Introduction
In this tutorial, you'll learn how to send messages to phone numbers stored in a Google Sheets CSV file using Python, the requests library, and the WaliChat API. We will download the CSV file from Google Sheets, read the phone numbers and messages, and then send them using the WaliChat API.
Prerequisites
- Basic understanding of Python
- Python 3 installed on your computer
- A text editor for writing code (e.g: Visual Studio Code, Atom, Vim)
- A WaliChat API token (you can obtain this by signing up here)
Install required packages
First, create a new directory for your project and navigate to it in your terminal. Then, run the following commands to install the necessary libraries:
pip install requests pandas
Prepare the Google Sheets CSV file
Create a new Google Sheets document and fill it with two columns:
- First column: phone number in E164 format with the country prefix.
- Second column: text message to send to the target phone number.
The Google Sheets document should have at least two columns and look like:
| Phone number | Message body |
|---|---|
| +1234567890 | 👋 Welcome to {{your-business-name}}! Thanks for signing up. We are just a message away! |
| +1234567890 | 💐 Your order has been shipped. Tracking number is {{tracking-number}}. Don't hesitate to reach out to if you need help! 🤗 |
The equivalent Sheets document exported as CSV should look like this:
+1234567890,"👋 Welcome to {{your-business-name}}! Thanks for signing up. We are just a message away!"
+1234567890,"💐 Your order has been shipped. Tracking number is {{tracking-number}}. Don't hesitate to reach out to if you need help! 🤗"
Get the download URL of your Google Sheets document
- Click on "File" in the top left corner.
- Go to "Share" > "Publish to the web".
- In the "Link" tab, select "Comma-separated values (.csv)" from the dropdown menu.
- Select the desired sheet page with the relevant data: by default the first one.
- Click on "Publish" and copy the URL.
Send text messages
Create a new file named send_messages.py in your project directory and add the following code:
import requests
import pandas as pd
# Replace this with the URL of your published Google Sheets CSV file
# See the indications above to obtain the Google Sheets download URL to enter here
google_sheets_csv_url = 'ENTER_GOOGLE_SHEETS_CSV_URL_HERE'
# Replace this with your WaliChat API token
# Get your API token here: https://app.wali.chat/apikeys
token = 'ENTER API KEY HERE'
# Optionally specify the target WhatsApp device ID connected to WaliChat
# you want to use for messages delivery (24 characters hexadecimal value)
device = 'DEVICE ID GOES HERE'
# Define the headers for the API request
headers = {
'Content-Type': 'application/json',
'Authorization': f"{token}"
}
# Define the URL for the WaliChat API
api_url = 'https://api.wali.chat/v1/messages'
# Read the Google Sheets CSV file and parse it as a CSV
data = pd.read_csv(google_sheets_csv_url)
# Iterate through the DataFrame rows
for index, row in data.iterrows():
phone_number = row[0]
message = row[1]
# Create the payload for the API request
payload = {
'phone': phone_number,
'body': message,
'device': device
}
# Send the message using the WaliChat API
response = requests.post(api_url, headers=headers, json=payload)
# Check if the API request was successful
if response.status_code == 200:
print(f"Message sent to {phone_number}: {message}")
else:
print(f"Failed to send message to {phone_number}: {response.text}")
print("Finished sending messages")
Send media messages
In this example, we will create a different program called send_media.py to send multiple image media messages to different phone numbers loaded from a Google Sheets document.
In order to send a media message, the easiest way is to provide a file download URL. If your file is not already uploaded somewhere, you can upload the file to Google Drive and make the file publicly available to be downloaded by the API in order to send it later.
Example download URL from a public file in Google Drive:
https://drive.google.com/uc?id=1RG3CAPiwiFlFATUlIIwhk0RrbEU4PgVP&export=download
Create a new file named send_media.py in your project directory and add the following code:
import requests
import csv
from io import StringIO
# Replace this with the URL of your published Google Sheets CSV file
# See the indications above to obtain the Google Sheets download URL to enter here
google_sheets_csv_url = 'ENTER_GOOGLE_SHEETS_CSV_URL_HERE'
# Set the download URL of the file to be sent.
# The file must be publicly accessible from the Internet and return the file binary content
# You can also upload a local file in Google Drive and make the file publicly available for download
# Accepted file formats are: images (JPEG, WEBP, PNG), video (MP4), audio (MP3, OGG) and documents (PDF, XLSX, DOCX, ZIP...)
