Create an SMS and RCS Campaign
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Information

RCS campaign creation is an add-on feature. Contact your MoEngage CSM (customer success manager) or the Support team to enable it for your account.to enable it for your account.

MoEngage offers the facility to utilize SMS and RCS as engagement channels, allowing you to reach out to users directly on their mobile devices and capitalize on the high open and read rates of text messaging. Perform the following steps to create an SMS & RCS campaign in MoEngage:

  1. Click + Create new, and then click Campaign. The Campaign page is displayed.
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    You can also navigate to the left navigation menu in the MoEngage dashboard, click Engage, and then click Campaigns. On the All campaigns page, click + Create campaign. The Create campaign page is displayed.
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  2. Under Outbound, click SMS & RCS and select one of the following campaign delivery types:
    • One Time: This type of campaign allows you to send messages to your audience once - either now or at a scheduled time. You may also use the Best time to send with the scheduled time option.
    • Periodic: This type of campaign allows you to send messages to your audience on a recurring basis at a defined frequency. You may also use the Best time to send with the scheduled time option.
    • Event Triggered: This type of campaign allows you to send messages to your audience that are triggered based on different user action events tracked on the app or server. For more information on creating this campaign, refer to Create an Event-Triggered Campaign.
    • Business Event Triggered: This type of campaign allows you to send messages that are triggered based on any defined business event. For more information, refer to Business Event Triggered Campaigns.
      For more information about delivery types, refer to Delivery Types.

The SMS & RCS campaign creation page is displayed. 
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Steps to Create an SMS & RCS Campaign

The following are the steps to create SMS & RCS campaigns:

  1. Target users: Define the target audience for the campaign.
  2. Content: Define the content of the SMS & RCS campaign to be sent.
  3. Schedule and goals: Define the campaign's delivery schedule and goals.

Step 1: Target Users

This section contains the following:

Campaign Details

The campaign details section contains the following fields: 

  • Teams: If your organization has teams enabled, select a team in the drop-down list. For more information, refer to Teams in MoEngage.
  • Campaign name: Enter the name of the campaign to manage and identify the campaign. The campaign name must have at least five characters, and the limit is 256.
  • User attribute that stores user’s mobile number: Select the user attribute, such as the mobile number. The attribute configured in the settings is selected in the User attribute with email address by default. You can override the same at the campaign level by selecting another attribute that contains the email address.
  • Campaign tags: Select campaign tags from the drop-down list. You can select a maximum of five tags. For more information, refer to Campaign Tags.
  • Message type: Select the message type. The options include:
    • SMS: Selecting this option enables you to create a traditional SMS campaign.
    • RCS only: Selecting this option enables you to create an RCS-only campaign. The RCS message will not be delivered to all the recipient's devices or networks that do not support RCS.
    • RCS with SMS as fallback: Selecting this option enables you to create an RCS campaign with SMS as a fallback. MoEngage attempts to deliver the message using RCS first. If the recipient's device or network supports RCS, MoEngage delivers the RCS message. If not, the message is automatically sent via traditional SMS to ensure delivery.
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      Information

      The Message type selected cannot be changed while editing an active campaign.


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Select Audience

This section contains segmentation filters that help you choose the target audience for your campaign. The following options are available:

All Users Filter by User Property Filter by User Behavior Filter by User Affinity Filter by Custom Segment

This filter option allows you to send the campaign to all the app users. When you use this option, you cannot add multiple filters.

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If teams are enabled for your account, you will be able to see the custom segments created by your team. The segmentation criteria specified for the team for which you are creating the campaign will get appended to the segmentation filters with an AND condition. For example, if the segmentation criteria for your team is the set of users whose last known city is Los Angeles and you have selected users who've purchased a product within the last 3 days as the target audience for your campaign, your target audience would be users who have purchased a product within the last 3 days and whose last known city is Los Angeles. For more information, refer to Teams in MoEngage.

