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Once a month doesn't wear people out, once a week does

Each segment in your list has its own sending limit, and you set it by watching who opens, not by how much you need to sell this week.

By Yodai · Published on September 6, 2026 · Updated on October 12, 2026

Picture your list split into three groups: people who bought recently, people who buy every once in a while, and people who haven't come back in months. The uncomfortable question comes after you've made the groups: how many times a month can you text each one without getting ignored, or worse, blocked?

The temptation is to treat everyone the same: one message every two weeks to your whole list, because it's easy to remember and feels fair to everyone. That's the costliest mistake you can make. Someone who bought from you last month can handle that pace without blinking, because they recognize you and expect to hear from you. Someone who hasn't heard from you in six months doesn't remember who you are, and one extra message pushes them to mark you as spam instead of replying.

How often you text doesn't depend on how much you need to sell this week. It depends on how active each group is, and you can decide that today, once, so you don't have to think it over every time you open WhatsApp.

How much each group can handle

The reason you can't use the same pace for everyone isn't just about manners. WhatsApp tracks the messages people mark as spam and bans accounts for it, and the customer who doesn't remember you is the first to mark you as spam or block you. If that happens, your whole number loses WhatsApp, even for the customers who actually want to hear from you.

That changes the question. It's not "how many times can I text before I'm annoying," it's "who can I text at the pace my number can afford?" The group that opens almost everything can handle more frequent messages, because they recognize you and expect to hear from you. For the group that never opens, every message they ignore is one more step toward muting or blocking you, so your margin for error with them is much smaller.

Fatigue doesn't warn you with a complaint, it warns you with silence. Nobody's going to text you "leave me alone": they just stop opening your messages, then they mute the chat, then they block you. By the time you notice, you've already lost two or three messages with that person.

That's why the frequency you decide on today isn't set in stone. It's just the starting point. Every month, when you check who opened your last message, move people between groups based on what they actually did, not what they did three months ago.

The message that brings them back, not the one that wears them out

The same message doesn't work for all three groups. With active customers, you can talk to them casually, like someone who was just here last week. With dormant customers, you need to remind them who you are and why you're reaching out before you ask them for anything. The colder the group, the shorter and more specific the message needs to be: one single thing to do, not three.

If you're unsure whether to increase or decrease someone's pace, decrease it. A group that's disengaged can bounce back with a good message; a blocked number can't. Next up is writing that message so it holds up through the three seconds it takes someone to decide whether to ignore you.

You've got the pace for each group figured out. What you write in each message is next: the first line that decides whether your customer reads the message or deletes it without opening it.