A festival WhatsApp marketing campaign works when three things are done before the festival week: a clean opt-in list, templates approved by Meta, and a send plan that stays inside Meta's limits. This checklist walks through all three, then covers costs, follow-ups and how to tell whether the campaign paid off. It uses Diwali 2026 as the example, but the steps fit Navratri, Eid, Pongal or any regional festival.
For dates and campaign ideas by business type, start with our festival marketing calendar for India. This page covers the WhatsApp side only.
Three weeks before: list and templates
1. Clean your opt-in list
WhatsApp says you may contact people only if they gave you their number and opted in to hear from you, and you must honour every request to stop (WhatsApp Business Messaging Policy, checked Oct 2026).
- Keep customers who opted in on your website, at the counter, in a form or by messaging you first.
- Remove anyone who asked you to stop, on WhatsApp or anywhere else.
- Drop numbers bought from lists or copied from groups.
- Tag each contact by what they bought or asked about, so you can send relevant offers.
Our guide to WhatsApp marketing rules in India covers opt-in wording and DPDP basics in more detail.
2. Write and submit your templates
Any message you start outside a 24-hour customer service window has to be an approved template. Meta reviews templates automatically, and "review can take up to 24 hours" (Meta, templates overview, checked Oct 2026). Allow extra days for a rejection and a rewrite.
Plan three templates per festival:
- The offer (marketing). Name the festival, the offer, the end date and how to order.
- The reminder (marketing). Short, sent once to people who did not reply.
- The order or booking update (utility). Confirmation, delivery slot or appointment time.
3. Pick the right category
Meta assigns every template a category: marketing, utility or authentication, and the category sets the price (Meta, templates overview). A festival greeting with an offer is marketing. An order confirmation is utility. Meta can re-categorise a template it finds mislabelled, so label a promotion as marketing from the start.
Ten days before: budget and limits
4. Work out the cost
Meta charges per delivered template message by category. India list rates, before GST (Meta pricing, effective 1 October 2026, checked 25 October 2026):
| Message | Example | Meta rate per message |
|---|---|---|
| Marketing | Diwali offer, reminder | ₹0.8631 |
| Utility | Order confirmation, delivery slot | ₹0.115 |
| Service | Your reply when a customer messages you | First 1,000 a month per number free |
Add 18% GST, plus any markup your provider adds. To budget a full campaign, use the WhatsApp API pricing calculator. Our WhatsApp Business API pricing guide explains each layer of the bill.
5. Check your messaging limit
Your messaging limit is the number of unique people you can message outside service windows in a rolling 24 hours. New business portfolios start at 250. Higher tiers are 2,000, 10,000, 100,000 and unlimited, and the limit is shared by every number in your business portfolio (Meta, messaging limits, checked Oct 2026).
- If your list is bigger than your limit, split the send across days.
- To reach 2,000, complete business verification, or deliver 2,000 messages to unique numbers within 30 days using high-quality templates.
- Above 2,000, Meta raises the limit when your quality is high and you used at least half your limit in the last 7 days.
6. Know the per-user marketing limit
WhatsApp may cap how many marketing messages one person receives from businesses, based on how often they read marketing messages and how busy their inbox is (Meta, per-user marketing limits, checked Oct 2026). In festival weeks many brands message the same customers, so more of your sends may hit this cap.
- A blocked delivery comes back as error
131049. - Wait at least 24 hours before trying that person again. Meta says earlier retries can block delivery to that user for up to 24 hours.
- When a customer replies to your offer, a 24-hour service window opens, and marketing messages inside it do not count toward the cap.
Festival week: send and watch
7. Send at the right point in the lead time
Our festival calendar suggests sending WhatsApp broadcasts 3 to 7 days before a major festival. For Diwali 2026, that means the offer goes out around 1 to 5 November, before Dhanteras on 6 November. Send the reminder once, two or three days later, and only to people who did not reply.
8. Send a small batch first
Send to a few hundred of your most engaged customers. Wait a few hours, then check replies, blocks and template quality before you send the rest.
9. Watch template and number quality
Meta pauses a template after "recurring negative feedback from customers, or low read-rates", and a paused template cannot be sent (Meta, templates overview). If a template drops to low quality, stop and rewrite it.
10. Reply fast
Replies are where the sales happen. A customer who asks "Is the hamper still available?" at 9 pm and hears back the next morning may have bought elsewhere. Staff the inbox through festival evenings, or let software answer from your price list and hand over to a person. If you are also running ads, Click-to-WhatsApp ads bring chats straight into the same inbox.
After the festival: follow up and measure
11. Send the utility follow-ups
Confirm every order, delivery slot or booking with a utility template at ₹0.115 a message. Meta has charged for utility messages even inside an open service window since 1 October 2026. Then send a review request to every customer, not just the happy ones (see how to get more Google reviews).
12. Measure what came back
Track these per template:
- Delivered and read counts from WhatsApp Manager or your provider.
- Replies, as a share of delivered messages.
- Orders or bookings you can tie to a WhatsApp chat.
- Blocks and opt-out requests.
- Total cost: Meta fees, provider fees and GST.
Divide total cost by orders to get cost per order. Write down which template, send day and audience did best, and start next year's Diwali plan from there.
How BeeCMO helps
Messenger Bee sends templates only to contacts with a recorded opt-in, honours STOP right away, shows the number of recipients and an approximate cost before each broadcast, and paces sending within your number's messaging limit. Nothing goes out until you approve it on WhatsApp. It then answers replies in seconds from facts you approved and hands over to you when needed. See Messenger Bee.
Frequently asked questions
How early should I start a Diwali WhatsApp campaign?
About three weeks before. Templates can take up to 24 hours to review, and a rejection costs more days. For Diwali on 8 November 2026, submit templates now if you have not, and aim to send the offer between 1 and 5 November.
Can I send festival greetings to all my WhatsApp contacts?
Only to people who opted in to messages from your business. Sending to everyone in your phone risks blocks and reports, which lower your quality rating and can limit your sending.
Is a festival greeting a marketing or utility message?
A greeting or offer is marketing. Order confirmations and delivery updates are utility.
Why did my festival message fail with error 131049?
The person hit WhatsApp's per-user limit on marketing messages from businesses. Wait at least 24 hours before trying again.
How much does a festival WhatsApp broadcast cost?
Multiply the number of delivered marketing messages by Meta's India list rate of ₹0.8631, then add GST and any provider markup. The reminder and the utility follow-ups are billed the same way, at their own rates.
Sources
All checked 25 October 2026.
- Drik Panchang, Diwali 2026 puja calendar (New Delhi): https://www.drikpanchang.com/diwali/diwali-puja-calendar.html?year=2026
- WhatsApp Business Messaging Policy: https://whatsappbusiness.com/policy/
- Meta, WhatsApp templates overview: https://developers.facebook.com/documentation/business-messaging/whatsapp/templates/overview
- Meta, WhatsApp Business Platform pricing: https://developers.facebook.com/documentation/business-messaging/whatsapp/pricing
- Meta, messaging limits: https://developers.facebook.com/documentation/business-messaging/whatsapp/messaging-limits
- Meta, per-user marketing template message limits: https://developers.facebook.com/documentation/business-messaging/whatsapp/templates/marketing-templates/per-user-limits