Guides · Playbook

The final 72 hours. Stage it Friday, sleep Monday.

8 MIN READ · UPDATED JULY 2026

GOTV lives or dies on timing. The campaign that stages the last three days on Friday runs Tuesday from a calm room. The one that writes texts on Monday night ships typos at midnight.

01Friday is the deadline

Everything that sends in the final 72 hours gets written, approved, and staged by Friday afternoon. The polls-open message, the midday nudge, the polls-close-soon push. Written once, gated once, scheduled per audience.

The operating rule

The last week is for execution. Any message being written inside the window is a message being written tired, and tired writes the text that ends up on a screenshot.

02The window math

Quiet hours run 8am to 9pm in the recipient’s local time, and states tighten from there. A list that touches two time zones has two send windows, and the platform holds and releases per recipient. Your job is picking the moment inside the window, not policing the window.

8a–9pthe federal window, per recipient
Frieverything staged
0messages written on Monday night

03Stage the sequence

Saturday reminds the early-vote universe where and until when. Sunday persuades the sporadics with one reason to show up. Monday is logistics, the polling place, the hours, the ride number. Tuesday sends twice. Polls are open, and polls close at 8.

Ballot Chase runs alongside all of it, and its suppression keeps every GOTV send off the people whose ballots are already back. Nothing burns goodwill faster than nudging a voter who voted two weeks ago.

04Election day

The morning send goes at 8:01 local, staged from Friday. The afternoon push goes to the segment that hasn’t voted, updated from the day-of file where your state provides one. Replies flood the inbox, and the two-way queue with suggested drafts is what keeps a small team answering ride requests instead of drowning.

05The pre-staging checklist

Every final-week message written and approved by Friday
Audiences saved as Segments, refreshed at send time
Quiet-hour holds verified for every state on the list
Ballot Chase suppression on, GOTV never texts a banked vote
Ride-request keyword live and routed
The Tuesday morning send scheduled, not remembered

Operational guidance, not legal advice.

Pairs with