Cons:
A. Most of the gateways don't accept Bulk SMS in a single API call. You have to develop your system to handle those calls because it causes an issue while you do bulk upload with data loader.
B. For every template you have to hard code your template in apex and it is very difficult to manage.
C. When there is a change in the template you have to edit and redeploy the code.
D. If you want to send SMS to different countries Integration is not a good option because International SMS gateway cannot give SMS at local Price.
E. You have to invest your money and time on every SMS template creation or update.
F. you have to develop your system to send SMS with less API calls which is important .
3. You can find Apps in AppExchange.
There are a few apps in AppExhnage which are providing complete automation, but few apps drain your API limits.
Pros :
A. No hard coding of Template. Like email Template you can manage SMS templates.(few are not provided)
B. 0 Development efforts.
D. Easy to manage the templates.
If your option is 3 ? You can have a look at our ValueText SMS App: https://goo.gl/m79twV ( Cheapest app at AppExchange )
For any assistance you can email us at support@valuetext.io
