Run an outbound calling campaign

A campaign has your assistant call a list of people one after another. You can upload a CSV file, or pick people from your contacts and write a short briefing for the calls. AIVA skips anyone on your do-not-contact list and only calls within calling hours. You need an assistant with a linked phone number, and the people on your list must have agreed to be called.

Your plan sets how many campaigns can be active at once: 1 on Starter, 3 on Growth, and no limit on Pro.

1. Create a campaign from a CSV file

1. In the sidebar, open Campaign & Scheduling → Campaigns.
2. Click Create Campaign.
3. In Create New Campaign, fill in:
   • Campaign Name.
   • Select Assistant: the assistant that makes the calls.
   • When should it start: Start now, or Schedule for later and pick the Start date and time.
4. Drop your file on Upload Leads CSV, or click it to browse. AIVA checks the file and shows how many contacts will be uploaded, how many duplicates were removed, and how many invalid rows were skipped. It also tells you how many are on your do-not-contact list. Those will be skipped when the campaign dials.
5. Choose How many calls at a time: 1 call at a time, 2 calls at a time or 5 calls at a time (default). Slower is gentler on your lines. Faster finishes sooner.
6. Under How did these contacts agree to be called?, pick Existing customers, Signed up on our website, Filled in a form, Opted in at an event or Other, documented elsewhere.
7. Tick the box to confirm these contacts have agreed to receive calls from you.
8. Click Start Campaign, or Schedule Campaign if you chose a later start.

A CSV campaign uses the assistant's own instructions for what to say. To give the calls a specific purpose, start the campaign from your contacts instead (step 3), or update the assistant's instructions first.

2. Format your CSV

• The first row must be column headings.
• One column must have phone or number in its heading. If none does, AIVA uses the first column.
• A column with name in its heading is optional. AIVA uses it as the contact's name.
• Other columns are ignored.
• Include the country code in every number, for example 14155550123 or +14155550123 for a US number. AIVA adds the + if it's missing.
• Rows without a usable number are skipped, and a number that appears twice is only called once.
• The file must be a .csv of up to 10 MB.

A simple file looks like this:

phone,name
14155550123,Alice Cooper
14155550199,Charlie Brown

Not sure? Under Need a sample CSV?, click Download for the template, or Use sample list to try the form with sample data.

3. Create a campaign from your contacts, with a briefing

1. Open Communication → Contacts and select the people you want to call.
2. Click Call selected.
3. Fill in the briefing:
   • Name this call list.
   • Purpose of the call: required. The AI has to be able to say why it's calling.
   • Instructions: what to say or ask, in plain English.
   • Assistant, and optionally a Voice for these calls.
   • If it cannot reach them: Take a message, Transfer them or Schedule a callback.
   • Matter / file (optional).
4. Leave Start calling immediately on to start now, then click Create and start calling. Turn it off and click Create call list to start it later from Campaigns.

Contacts without a phone number are left out, and AIVA tells you how many.

4. Do-not-contact and calling hours

Every call opens by saying it's an AI assistant.

• Do-not-contact: numbers on your do-not-contact list are never called. People who reply STOP to a text are added automatically. You can see the list under Communication → My Numbers → Do-not-contact. Skipped people appear on the campaign's Skipped tab.
• Calling hours: AIVA only calls between 8am and 9pm in each person's local time. It works this out from their contact's time zone or their number. If neither is known, it uses the assistant's time zone. People outside the window wait until it opens.

If your subscription or OpenAI key stops working, the campaign pauses rather than failing.

5. Manage your campaigns

The Campaigns page shows totals for Running, Paused and Scheduled campaigns, plus Calls Made. Filter the list by status: Active, Pending, Completed, Paused, Failed, Partial or No Answer.

Each row has buttons to:

• Start campaign or Pause campaign.
• Edit schedule, for a campaign that hasn't started yet.
• View leads, to see each person and their status.
• Retry failed leads.
• Duplicate campaign, to reuse its name and assistant in a new campaign.
• Delete campaign.

6. See results and export them

Click a campaign to open its details:

• Progress: Total leads, Completed and Failed, plus Export results (CSV).
• Contacts: everyone on the list, with a search box.
• Settings: the assistant, status, schedule, pace, Calling hours, and when it was created.
• Skipped: people who weren't called, with the reason.

The export has one row per person with name, phone, status, note, call_sid and created_at. Each call also appears in Communication → Calls → Logs with its recording, transcript and summary.

Troubleshooting

• No valid phone numbers found in CSV: check the heading row and that the numbers include a country code.
• Tell the AI why it is calling before starting a bulk call.: fill in Purpose of the call.
• None of the selected contacts have a phone number.: add numbers to those contacts first.

Next steps

• Monitor live calls while the campaign runs.
• Review calls and results.
• Send AIVA events with webhooks. The campaign.completed event fires when a campaign finishes.