Scheduling an SMS Sending

When sending an SMS campaign, if you choose to schedule the sending for a later time/date, a lot can change before the scheduled time.

For example, people may sign up for communication from you; a few others may unsubscribe between the time you set up a campaign sending and the actual time of sending. Or, you could want to make some changes to a scheduled campaign.

So what happens in the scenarios mentioned above?

As a rule of thumb, we freeze the sending details 15 minutes before the scheduled sending time.

Let us look at the different ways in which this impacts your sending:

Scenario I

Sending is scheduled for a time that is less than 15 minutes away from the current time

For example, if the present time is 5 pm, and the user schedules a campaign for sending at any time between 5 pm to 5:15 pm.

In this scenario:

The campaign’s sending details will be frozen immediately, i.e., at 5 pm.

  • The user will not be allowed to make any changes to the campaign content or the recipient groups.
  • The campaign will be sent to all the contacts that were a part of the recipient group(s)/ dynamic group(s) at 5 pm. This means that in case of a contact, who was a part of the recipient group at 5 pm, but he/she unsubscribed from the mailing list at 5:05 or 5:10 pm, he/she would still receive the campaign. Similarly, if a contact gets added to the recipient dynamic group at 5:12 pm, he/she will not receive the campaign.

Scenario II

Sending is scheduled for a time that is more than 15 minutes away from the current time

For example, if the present time is 5 pm, and a campaign is scheduled for sending at any time later than 5:15 pm, let’s say at 10 pm.

In this scenario:

  • The user will have the option to edit the campaign (both content and sending details) until 15 minutes before the scheduled sending time, i.e., until 9:45 pm in the above example.
  • The user will also have the option to cancel (delete) the campaign sending until 15 minutes before the scheduled sending time, i.e., until 9:45 pm in the above example.
  • The sending details for this campaign will be frozen at 9:45 pm, i.e.,
    • The user will not be allowed to make any changes to the campaign content or the recipient groups.
    • The campaign would be sent to all the contacts that were a part of the recipient group(s)/ dynamic group(s) at 9:45 pm. This means that in case a contact, which was a part of the recipient group at 9:45 pm, but he/she unsubscribed from the mailing list at 9:50 pm, he/she would still receive the campaign. Similarly, if a contact gets added to the recipient dynamic group at 9:50 pm, he/she will not receive the campaign.