hashChat · Guide
How to send a broadcast that actually arrives
Most broadcasts in this market fail quietly — they go out, nothing bounces, and barely anyone receives them. Here is why that happens, how approval and daily limits really work, and what a send costs.
The short answer
On the WhatsApp Business API, a broadcast is a template message: text you submit to Meta in advance, get approved once, then send many times with the variable parts filled in. You are billed per message, and how many you may send in a day depends on a tier you earn rather than one you buy.
On the free WhatsApp Business app there is no approval and no per-message cost — but there is a rule that quietly wastes most campaigns, and it is the next section.
Why your last broadcast reached almost nobody
A broadcast list in the free app only delivers to people who already saved your number. Everyone else is skipped silently. No error, no warning, no way to tell from the app that it happened.
So a list of 500 leads collected from ads, walk-ins or a form might genuinely reach forty of them — the handful who saved you. People usually conclude their message was bad, or that WhatsApp is throttling them. Neither is what happened.
The API removes that rule and replaces it with a different one: the person must have opted in. That is a requirement about consent, not about whether they tapped “save contact”. It is also the single most common reason a business outgrows the free app — the full comparison is here.
Templates, and what they cost
Meta reads what a template says and prices it by category — and it will re-categorise one that is labelled wrongly. The gap between the top two rows is the difference between a campaign that pays for itself and one that does not.
| Category | What it covers | Rate |
|---|---|---|
| MarketingThe expensive one, and the one most broadcasts fall into. | Offers, launches, re-engagement — anything promotional. | ~PKR 13.20 / message |
| UtilityRoughly a fifth of the marketing rate. Worth structuring for. | Order confirmations, delivery updates, appointment reminders — tied to something the customer did. | ~PKR 2.79 / message |
| AuthenticationNarrow purpose; not a route around marketing rates. | One-time passcodes and login verification. | Priced separately |
| Service (not a template)No approval needed. This is where automations and team replies live. | Any free-form reply within 24 hours of the customer messaging you. | Free |
Rates are Meta’s, charged to your own account, and Meta changes them periodically — the full pricing breakdown is here.
Why templates get rejected
The usual cause is a promotional message submitted as utility — Meta goes by the content, not the label. After that it is nearly always formatting: a variable sitting at the very start or end of the message, two variables next to each other, or sample values left out. None of these are verdicts; fix and resubmit.
Your daily limit is earned, not bought
Meta caps how many unique customers you may start conversations with in a rolling 24 hours. The ladder climbs as you send consistently without generating complaints:
| Customers / 24 hours | When you are here |
|---|---|
| 250 | Where a new, unverified number starts. |
| 1,000 | After Business Verification, with a healthy quality rating. |
| 10,000 | Earned by sending consistently without complaints. |
| 100,000 | Same ladder, one rung up. |
| Unlimited | The top of the ladder. |
There is no form to request a higher tier. It moves on its own — upward when you send well, and back down after a campaign that draws blocks and reports. This is the mechanism behind most of the “my number got restricted” stories in this market.
Quality rating decides everything else
Every block and every report a recipient files pushes your rating down, and the rating drives the tier above. The protective habits are unglamorous and they work: send to people who asked to hear from you, keep an obvious way to stop, send less often than you are allowed to, and answer replies quickly — a broadcast that starts real conversations reads very differently to Meta than one that only gets dismissed.
Worth knowing: replying inside the 24 hours after a customer messages you is free and needs no template. A cheap broadcast that opens conversations, answered well, costs less than a large one that nobody responds to.
A checklist that survives contact with a real campaign
- Submit the template early. Not an hour before the campaign. Rejection is routine and resubmission costs you a cycle.
- Check the category honestly. If it promotes something, it is marketing. Labelling it utility gets it re-categorised or refused, and delays the send.
- Send to opted-in people only. A smaller list that expects you outperforms a large one that does not, and it protects the rating that sets your ceiling.
- Test on a few numbers first. Variables render differently than they read in the editor.
- Have someone ready to answer. Replies land inside the free 24-hour window; a broadcast nobody answers wastes the part you paid for.
- Do the arithmetic first. 1,000 marketing messages is roughly PKR 13,200 to Meta. Know the number before you press send, not after.
Questions people ask
Why did my broadcast only reach a few people?
Almost always the saved-number rule. A broadcast list in the free WhatsApp Business app only delivers to recipients who already have your number saved in their phone. Most of a collected or purchased list has not saved you, so the message quietly reaches a fraction of it and nothing tells you that happened. The API has no such rule — it asks for opt-in instead, which is about consent rather than about phone contacts.
Do I need Meta to approve every broadcast?
You need approval for the template, not for each send. Once a template is approved you can send it repeatedly, filling in the variable parts each time. Approval usually comes back quickly, but plan for it rather than writing a template an hour before a campaign.
Why do my templates keep getting rejected?
The most common cause is category mismatch — a promotional message submitted as utility. Meta reads the content, not the label. After that it is usually formatting: variables sitting at the very start or end of the message, two variables next to each other, or missing sample values. All of these are fixable and resubmittable.
How many messages can I send in a day?
It depends on your messaging tier, which counts unique customers in a rolling 24 hours. New numbers start low and the ladder climbs as you send consistently without generating complaints. You do not apply for a higher tier; you earn it, and a bad campaign can move you back down.
What does a broadcast to 1,000 people cost?
At roughly PKR 13.20 per marketing message, about PKR 13,200 in Meta charges, plus your platform subscription. The same list on a utility template costs around PKR 2,790, which is why it is worth asking whether a message is genuinely promotional before sending it as one.
Can I broadcast to numbers I bought or scraped?
You should not, and it tends to end the account rather than the campaign. Broadcasting to people who never asked to hear from you is what drives blocks and reports, which pushes your quality rating down and your daily limit with it. The cheapest protection is a list of people who actually opted in.
Read next
Where hashChat fits
hashChat is where the broadcast is actually put together — the contact list, the approved templates, the send, and the shared inbox your team answers the replies in. It connects to your own WhatsApp Business account, so the number stays yours and Meta bills you directly with nothing added on top. From PKR 2,000 a month, 3 days free.