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Contact Groups and Messaging
Contact Groups and Messaging
Gary Armstrong avatar
Written by Gary Armstrong
Updated over a week ago

You can think of a Contact Group as a segment of people you want to message. Contact Groups have criteria that you set when creating the group that will be used to include or exclude people from the group.

It's important to note that only people that have opted into one of your Engagement Keywords will be included in any Contact Group.

Criteria

The available criteria for a Contact Group are:

  • Opt-in Date

  • Opt-in Keyword

  • Donor Status

  • Donor Registration Date (first time they completed a donation)

  • Donor Location Assignment

  • Donation Status

  • Donation Start Date (date the donation was initiated)

  • Donation Confirmed Date

  • Donation Collected Date

The last two (Donation Confirmed Date and Donation Collected Date) can differ when it's a first-time donor.

You can specify multiple criteria when creating your Contact Group.  For example, here we've created a group that will include donors that have large uncompleted donations.

The criteria builder is powerful, and will allow you to create complex criteria, such as nested groups.  Here's one that will include donors that have yet to complete their gift to either the Guatemala or Brazil Mission trip Causes.

Notice how we created one top-level "AND" rule with a Donation Status of Pending so as to only include pending donations, and then a nested "OR" rule group specifying either the Guatemala Mission Trip or Brazil Mission Trip Causes.

You'll use the Add Rule button to add a single rule, and the Add Group button to create a group of rules.  Rule groups can be nested or not.

Authorized Senders

An Authorized Sender is someone to whom you will give permission to send messages to a Contact Group.  You'll designate one ore more Authorized Senders when you create or edit a group.

When creating a Contact Group, just either choose an existing Authorized Sender from the drop down, or select the -- New Sender -- option.

Sending a Message to a Contact Group

The way messages are created and sent is very intuitive, convenient and simple. They are sent just like you'd send a regular text message: from the messaging app on your mobile device!

To send a message to the Contact Group, simply send the text message you want to broadcast to the group to the group's Messaging Number

Your message will then be queued for delivery to your donors. It's that simple!

Don't worry. Your personal mobile number is private and never used as the sending number, and donors won't see the Messaging Number, either. The "from" number of the message they receive will be a randomly-assigned communication number from our short code provider.

Messaging Costs

Messages you send work off of a credit system. Each message you send to each contact uses 1 credit (see Messaging Capabilities below) and each of those credits cost 5¢ USD. Credits are purchased in blocks of 200, so one block of credits will cost $10 USD.

Your message credit account balance will be shown at the top right of the dashboard. 

If clicked, it will take you to your organization's credit transaction history, or ledger, which will show all credits purchased and spent.

When you attempt to send a message but there aren't enough credits in your account balance, a block of credits will automatically be purchased and charged to the payment method on file for your account

Messaging Capabilities

You can send plain old text messages, or you can also include emojis or pictures in your messages!

Messages with plain text or emojis cost 1 credit, and messages containing pictures cost 2 credits.

Also, messages longer than 1,600 characters will be broken up and sent as separate messages and each message segment will cost 1 credit.  If the message also contains a picture the last segment will cost two credits.

Here are some examples:

  • 1 plain text message less than 1,600 characters is sent.  Cost is 1 credit.

  • 1 plain text message less than 1,600 characters is sent that contains emojis.  Cost is 1 credit

  • 1 plain text message that is 1,800 characters is sent.  It's broken into two segments and costs 2 credits total, one for each segement.

  • 1 message that is 1,800 characters is sent that contains 1 picture.  It's broken into two segments and costs 3 credits.  1 credit for the first segment that is simply plain text, and 2 credits for the last segment that is both plain text and a picture.

  • 1 message is sent that is 40 characters and contains a picture, and is sent to 50 contacts.  Cost is 100 credits.

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