# Quick messages

Use quick messages to send one-off email or SMS campaigns fast. You don’t need an audience from your Apteco system or a complex journey—just upload a list of contacts, pick a template, and send.

This form of campaign is a simple, single-stage journey where you need to quickly communicate with contacts from an external list.

## When to use quick messages

Use quick messages when:

- You have a CSV, TXT, or TSV file of contacts not in your Apteco system
- You need to send a one-time communication to an external list
- You want a straightforward, "batch and blast" communication approach without any path splits in your customer journey

> [!NOTE]
>
> **Example use cases**
>
> **Event invitation**
>
> You need to send an urgent invitation to a list of industry contacts for an upcoming webinar. These contacts aren't in your Apteco system but you have their email addresses and names in a CSV file from a recent networking event.
>
> **Product announcement**
>
> You've acquired a new list of potential customers from a trade show and want to send them a one-time product announcement email.
>
> Rather than importing these contacts into your main database, you can quickly upload the CSV file and send your announcement while maintaining separation from your Apteco system data.

## Creating a quick message

Use quick messages to send one-off email or SMS campaigns fast. Just upload a list, choose a template, and send straight away.

### Creating a quick message

To create a quick message:

1. Navigate to your desired marketing folder in Campaigns.
2. Click **\+ New**, then **Quick Message**.
3. Enter a name for your campaign.
4. Click **Create**.

Orbit creates your campaign in the current folder and applies the quick message label next to the campaign name.

You can now upload your target segment file.

### Uploading your list of contacts

To define your target audience:

1. Click the **Target segment** journey step.
2. Enter a name for your target segment.
3. Click **Create**.
4. Click **Select file** to upload your contact list.
5. Choose a **CSV**, **text**, or **TSV** file containing your contacts.

   > **File format requirements**
   >
   > **CSV files**
   >
   > - Use comma-separated values
   > - You can optionally enclose values in quotes
   >
   > **TSV/TXT files**
   >
   > - Use tab-separated values
   > - Do not use enclosers
   > - You can't have a comma delimited file with a .txt file extension
6. Review the preview data to ensure columns and data appear correctly.

   > **Note**
   >
   > You can only preview the first 5 rows, no matter the file size.

   > **Tip**
   >
   > Click **Refresh Counts** to see how many contacts are in your file.
7. Click **Apply**.

You can now set up your message.

### Configuring your quick message

To set up your message:

1. Click the **\+** under your target segment step.
2. Select either **Email** or **SMS** as your channel type.
3. Enter a **name** for your message step.
4. Click **Create**.
5. Select your **Apteco Email** or **Apteco SMS** channel. Your credits display beneath your selected channel
6. Choose your template from the dropdown.
7. Enable **UTM Tracking** if you want Orbit to add UTM codes to links in your message. See [UTM code tracking](<https://help.apteco.com/en/orbit/campaigns/journey-builder/utm-code-tracking/index.md>).
8. To allow Orbit to add any required content fields, click **Add**.
9. Map the required fields from your uploaded file, rather than a variable:

   - firstname
   - **Actual Email Address** or **Actual Mobile Number** (depending on your channel)
10. If your template contains any personalisation fields, click **\+ Add Content Field**.

    See [Message personalisation](<https://help.apteco.com/en/orbit/campaigns/journey-builder/personalisation/index.md>).

    > **Note**
    >
    > Orbit only populates personalisation content when you build the content as a variable rather than a contact property.

    > **Tip**
    >
    > If you want add communication history fields to record the name of the message or campaign, you can use the campaign structure field type.
    >
    > See [Campaign structure content field](<https://help.apteco.com/en/orbit/campaigns/journey-builder/personalisation/campaign-structure-content-field/index.md>).
11. Click **Apply**.
12. Click **Save** to save your campaign.
13. Click **Publish**.
14. Review your campaign summary, which includes the option to record communication history.

    > **Note**
    >
    > This is for reporting purposes and the data is not part of your FastStats system communication history.
15. Click **Publish** again to send your quick message immediately.

You’ve now sent your quick message.

### Monitoring and reporting

After publishing your quick message:

- Use the [Overview tab](<https://help.apteco.com/en/orbit/campaigns/overview/index.md>) to see campaign statistics and delivery information.
- View the [Monitoring tab](<https://help.apteco.com/en/orbit/campaigns/campaign-monitoring/index.md>) to track delivery progress.

### Important notes

- Quick message contacts remain separate from your Apteco system data
- Campaigns send immediately with no option for scheduled delivery
- Create message templates in advance using the Orbit [Template builder](<https://help.apteco.com/en/orbit/campaigns/template-builder/index.md>)