file_url = 'https://picsum.photos/seed/picsum/600/500'
# Replace this with your API token
# Get your API token here: YOUR_CONSOLE_URL/apikeys
token = 'ENTER API KEY HERE'
# Optionally specify the target device ID connected to the API
# you want to use for messages delivery (24 characters hexadecimal value)
device = 'DEVICE ID GOES HERE'
# Define headers for the API request
headers = {
'Content-Type': 'application/json',
'Authorization': f'{token}'
}
# Define URLs for the API
base_url = 'https://api.wali.chat/v1'
url = f'{base_url}/messages'
files_url = f'{base_url}/files'
def upload_file(url):
body = {'url': url}
try:
response = requests.post(files_url, json=body, headers=headers)
response.raise_for_status()
return response.json()['id']
except requests.exceptions.HTTPError as error:
if error.response.status_code == 409 and error.response.json():
return error.response.json()['meta']['file']
print(f'Failed to upload file: {error.response.text}')
return None
def normalize_phone(phone):
return f"+{phone.replace('\\D', '')}"
def send_message(phone, message, file):
body = {
'phone': phone,
'message': message.strip(),
'device': device,
'media': {'file': file}
}
try:
response = requests.post(url, json=body, headers=headers)
response.raise_for_status()
print(f"==> Message created: {phone}")
except requests.exceptions.HTTPError as error:
print(f'Failed to create message to {phone}: {error.response.text}')
def main():
try:
if not file_url:
raise ValueError('Missing required fileUrl')
print('=> Downloading Google Sheets CSV file...')
response = requests.get(google_sheets_csv_url)
response.raise_for_status()
data = response.text
records = csv.reader(StringIO(data))
print('=> Uploading file...')
file_id = upload_file(file_url)
if not file_id:
raise ValueError('Failed to upload file: check the error')
print('=> Processing messages...')
for phone, message in records:
if not phone or not message:
continue
number = normalize_phone(phone)
if number and len(number) >= 8 and message:
send_message(number, message, file_id)
except ValueError as error:
print(f'Error: {error}')
except requests.exceptions.HTTPError as error:
print(f'Error: {error.response.text}')
if __name__ == "__main__":
main()
Replace the Google Sheets URL to export as CSV
In the send_messages.py and send_media.py files, make sure you have replaced the Google Sheets CSV URL and your actual WaliChat API token:
# Replace this with the URL of your published Google Sheets CSV file
google_sheets_csv_url = 'ENTER_GOOGLE_SHEETS_CSV_URL_HERE'
See the indications above to obtain the Google Sheets download URL to enter here.
Replace the API token
In the send_messages.py file, make sure you have defined the API token of your actual WaliChat account:
# Replace this with your WaliChat API token
token = 'ENTER API KEY HERE'
Optionally, if you have multiple WhatsApp numbers connected in your WaliChat account, you can specify which WhatsApp number you want to use for the messages delivery by specifying the WaliChat unique device ID (24 characters hexadecimal value) in the following line:
# Optionally specify the target WhatsApp device ID connected to WaliChat
# you want to use for messages delivery (24 characters hexadecimal value)
device = 'DEVICE ID GOES HERE'
Run the program
Run the program in the cloud
You can run the program in the cloud for free in Replit.com without installing any software on your computer.
Simply create a new project and copy & paste the provided code, then click on "Run" to send the messages. It is that simple 😀
Run the program on your computer
Open a terminal in your project directory and run the following command to execute the send_messages.py or send_media.py script:
python send_messages.py
Similarly, you can run the send_media.py script in order to send media messages:
python send_media.py
If everything is set up correctly, you should see output indicating the messages have been created successfully:
=> Message created: +1234567890
=> Message created: +1234567890
=> Message created: +1234567890
Note messages will be added to your number's message delivery queue and delivered asynchronously in background over time based on your number's subscription message delivery speed per minute limit or the manually configured delivery speed you have defined in your number's settings.
Conclusion
In this tutorial, you learned how to send messages to phone numbers stored in a Google Sheets CSV file using Python and the WaliChat API.
You can update the Google Sheets document and run the program again anytime you want to send new messages through your WaliChat connected WhatsApp number.
You can further customize the script to handle additional columns, create different types of messages, or integrate it with your own software as needed.