Text messages

Configured in

• sms-templates
• twilio

Text a candidate in a real conversation — bubbles, delivery receipts, templates and the AI assistant, right on their profile.

Where to find it

Candidate profile → Texts tab

Who can use it

Anyone with access to candidates. Adding a phone number requires edit access.

Direct URL

https://app.nextal.com/candidates/<ID>?tab=texts

🔒Requires permission:Candidate Read

What it does

The Texts tab is the SMS conversation with this candidate: everything your team sent them and everything they answered, laid out as a chat thread. Outgoing messages sit on the right, the candidate’s replies on the left, and a composer stays on screen at the bottom of the tab.

The Texts tab. The thread opens on the newest message; the composer never leaves the screen.

Reading the conversation

• Bubbles. Your messages (and your colleagues’) are blue, on the right; under each one, who sent it, the time and its delivery state. The candidate’s replies are white, on the left.
• Day separators. A small Today, Yesterday or date pill splits the days.
• The chips at the top. All, Sent and Received filter the thread, with the number of messages on each side.
• The number and “Open in Messages”. To the right of the chips, the candidate’s phone number and a link that opens the same conversation on the Messages page, next to all the others.

Delivery states

Every outgoing message carries one of these states:

State	What it means
sending…	The message is on its way to the SMS provider. The state updates by itself within seconds.
sent	The provider accepted the message.
delivered	The candidate’s phone received it.
not delivered	The message did not arrive (invalid number, phone unreachable…). The bubble gets a red outline and a retry link sends the same text again as a new message — the failed one stays in the thread.

Writing a message

1. Type

   Write in the box at the bottom of the tab. Enter sends; Shift+Enter adds a line break.

2. Or start from a template

   The Template menu lists your organization’s active SMS templates (your custom templates and the system ones). Picking one fills the box; you can still adjust it before sending.

3. Or ask the AI assistant

   Generate with AI drafts a message from a prompt, aware of the candidate, the job and the conversation so far. You review, then insert. Once there is text, the bar offers Improve, Change tone, Fix spelling and Shorten.

4. Watch the counter

   The counter on the right of the bar (0 / 160) shows the message length and how many SMS segments it will take. A message with characters outside the basic SMS alphabet (for example “ê”, “œ” or an emoji) counts 70 characters per segment instead of 160. Above five segments, sending is refused.

5. Send

   The bubble appears right away as sending…, then turns to sent / delivered without a refresh.

Caution

SMS provider required. Text messages go out through the provider your admin configured (Twilio or ClickSend) in Configuration → Integrations. Without a provider, messages do not leave.

Note

Spellcheck. The browser underlines misspelled words in the compose language — the one in the AI assistant’s Language picker, by default the recipient’s preferred language, otherwise yours. If nothing gets underlined in French or Spanish, install that dictionary in your browser. Fix spelling (AI assistant) then proposes a corrected version — spelling, grammar, punctuation, accents — with the list of corrections; nothing is applied until you accept.

No phone number

With no number on file, the composer gives way to an Add phone number button.

If the candidate’s profile has no phone number, the composer is replaced by No phone number on file and an Add phone number button (edit access required). The number is saved on the profile and the composer appears at once. Any existing history stays visible in the meantime.

The candidate’s replies

Replies land in the thread automatically and, if you turned it on in your notification preferences, trigger an email.

Note

A reply that could not be matched to the candidate does not appear on this tab. Nextal attaches a reply to a candidate by the number it came from. If no candidate has that number — or two or more candidates share it — the reply stays on the Messages page, shown as “Unknown sender” with the number. See Messages (SMS) for what to do.

Texting from the Kanban

The Send Text Message button on the Kanban board and on the candidate list still opens its side panel, including for a bulk send. See Send an SMS from the Kanban. The message then shows up on this tab like any other.

Tips

• SMS open rate beats email. Use it for “I just sent you the offer details” follow-ups, interview confirmations, or last-minute schedule changes.
• Keep it short. One 160-character segment costs less and reads at a glance; the counter tells you before you send.
• Never paste a long URL. Use a short link service — long URLs eat your character budget and look spammy.