Who schedules interviews by text?
Recruiters and staffing teams with more candidates than calendar slots, especially for hourly, healthcare and warehouse roles where candidates rarely sit at a desk.
Recruiting and staffing teams use three small campaigns for this job: the invite below, a reminder the day before, and a rebooking sequence for anyone who misses the slot.
What does an interview scheduling sequence look like?
An invite with a booking link, two follow-ups over the next few business days, and a check before the follow-ups that skips anyone who has already booked.
- Text · Day 1
Hi {{First name}}, {{Recruiter}} at {{Agency}} about the {{Role}} job. Pick an interview time at {{Booking link}} or reply with a day that suits.
153 characters with the fields filled in, one segment. With the opt-out line: 2 segments.
- Wait
1 day, business days only
- Condition
Interview has a value: end the sequence for this lead. Otherwise: next step.
- Text · Day 2
Still keen to meet you about the {{Role}} job, {{First name}}. Are mornings or afternoons better? Reply and I'll find a slot.
123 characters with the fields filled in, one segment. With the opt-out line: 2 segments.
- Wait
2 days, business days only
- Text · Day 4
Last nudge on the {{Role}} job. If the timing's wrong or you've found something else, a quick reply helps me plan. Thanks either way.
139 characters with the fields filled in, one segment. With the opt-out line: 2 segments.
Every text in a sequence ends with: Msg frequency varies. Msg & data rates may apply. Reply STOP to opt out, HELP for help. A reply ends the sequence, so the line is on each automated text, and your team’s answers from the inbox go without it. Names are made up.
- The Condition step reads an Interview column. A Condition step reads the person’s row in your list at the moment it runs. Change a column by hand, or let your CRM’s sync change it, and the next Condition step sees the new value. Fill in the interview time when a candidate books through the link, and the nudges stop.
- The day-before reminder is its own one-step campaign. Push tomorrow’s interviews into it in the afternoon, or schedule its launch, with the role, the time and how to reschedule.
- The rebooking sequence starts when a candidate misses the slot: a kind check-in that day and the booking link the next business day if they haven’t replied. The no-show guide has wording for it.
- Fields such as {{Role}} and {{Booking link}} come from your list. If a field is empty for someone, they pause at that step with the missing column named, so nobody gets a text with a gap in it.
When should interview texts go out?
The invite within a business day of the application, the reminder the afternoon before the interview, and the follow-ups on business days only.
Waits count whole days, from 1 to 30, and Business days only skips Saturdays and Sundays. To start a batch at a set time, use Schedule on the Launch tab and pick the date and time.
Each campaign has its own sending days and hours. With Send in each lead’s local time on, those hours follow each person’s time zone, read from the area code of their number, and Textually never sends a campaign text before 8 AM or after 9 PM on their clock, the window US federal rules set for telephone solicitations (47 CFR 64.1200(c)(1)). A text that falls due outside the hours waits for the next allowed time.
Do I need consent to text job candidates?
Yes. A clear line about texts on your application form, recorded with the date, is the usual way to get it. Candidates you sourced from a profile or a job board should be asked first by email or a call.
Carrier guidance treats application updates as informational texts that need express permission (CTIA, 2023), and autodialed texts to mobiles need prior express consent (47 CFR 64.1200(a)(1)). The recruiting texting guide covers sourced candidates, job scam lookalikes and Canada. This is a summary of public rules as of October 2026, not legal advice.
In Textually each person needs a consent record, the source and the date they agreed, carried from columns on your list or your CRM, or you confirm consent for the whole campaign at launch. A text step skips anyone without one and saves the reason on the lead.
What happens when a candidate replies or texts STOP?
A reply ends the invite sequence and lands in the shared inbox, where any recruiter can book the slot. STOP or clear stop wording opts the candidate out across your workspace.
- A reply of any kind ends the sequence for that person, and no later step goes out. The thread lands in the shared inbox with a label such as Interested or Declined, and whoever answers sends from the number the person already knows.
- STOP, or clear wording such as “please stop texting me” or “remove me from your list”, opts the person out across your whole workspace: this campaign, every other campaign that holds their number, and any you run later. The inbox won’t send to them, and a later text from them does not undo it.
Every member of the workspace sees the reply in the bell inside Textually, and each person can turn on email or browser alerts. A thread that has waited more than 4 hours is marked overdue in Needs reply. “Can we do 4?” needs an answer before the slot goes to someone else.
The opt-out holds for future roles too, so a candidate who said stop never hears about the next opening by text.
How do I bring candidates in from my CRM or ATS?
From a connected CRM, a spreadsheet, a CSV export from your applicant tracking system, or the API. Each becomes a list you push into the invite campaign.
Close and HubSpot add each reply and opt-out to the record, and Google Sheets imports a shared sheet of applicants, with Refresh from sheet to bring in rows added since. An applicant tracking system without an integration works through a CSV export or the API.