# Diwali Marketing on WhatsApp and AI Calls > Diwali marketing ideas for small business: a festive timeline for WhatsApp, Instagram comment-to-DM, broadcasts and AI calls, plus sample offer messages. Source: https://business.mysmartassistant.ai/blog/diwali-marketing-whatsapp-ai-calls · Published 2026-10-24 · Language: English · Publisher: MySA Business (https://business.mysmartassistant.ai) The most useful Diwali marketing ideas for small business are less about a clever offer and more about being able to answer everyone who responds to it. In the festive rush, the shop that replies first on WhatsApp, Instagram and the phone usually gets the visit. With MySA Business you can set up AI replies, offer posts that send details by DM, broadcasts to customers who opted in, and AI calls, two to three weeks before Diwali, so your team spends the busy days serving customers rather than typing "price?" answers. This guide is for shops, salons, jewellers, online sellers and coaching institutes, and follows the season in three parts. ## A festive timeline plan Have everything ready before the first offer goes out; nobody has time to test in the middle of the rush. | When | Channel | What to set up | | --- | --- | --- | | 2–3 weeks before Diwali | All | Business Details with festive offers, timings and policies; test calls and test chats | | 2–3 weeks before Diwali | WhatsApp | Smart reply, missed-call auto-reply, a broadcast template sent for approval | | 1–2 weeks before Diwali | Instagram / Facebook | Offer post with "comment OFFER", carousel template with Call and WhatsApp buttons | | 1–2 weeks before Diwali | AI calls | Outbound or scheduled campaign to past customers who agreed to be contacted | | Dhanteras to Diwali week | Phone, WhatsApp | Inbound AI on your number 24/7, DND hours set, appointments open | | The week after Bhai Dooj | AI calls | Follow-up calls for "call me later", Positive Leads reviewed | ## Before Diwali: get your answers ready Every reply the AI gives comes from the Business Details you approved. So the first job is writing down this year's festive information in plain language: what is on offer, which products or services it covers, until when, your extended timings, exchange and return rules, and delivery cut-off dates if you sell online. If you did not write it, the AI will not quote it. Then test it. Message your own WhatsApp number from another phone, ask the questions your customers ask, and place a free [Test call](/docs/test-calls) to hear an AI call in the language you chose. ## WhatsApp during the festive rush Diwali WhatsApp marketing starts with the inbox, not the broadcast. - **Smart reply.** The AI answers each message from your Business Details, in the language the customer writes, Hinglish included. The flood of "price?", "kab tak hai offer?" and "shop kitne baje khulti hai?" gets an answer straight away. See [WhatsApp Smart Reply](/features/whatsapp-smart-reply). - **Missed-call auto-reply.** The AI cannot pick up a WhatsApp voice call, so when a customer rings your WhatsApp on a busy evening, the call is declined politely and followed by a text with your own message. You can also switch on an AI voice callback, a real AI call billed at your call rate, with its own cooldown and daily limit. Your team still sees every chat in the Conversations inbox and can reply by hand at any time. Add family and staff numbers to the Exceptions list so the AI leaves them alone. ## Diwali offer broadcasts on WhatsApp A broadcast is how one Diwali offer reaches your whole customer list at once. With Broadcasts enabled for your workspace, the Owner sends one approved WhatsApp template from your own WhatsApp Business number, through the provider connected under Integrations (Meta WhatsApp or Automate Chats). How a festive broadcast is set up: 1. **Template.** Pick an approved template. Get your Diwali template approved early; it cannot go out before that. 2. **Audience.** Choose a past campaign (for example everyone who answered a call), or upload a CSV of up to 50,000 customers who opted in. Numbers without a country code are read as Indian. 3. **Message.** Fill each blank from the customer's name, your business name or address, a CSV column, or one of your own APIs, so a jeweller's message can carry today's gold rate. 4. **Schedule.** Send now, or schedule it in India time up to 30 days ahead, for example the morning of Dhanteras. 5. **Review.** See exactly how many people it goes to, and who was left out and why (duplicate, opted out, unreadable number). Messages go out steadily within your number's WhatsApp limit, which starts at 1,000 different people in a rolling 24 hours. A bigger list keeps going on its own as the limit frees up, so start large festive broadcasts a few days early. Anyone on your Opted out list is left out of every broadcast. Each broadcast has a report of what was accepted and what was not sent, and **Send again** retries only the messages that were not sent. Details are in [WhatsApp broadcasts](/docs/whatsapp-broadcasts). The replies that come back are answered by Smart reply, so the broadcast and the inbox work together. ## Diwali offers on Instagram and Facebook A Diwali offer on Instagram works well as a post that asks people to comment a word, such as "OFFER". With comment-to-DM, that comment keyword sends a template by DM, for example a swipeable carousel of your festive collection with Call and WhatsApp buttons. One private message goes per comment, as Meta allows. Only real questions get a reply, so "nice" and emoji comments are skipped. DMs are answered from your Business Details in the customer's language, within Meta's 24-hour window after the customer's last message. The same works on Facebook Page comments and Messenger. More on [Instagram comment-to-DM](/instagram-comment-to-dm). ## No missed conversations on Instagram and Facebook In the festive week, a DM read at midnight and answered the next afternoon is usually a lost sale, and Meta allows replies only within 24 hours of the customer's last message. The AI closes that gap: - **Every DM gets an answer at any hour**, including the burst of five short messages a customer sends in a row: set a reply wait of a few seconds and they are merged into one clear reply. - **Every comment that asks something gets a reply**, publicly, privately by DM, or both (Hybrid). - **Interested customers are not lost.