How to Plan a Bulk SMS Campaign: Step-by-Step Execution Guide

Whether you are running festival offers, service updates or mixed programmes, the steps below help messages clear DLT scrubbing, reach the right people and produce numbers you can improve next time. For how categories differ, see Transactional vs Service vs Promotional SMS.

1. Establish audience consent and opt-outs

Promotional and other commercial traffic must follow TRAI preference and consent rules. Unsolicited commercial communication risks blocking, template or header problems, and complaints.

• Keep verifiable opt-in records for promotional (and consent-based) sends.
• Include the opt-out method your DLT portal requires on promotional templates.
• Do not put marketing copy on transactional or service templates - mixed content is treated as promotional. Details are in the DLT registration guide.

2. Character encoding, length and Unicode

Encoding affects how many SMS credits a send consumes and how the message splits.

• GSM / English: plain Latin text typically fits about 160 characters in one segment (coding=0 on the SMSTAKE HTTP API).
• Unicode: regional scripts (Hindi, Telugu, Tamil and others), many symbols or emoji use UCS-2 / Unicode. A single segment is then about 70 characters (coding=2). One unexpected Unicode character can switch the whole message.
• Concatenation: longer texts are split across segments and charged accordingly. Put the offer or action early so a break does not hide the point. See also why SMS delivery fails for Unicode surprises.

3. Segmentation and personalisation

Untargeted blasts drive opt-outs. Segment by behaviour, location or engagement where your privacy policy allows.

• Use only approved DLT template variables for names, order ids, amounts or dates.
• Prefer typed tags such as {#numeric#}, {#alphanumeric#} and {#url#} - not the old generic {#var#}. Fixed words must match the approved template exactly. See the variable tagging guide.
• Whitelist any URLs before you put them in templates.

4. Timing, scheduling and delivery windows

• Promotional (-P): commercial promotional traffic is limited to permitted hours. Industry practice commonly cites 10:00 AM to 9:00 PM - confirm the window on your operator portal and with your provider before scheduling.
• Transactional / service: time-sensitive OTPs and many service alerts are designed for timely delivery; confirm current operator practice for each template category. Category rules are summarised in the classification guide.
• Schedule when your audience is likely to act, then verify with delivery and click data from past campaigns.

The SMSTAKE HTTP API supports optional scheduletime in IST (YYYY-MM-DD HH:mm:ss) when you need a deferred send - see the SMS API reference.

5. Measure delivery and response

• Delivery reports: store the submit ack_id, then use pull DLR or push webhooks to count delivered, failed, rejected and related statuses. Start with SMS delivery reports explained and the DLR webhook guide.
• CTA tracking: if the template includes a link, use a short URL you control and campaign parameters (for example UTM tags) so you can attribute visits or conversions. Only use whitelisted URLs.

See SMSTAKE Bulk SMS → · API integration guide · Choose a provider