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Information

This is an add-on feature. Please contact your MoEngage CSM (customer success manager) or the Support team to enable it for your account.

After selecting the filter criteria, you can do the following as well:

  • Create Multiple Filters: You can create and combine multiple user property rules, user activity rules, and custom segment rules to create a complex user segment using this option.
    1. Click + Filter.
    2. Click AND or OR.
    3. Select the attribute or event and define the filter conditions.
  • Exclude Users: Select this checkbox to define the filter criteria for users to be excluded from the campaign.
  • Send campaign to the users opted-out in subscription management: Turn this toggle on to automatically include opted-out users from the campaigns. For more information, refer to Subscription Management.
  • Reset filters: Click this option to reset the segmentation filters.
  • Show count: Click this button to display the total number of users who are currently in the configured segment.

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Control Groups

This section contains information about control groups for the campaign. A control group is a set of users added to an exclusion list. These users will not receive the marketing campaign. Control Groups are enabled only for promotional campaigns and are not applicable to transactional campaigns. You can enable the control groups to which you want to send the promotional campaign.

In the Enable control groups section:

  • A global control group is a list of users who will not receive any of the marketing campaigns.
    Turn the Global control group toggle on to 
    not send the campaign to all the users in the control group. 
  • Campaign Control Group is created by combining the user base that qualifies for the campaign.
    Turn the Campaign control group toggle on to not send the particular campaign to the control group. 

For more information, refer to Control Group.

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Click Next or use the tabs at the top of the create campaign navigation to move to Step 2 "Content"

Step 2: Content

This section describes how to create content for your campaign:

SMS RCS Only SMS with RCS as Fallback

If you selected Message type as SMS, use the following options to create content for your SMS campaign:

  • A default template where you fill in the required details for all the fields.
  • A custom template that pre-populates the data from the templates uploaded to MoEngage using the SMS Template APIs.

Create SMS Content Using the Default Template

Perform the following steps to create the content for the SMS campaign:

  1. Select the default template. The Content section is displayed.
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  2. In the SMS sender list, select the SMS connector (service provider). The Template ID is mandatory for connectors sending SMS to Indian users. For more information on regulations, click here.
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  3. In the Message field, enter the content to be displayed in the SMS.
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  4. To personalize your message, enter @ in the Message field. The SMS & RCS Personalization pop-up window is displayed. For more information, refer to Personalization.
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  5. In case the attribute chosen is not available for the user, or there is some failure in displaying the attribute, we can select a fallback option, as shown above. Select No fallback if there is no alternative to the failed attribute. You can choose not to send the SMS or replace the failed attribute with a text of your choice using the Replace text option.
    You will see the character count of your message and the SMS count.
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Create SMS Content Using the Custom Templates

To create the SMS content using custom templates, refer here.

Create Content Using the Custom Templates

 

Beta

  • This feature applies only to the SMS channel.
  • This is an Early Access feature. To enable it for your account, contact your CSM or raise a support ticket.vvv

Custom templates are uploaded to MoEngage using the Custom SMS Template API. For more information, refer to the Custom Template API. This option helps you have a pre-defined set of templates created outside the MoEngage ecosystem. You can reuse these templates, preview them on the dashboard, and use them to send campaigns to your customers.

You can do the following actions in the custom templates section:

  • Select a template: Click a template to select it.
  • Sort templates: Click the Sort.png icon to sort the templates in ascending or descending order of the last modified time of the template.
  • Search templates: Enter the template name in the search box at the upper-right corner of the custom templates section to search for a specific template.
  • Preview a template: You can preview a template by hovering over it and clicking the PreviewIcon__1_.png icon that appears, as shown below:
    PreviewCustomSMSTemplate.gif

After you select a custom template, it will be loaded in the UI with details of all the fields in the template. You can view the fields, but can edit them only if you have the Edit Templates permission.

