How to manage permissions through SMS

SMS marketing is a digital channel and as such is governed by the EU directive from November 2003 in the same way that email marketing is. This means that managing contact preferences is an essential part of an SMS campaign.

So how do people manage the preferences?

Opting in to SMS promotions

Opt-in rules operate in the same way as email. If a person gives you their mobile phone number and you provide them with a method of telling you that they do not want to be sent marketing messages, you are legally able to send them promotional communications.

Thus, all you need to do is add a sign-up box on your websites, literature- all your data capture points and it is best practice to provide a tick box for people to say that they are happy to receive promotional messages.

Opting out to SMS promotions

On every SMS message, you must provide a mechanism for people to opt-out of your promotions. The industry standard mechanism for this is to allow the recipient to text back the word STOP, and then you must suppress their number from your database.

This has an implication for your SMS marketing message design in that you must provide an active reply number.

SMS Services provided by Adestra

Adestra provide inbound and outbound SMS marketing services. For more information, please read about our SMS broadcasting service