Choosing Recipients for a Broadcast
The four ways to select who receives an SMS broadcast, from everyone to a precisely filtered segment.
The four recipient options
- Everyone - your entire eligible membership
- Specific Members - search and hand-pick individuals
- Groups - target a Ministry, Department, Fellowship, Cell, or similar
- Filters - combine conditions like Member Status, Member Type, Gender, Age Range, Branch, Attendance Status, Birthday Month, and more
Recipient count before sending
Whichever option you choose, Sermfy shows the total recipient count before you confirm, review this number, an unexpectedly large or small count is often the first sign a filter combination isn't quite what you intended.
Use Filters instead of Groups when the audience you want doesn't map to an existing group, for example, "everyone who hasn't attended in the last month" is a Filter condition, not a group membership.
Best practice
For anything time-sensitive or costly in SMS credits, send a test broadcast to yourself or a small internal group first using Specific Members, confirming the message and merge fields render correctly before sending to your full recipient list.
Related Articles
Sending Your First SMS Broadcast
How to compose a broadcast, use merge fields to personalize it, choose your recipients, and understand what happens when you hit send.
Requesting and Using a Sender ID
Why you can't register a Sender ID directly, and what the approval process looks like.
Using Merge Fields in a Broadcast
Personalize every message automatically with @@ merge fields, without writing a separate message per recipient.
Scheduling a Broadcast for Later
Send Now vs. Schedule, and what happens to a scheduled broadcast's status along the way.