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Information

  • Any user with the following roles can edit the templates: Default Admin, Manager, and Marketer.
  • To enable edit access for other users, they must have the Edit Templates permission.

Personalized Preview

Personalized preview allows you to visualize how your personalized content appears to end users. You can preview the message types with personalized content on the right side of the screen. Perform the following steps to preview the personalized content:

  1. Click the respective tabs for the message type to preview the personalized content.
  2. Select the Preview type as Default or Personalized.
  3. Click the edit icon adjacent to the Personalized Preview type. You are taken to the Personalized preview page.
    For more information, refer to Personalized preview.
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URL Addition and Shortening

Add the URL in the SMS or RCS message to track SMS or RCS click for the URL. MoEngage will use URL shortening services to shorten your URL and then track the users who clicked the URL. Note that URLs included in the RCS actions, when clicked, are tracked by default and don't need shortening.

The following points are to be noted for URL Shortening:

  1. Shortened Links expire in fourteen days and cannot be tracked after expiry. When a customer opens a link beyond its expiry, they see a "This link is no longer active" message.
  2. If user and event attributes are used in the shortened links, the attributes' names must abide by the following:
    1. They must not contain spaces.
    2. If the attributes contain links, their values should not contain http:// or https://. These can be added before the attribute to shorten the link.
  3. Special characters such as apostrophes and commas are not supported in shortened links.
  4. Multiple JINJA operations are not supported in links that are to be shortened. For example, using a Content API link in a Product or vice versa (in a link that is to be shortened) is not supported.

Add a Locale

Locale is a criterion based on which you can further sub-segment your target audience to send them a Localized message. To add a locale to the campaign, click + Locale at the top right corner of the content creation step. You can add a new locale or add an existing locale to the campaign. For more information, refer to Localize campaign message.

Add a Variation

Creating variations of campaigns allows you to determine the effect of a modified variable on other campaign variables. It also enables the comparison of performance between campaign variations.To add a variation to the campaign, click + A/B test at the top right corner of the content creation step. You can add a new variation or copy the existing variation. After adding a variation, you can see the variations as tabs on the top ribbon above the content editor, as shown below.Variations_Added.pngYou can specify the user distribution for each variation by clicking User Distribution, which is available at the top right corner. For more information, refer to A/B Testing.

arrow_drop_down Test Campaign (optional)

Test campaigns enable previewing the campaign on a test device to ensure that your notification is conveyed in the manner that you desire.

You can test the campaign you created by selecting any of the following options and providing the value for the attribute chosen for your test user:

  • Unique ID
  • Email ID
  • Mobile Number (Registered With MoEngage)
  • Mobile Number (External/Not Registered with MoEngage)
  • Google Advertising identifier
  • iOS Identifier for Advertising
  • Device Push Token
  • Custom Segment

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Click Next or use the tabs at the top of the create campaign navigation to move to Step 3 "Schedule and Goals".

Step 3: Schedule and Goals

This section contains the following:

  • Delivery schedule: Choose when the campaign should be delivered to your users and the periodicity of delivery.
  • Conversion goals: Choose the conversion goals and revenue metrics to be tracked for the campaign.
  • Delivery controls: Choose the advanced delivery control options such as throttling, frequency capping, and expiration settings for the notification. For more information about minimum delay between campaigns, refer here.

Delivery Schedule

arrow_drop_down One Time
As soon as possible At specific date and time

Send the campaign immediately to the target users.

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arrow_drop_down Periodic
At fixed time Send in user time zone Best time for user (Sherpa)
Choose this option to send the campaign on a specified date and time. The following fields are available in this section:
  • Campaign time zone - the timezone in which the campaign should be sent.
  • Start date - the date on which the campaign should be sent.
  • Send time - the time at which the campaign should be sent. Select am or pm depending on when the time of day at which the campaign should be sent.
  • Periodic - the periodicity of the campaign. You can choose from three options: Daily, Weekly, and Monthly, from the radio buttons available to the left of the screen.
    Periodicity Description
    Daily

    Repeat every - This option lets you specify the number of days after which the campaign should be repeated.

