Frequency Capping

Frequency Capping launched by Meta limits the number of marketing messages that can be sent to a user in India within one week. The end user can only receive messages from a limited number of brands in a rolling 7-day window. Meta dynamically decides the window and cannot be shared with the end business to protect the channel's user experience. It has the following impact:

• Frequency Capping impacts marketing messages sent to users in India (+91) country code.
• Session messages and CTWA re-targeting campaigns remain unaffected.
• The limit applies to new marketing template conversations, However, utility and authentication templates are delivered normally.
• If a marketing conversation is active between a business and a WhatsApp user, the marketing template messages sent to the user remain unaffected.

For more information, refer to Meta's documentation on this topic - Per-User Marketing Template Message Limits.

Message Delivery under Frequency Capping

Frequency Capping operates on a first-come, first-serve basis. This means that the messages of the initial set of brands are delivered to the end customer, while the messages of the remaining brands are not delivered. The capping is determined at the end-customer level and by the phone number, independent of the WhatsApp Business Account (WABA). It is based on the number of marketing template messages an individual receives from any business.

Failed WhatsApp message

In the case of a failed message, businesses receive a generic error code, specifically error code 003, without specific error messages. This can happen due to the following reasons:

• The recipient's phone number isn't registered on WhatsApp.
• The recipient hasn't accepted the new Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
• The recipient is using an outdated WhatsApp version.
• The message couldn't be delivered to maintain a high-quality user experience (Frequency Capping).

While there might be occasional opportunities to bypass the message delivery limit during festivals and holidays, the system does not provide specific reasons for message-sending failures, although probable reasons are shared.

Best Practices

You can take the following measures to deal with the limitations due to Frequency Capping:

• Avoid Immediate Retries: Refrain from immediately resending the same template to users upon encountering high failure rates to prevent receiving additional error messages.
• Retry Timing: Retry sending messages to affected users at different times within the 24-hour window.
• Template Variation: Modify templates slightly to avoid repetition and improve delivery success rates.
• Segmentation: Use Contlo to create segments of bounced users from specific campaigns and retry sending messages to this audience.