When to use proactive messages
Proactive messaging is for reaching out to a specific customer on their phone-based channel outside of a live reply. Common cases include:
Following up on an open ticket after resolution.
Sending a reminder or update on a transactional event.
Reaching a customer who has left the Intercom web messenger and prefers SMS or WhatsApp.
Keep in mind that WhatsApp requires a pre-approved template for messages sent outside the 24-hour customer-service window. See Sending WhatsApp Templates from the Inbox App for that flow.
Sending a proactive message
Open the customer’s conversation in Intercom.
In the Octopods panel, click Send a proactive message.
Choose the recipient. Click Send to this user/lead to message the contact whose conversation you are already in, or click Search for another user/lead to look up a different contact. If you search, Octopods offers three lookup fields — user/lead ID, email, or phone number — each covering a different way to identify the right contact.
On the Choose channel screen, select the channel to send through from the list — a connected SMS, WhatsApp, or Viber Business Messages channel.
Under Write your message, type the message body in the text area. The field caps at 500 characters.
Click one of the two send buttons. Send message sends the message on the chosen channel and logs it against the current Intercom thread. Send message & open Intercom conversation sends the message and also opens a fresh Intercom conversation for the reply, so the follow-up exchange lives in its own thread.
Seeing delivery status
After you send, the panel shows either:
Message sent! — the message has left Octopods on its way to the customer. Click Done to close.
Failed to send! — delivery did not complete. An error description explains why, Re-send your message lets you retry with the same body, and Finish closes the panel.
Reviewing your recent proactive messages
Click View sent messages in the Inbox App to see a list of your recent proactive sends. The history shows the channel, recipient, and status so you can confirm whether previous messages were delivered before starting another.
Common delivery errors
If a proactive send fails, the panel shows one of these messages:
“Your phone number is invalid. Make sure the number is in an international phone format. See E.164” — the recipient’s phone number is missing a country code or contains characters Octopods cannot parse. Edit the number in E.164 format (for example,
+14155550100) and try again.“Phone number is missing.” — there is no phone number on the contact or entered in the field. Add a phone number to the contact in Intercom or type one into the field before sending.
“We have failed to send your message through your [channel] channel.” — the channel rejected the message at send time. Check that the channel is healthy in your Octopods workspace, that you are within the channel’s messaging rules (for example, the WhatsApp 24-hour window), and that the content follows provider policy.
For provider-specific limits — character counts on SMS, template-only sending on WhatsApp outside the service window — see the channel-level documentation in the Channels section.
What’s next
See the Proactive Messaging section for how proactive sends work outside of the Intercom Inbox App.