    For example, if you choose to repeat every 3 days and the campaign starts on Monday, it will run again on Thursday.

    Weekly

    Repeat every - This option lets you specify the number of weeks after which the campaign should be repeated.

    For example, if you choose to repeat every 3 weeks and the campaign starts the first week, it will run again in the fourth week.

    Repeat on - This option lets you specify the day(s) of the week on which the campaign is to be sent (For example, if you wish to send the campaign every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, select these days in this option).

    Monthly

    Repeat every - This option lets you specify the number of months after which the campaign should be repeated.

    For example, if you choose to repeat every 3 months and the campaign starts in January, it will run again in April.

    Repeat on - This option lets you do the following:

    • Days of month - Choose this option for repeating campaigns that are date specific. Select the date(s) of the month the campaign is to be sent(For example, to send the campaign on the 5th and the 25th of a month, select the 5th and 25th in the calendar widget.).
      Note: If the selected date(s) doesn't exist in the month specified (as it is a shorter month), a campaign will be sent on the last date. (For example, if the 30th and 31st are selected and the month is February, one campaign would be sent on the 28th).
    • Days of week -  Choose this option to specify the day(s) of the week on which the campaign is to be sent (For example, if you wish to send the campaign every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, select these days in this option).
      Note: In case of a day of the week not existing in a month (for example, fifth Saturday), the campaign would be skipped for that instance. And in case of overlap (for example, 4th Monday and last Monday), only one instance would be sent.

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  • Ends - the date on which the campaign will end. The following options are available:
      • Never - the campaign will be scheduled to run daily.
      • On - the campaign will end on the end date specified in the End Date field.
      • After - the campaign will end after the number of occurrences specified in the occurrences field.
arrow_drop_down Event Triggered
Click Active continuously under Send campaign and do the following:
Field Description
Campaign time zone

Select the campaign time zone in which the campaign is sent

Start date

Set the start date at which the campaign is sent.

Send time
      1. Set the send time at which the campaign is sent.
      2. Select AM or PM
End date Set the end date at which the campaign is stopped.
End time
      1. Set the end time at which the campaign is stopped.
      2. Select AM or PM

When will event triggered campaigns be sent?

The campaign will be sent only when:

  • The event property/attribute which is being used to create these types of triggers (like the flight_time example), is in a valid date-time format. If it is not in date-time format, the string should have data in one of the supported formats. If the selected attributes do not contain data in any of these formats, the campaign won't be sent to your users. 
  • The date/time value from the attribute is greater than the time at which the trigger condition is fulfilled.
  • The date/time value from the attribute is less than 30 Days + the time at which the trigger condition is fulfilled e.g. If your trigger condition is fulfilled at date D, your notification will be sent only when the attribute value is less than D+30.
  • The intelligent delay optimization (With Delay) does not work for campaigns sent on relative timing.

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arrow_drop_down Business Event Triggered
Click Active continuously under Send campaign and do the following:
Field Description
Campaign time zone

Select the campaign time zone in which the campaign should be sent.

Start date

Set the start date at which the campaign should be sent.

Send time

Set the send time at which the campaign should be sent. Select AM or PM

End date Set the end date at which the campaign should be stopped.
End time

Set the end time at which the campaign should be stopped. Select AM or PM

When will business event-triggered campaigns be sent?

The campaign will be sent only when:

  • The data type(s) of the user attribute(s) or event attribute(s) mapped to data type(s)the business event's attribute(s) match.
  • The attribute(s) used in segmentation is passed in the trigger request for the business event.
  • The intelligent delay optimization (With Delay) does not work for campaigns sent on relative timing.

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Conversion Goals

You can add conversion goals to track the business metrics for your campaigns. You can track a maximum of five conversion goals. You can choose any app event as a conversion goal activity and set more than one conversion goal. The first goal will be treated as a primary goal.

