Political texting vendors love to advertise big deliverability numbers.
– “95% deliverability.”
– “98% inbox placement.”
– “Near-perfect delivery at scale.”
But very few explain what those numbers actually represent or how they are calculated. For political consultants and campaign managers making high-stakes decisions, that lack of clarity is a material risk.
This article breaks down what a 97% text message deliverability rate actually means for political campaigns, why many vendor claims are inflated, and what questions campaigns should be asking before trusting a number on a sales slide.
Deliverability Is Not the Same as “Sent”
The first misconception is simple but critical.
Deliverability is not whether a message was sent. Deliverability is whether a message was accepted and delivered to the recipient’s device by the carrier.
Many platforms quietly blur this distinction.
- Sent means the platform attempted to hand the message off.
- Delivered means the carrier accepted it and placed it on the device.
- Seen or read is an entirely separate metric.
Some vendors calculate “deliverability” based on messages successfully handed to upstream aggregators, not on actual carrier-level delivery. For political campaigns, that difference can represent tens of thousands of voters who never see a message.
A legitimate 97% deliverability rate refers to carrier-confirmed delivery, not internal platform logs.
Why Political Campaigns Are Scrutinized More Heavily
Political traffic behaves differently from most commercial text messaging.
Campaigns typically send:
- Large volumes in short time windows
- Highly time-sensitive content
- Repeated calls to action (donate, vote, respond)
- Messages from new or seasonal sender identities
Carriers evaluate risk signals, not political ideology. High velocity, inconsistent sender histories, and engagement volatility all increase scrutiny. As a result, political messages are more likely to be filtered than retail or appointment reminders, especially during peak election periods.
When a vendor claims percentage for their text message deliverability for political campaigns, the real question is whether that number holds under:
- GOTV traffic spikes
- Fundraising deadlines
- New list uploads
- Newly registered campaign entities
If the answer is “we average that across all clients,” the number is not meaningful for campaigns.
How Inflated Deliverability Claims Are Created
Most inflated message deliverability claims fall into one of four categories.
1. Aggregated Cross-Industry Averages
Some vendors blend political traffic with low-risk verticals like healthcare reminders or retail receipts. The resulting average looks impressive but does not reflect campaign conditions.
2. Short Measurement Windows
A platform may measure deliverability during off-cycle months and extrapolate those results into election season, when filtering pressure increases dramatically.
3. Partial Carrier Coverage
If delivery reporting only includes certain carriers or routes, blocked traffic can be excluded from the denominator entirely.
4. Redefining the Metric
In some cases, “deliverability” is defined as messages that did not hard-fail, not messages that actually reached devices. All of these are misleading.
What a Real Deliverability Rate Represents
A legitimate 97% SMS deliverability rate for political campaigns typically means:
- Delivery is measured at the carrier-acknowledged level
- Political traffic is segmented from commercial traffic
- Data reflects peak election-cycle behavior
- Sender reputation is actively managed, not reset every cycle
- Compliance and opt-in hygiene are enforced upstream
At scale, moving from 92% to 97% deliverability is not incremental. It is transformational.
For a campaign sending 1 million messages:
- 92% deliverability = 80,000 voters never reached
- 97% deliverability = 30,000 voters never reached
That 50,000-voter gap directly affects fundraising totals, volunteer recruitment, and turnout.
Why Campaigns Rarely See Silent Blocking Coming
One of the most dangerous aspects of poor deliverability is that blocking is often silent. There isn’t any feedback or notifications.
Campaigns assume underperformance is a messaging problem when it is actually a delivery problem. Consultants adjust copy, timing, and targeting without realizing that a significant portion of their audience is never receiving messages at all.
This is why high deliverability is not a vanity metric. It is an early warning system.
The Questions Campaigns Should Ask Vendors
Instead of asking “what is your deliverability rate,” political campaigns should ask:
- How do you define deliverability at the carrier level?
- Is political traffic measured separately from other industries?
- What does deliverability look like during GOTV windows?
- How do you protect sender reputation over time?
- How do you identify and mitigate silent filtering?
Vendors that can answer these questions clearly tend to have defensible numbers. Vendors that cannot often rely on averages and assumptions.
Why Deliverability Is the Foundation Metric
Every political texting KPI depends on deliverability:
- Donations require delivery
- Replies require delivery
- Volunteer sign-ups require delivery
- Turnout reminders require delivery
A campaign cannot optimize engagement on messages that never arrive.
When a platform claims a certain percentage deliverability for political campaigns, the number should represent disciplined infrastructure, compliance-first workflows, and carrier-aware sending practices. Anything less is marketing, not measurement.
Political campaigns that understand what high deliverability actually means gain a structural advantage long before Election Day.