** From the second message on, when someone asks about price, booking or a visit, the AI asks once for their name and mobile, and any Indian mobile number written in a DM is saved as a lead under Positive Leads. - **Nothing is hidden from your team.** Every DM conversation appears in the live inbox, and the Channel Report shows the chat leads from Instagram and Facebook and the calls they led to, so after Diwali you can see who to follow up. More in [Instagram DM automation](/features/instagram) and [Facebook Messenger automation](/features/facebook). ## Intent-based calling: call when the customer agrees Some festive chats are clearly buyers: asking about price, availability, a booking or a visit. With intent-based calling, in the console called **Call when the customer agrees**, the AI asks once whether your team may call. On a yes, an AI call goes out in the customer's language with a summary of the chat. On a no, it keeps helping in the chat and does not ask again. At most one such call a day goes to the same number across WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook. ## AI calls for festive season sales Festive season sales calls cover both directions. - **Inbound, 24/7.** The AI answers your business number at any hour, in the language you choose. See [inbound calls](/features/inbound-calls). - **Outbound campaign.** Upload a CSV or Excel list of past customers who agreed to be contacted and the AI calls them about your offer. Make sure you have the customer's permission to call. - **Scheduled campaign.** A long list can be spread over several days, so calls do not all land on one afternoon. Read more in [automated outbound calling](/blog/automated-outbound-calling-software). - **DND hours.** Set DND hours so no calls go out during puja evenings or late at night. Calls inside the window are held, not lost. See [DND hours](/docs/dnd). - **Live data.** A jeweller's today's gold rate can be read from your own API, fetched just before each outbound call or looked up during the call. If the API fails, the call still goes on. See [Custom APIs](/features/custom-apis) and [WhatsApp automation for jewellery shops](/blog/whatsapp-automation-for-jewellery-shops). - **Appointments.** For salons and parlours, the AI can book a slot during the call; the customer gets WhatsApp messages to confirm, and a reminder 3 hours before. See [Appointments](/features/appointments). Every call leaves a recording, an AI summary, sentiment and tags. ## After Diwali: follow up, do not forget The week after Bhai Dooj is when "call me after Diwali" customers expect to hear from you. When a customer said "call me later" on a call, a follow-up call is already scheduled for the time they asked, in the language of the original call. Calls that did their job appear as Positive Leads, and the Lead Feed can deliver them by email to your team, Google Sheet, webhook or API. See [Lead Feed](/docs/lead-feed). ## Sample Diwali offer messages These are samples to adapt. Replace the brackets with your own details; do not copy numbers you have not decided. A broadcast must use a WhatsApp-approved template and go only to customers who opted in. For greetings rather than offers, see [100+ Diwali wishes for customers](/blog/diwali-wishes-for-customers). **Sample 1 (WhatsApp, Hinglish)** > Namaste! [Shop name] ki taraf se Diwali ki shubhkamnayein. Is Diwali [product/category] par [X]% off, [date] tak. Details ke liye isi number par reply karein. **Sample 2 (Dhanteras offer message, jeweller)** > Dhanteras par [Shop name] mein [offer, e.g. making charges par X% off]. Aaj ka rate jaanne ke liye "RATE" likh kar bhejein. Offer [date] tak. **Sample 3 (salon or parlour, English)** > Get Diwali-ready at [Salon name]! [Service] at [X]% off until [date]. Reply "BOOK" to pick a slot. **Sample 4 (Instagram post caption)** > Our Diwali collection is here. Comment OFFER and we will DM you the full catalogue with prices. **Sample 5 (online store, Hinglish)** > [Store name] Diwali sale: [category] par [X]% off. Diwali se pehle delivery ke liye [date] tak order karein. Reply "SALE" for the link. ## Getting started 1. [Sign up](/signup) and verify your mobile number; your Test environment gets ₹100 of Test credit. 2. Write your festive Business Details and connect your WhatsApp number and Instagram or Facebook account. 3. Use **Try now** to hear an AI call on your own phone, then go Live with a prepaid wallet. For volume pricing, [contact sales](/contact). Start two to three weeks before the rush. Templates need approval, and you will want time to test. ## Frequently asked questions ### Can I send a Diwali offer to all my WhatsApp contacts? No. A broadcast sends one approved WhatsApp template, and it should go only to customers who opted in. Numbers on the opted-out list are always left out, and sending is paced within your number's WhatsApp limit, which starts at 1,000 different people in 24 hours. ### Will I miss Instagram and Facebook messages during the rush? Not if the AI is switched on. It answers DMs and real question comments at any hour within Meta's 24-hour window, saves the mobile numbers customers share as leads, and your team can read every conversation in the live inbox. ### Will the AI call customers during puja time? Not if you set DND hours for those evenings. Calls that fall inside the window are held until it ends, not lost. ### Can the AI tell callers today's gold rate during Dhanteras? Yes, if your shop has its own rate API added under My APIs. The AI reads the rate from your system and does not make one up. ### Can the AI handle the rush of price questions on Instagram? Yes. It replies to DMs from your Business Details in the customer's language, and comment-to-DM sends your offer carousel to everyone who comments your keyword. ### Can I also send the Diwali offer by SMS or email? No. MySA Business does not send SMS or email campaigns to customers. Offers go out by WhatsApp broadcast, Instagram and Facebook replies, and AI calls. ### When should I set this up? Two to three weeks before Diwali. That leaves time for template approval, test chats and a test call before the busiest days.