For example, if you want to track the number of customers who have purchased an iPhone after your campaign was sent. (Event: Purchase event, Product: iPhone). Your conversion goal setup might be similar to the following image:

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With multiple conversion goals, you can track more than one business metric or visualize a funnel for your user actions. For example, if you want to check the following, you can do so with multiple conversion goals.

  • How many users have viewed the product page?
  • How many of them added that product to the cart?
  • How many of them made a successful order?
arrow_drop_down Tracking Revenue Performance (Optional)

With MoEngage, you can track the revenue generated by your campaigns. For example, you can track the revenue generated by your product after sending a communication. To track revenue performance, enable the Revenue performance toggle for the conversion goal for which you want to track the revenue.

In the example here, to track revenue for orderSuccessful events, you must enable the Revenue performance toggle.

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After choosing the goal, you can select the numeric attribute that captures the order's total monetary value. In this example, cartValue contains the total order value. You can choose the currency in which your monetary value is being reported. RevenuePerformance.png

Set Attribution window: You can set an attribution window (a time period or window that is calculated since the user has received/clicked the campaign, for which you want to attribute the conversion goals to a specific campaign.) By default, it is set for 36 hours while the maximum attribution window can be set up to 10 days. In the example below, the attribution window is set to 36 hours.

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Delivery Controls

Delivery Control for One Time, Periodic, and Business Event Triggered Campaigns Delivery Control for Event Triggered Campaigns

This section contains the following options:

Frequency Capping

This feature helps control the number of emails sent to a user in a day.

  • Ignore frequency capping: Enable this toggle to ignore the frequency capping limit for this SMS & RCS campaigns. Click Ignore frequency capping to ignore the capping for your SMS & RCS campaigns when you want to ignore the capping but want this campaign to be counted. For example, the frequency capping value is set to three. You have sent three campaigns today to a group of users. You realize that the SMS & RCS messages triggered by this campaign is urgent and should go on high priority even though some customers have already received three campaigns. If you use the Ignore Frequency Cap, people who have already received 3 campaigns will receive this one as well. For more information, refer to Frequency Capping.
  • Count for the frequency capping: Enable this toggle if you want this connector to be counted for frequency capping limit. If you use Count for frequency capping, people who would have received 2 communications already and send this as well, their receipt count will become 3 after this campaign is sent.

Throttling

Throttling is a feature that allows you to control the sending rate of SMS & RCS campaigns. In the Request limit section, enter the number of requests per minute sent for the SMS & RCS campaigns. For example, send the request URL with a default of 60,000 rpm (minimum of 60,000 requests per minute and maximum of 200,000 requests per minute). For more information, refer to Throttlling.

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Your campaign is now ready to be sent. Click Publish, confirm in the dialog box, and your campaign is created.

Campaign Actions

After publishing the campaign, you can view the campaigns in Engage > Campaigns. Click the ellipsis icon under Actions to view the following campaign actions:

  • View: This option allows you to view campaign information. Clicking this option takes you to the Campaign analytics and info page.
  • Duplicate: This option allows you to create a copy of the campaign with all existing details, appending Duplicate to the campaign name.
  • Edit: This option allows you to edit campaign details. Note that it is not possible to edit an active campaign and change the Message type once the campaign is published.
  • Pause: This option allows you to pause a campaign.
  • Archive: This option allows you to archive a campaign. The archived campaigns can be unarchived.
  • Unarchive: This option allows you to unarchive a campaign.

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You can also view the following campaign actions on the Campaign info and analytics page of a campaign:
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  • Campaign Status: A campaign can have various statuses, including Active, Expired, Not Sent, Paused, Scheduled, Sending, Sent, and Stopped. If the Campaign Approval Workflow (CAF) is enabled, additional statuses such as Under Review and Rejected are also available.

Next Steps

If you have successfully created the campaign, you will be taken to the Analytics and Info page.

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