Podcast Transcript:
Here’s everything you need to know about SMS and text message marketing.
Hey there. I’m Jillian Kendrick and welcome to the Momentum Marketing Podcast. I’m a mama, a wife, an entrepreneur and a three time best selling co-author. In each episode you’ll get real world, practical advice and strategies. And maybe a parenting tip or two along the way. If you’re ready to create a business that supports your family and your lifestyle, then you’re in the right place.
Hey there. Thank you so much for listening and joining me today. If you haven’t already gone to jilliankendrick.com/ and grabbed my latest free training on how I get over 600 leads every single month. Then trust me, you are missing out if you haven’t gone there already. So go to jilliankendrick.com/ grab your access to the free training. As soon as you click that button, you’ll get immediate access to that training video. You guys. This, it’s so good. It’s literally so good and I promise you this isn’t gonna be another boring drab hour long . I think the total length is 38 minutes and some change. It’s not super long at all. I go really, really fast. It is packed full of amazing goodies. Some things that even if you are a seasoned long time business owner or marketer, I promise you are going to learn something in this training. It is so good. I recently had a colleague of mine review it just to get some feedback and she’s like, “Jillian. This is amazing. Like this is better than I could do.” And I look up to this person. I think she’s incredible and the fact that she said that completely floored me. So go check out that training. It is so, so, so, so good. I promise you it’s gonna be worth your time at jilliankendrick.com/. Go grab it now, in fact, pause this and go grab it. I’ll wait. It’s OK.
So what’s on the table for today? We are talking about SMS and text message marketing.
Normally I try to plan my podcast topics a little bit further in advance. But today is kind of an off the cuff sort of one because I am right in the throes of finalizing all of this stuff for my new training that I just mentioned jilliankendrick.com/. And I’m adding text message marketing as part of the entire launch. So of course, to do that, I need to make sure that I am in compliance with all of these text message, rules and laws that exist around the world. Because I’m not only going to be marketing to people in the US and in North America, but I’m also going to be starting to do overseas, the UK, Ireland, Germany, France, Australia, other places like that. I’m gonna be marketing to other people around the world and I need to make sure as a business owner that I’m compliant and I’m protecting myself and following the laws of the places that I’m doing business in.
So to do that, I have spent a lot of time doing Google searches, and figuring out how do I make sure that I’m compliant with the SMS laws. Now, let’s talk about one thing really quick. There are different laws and different rules when it comes to email marketing than it is for text message marketing. So whatever type of marketing you’re doing, if it’s inbound, outbound, all of that. If you are sending text messages and emails, the laws for those two different types of marketing can be and probably are different in every country. And if you’re in the US, they can even be different in every single state. So you need to make sure that you’re protecting yourself and that you’re following along with those laws.
For instance, in the United States, we have something called TCPA, the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, and TCPA compliance is a federal law in the United States that regulates telemarketing spam. Now does it do an amazing job of it? No, probably not. Because if you’re like me, you probably get a lot of phone calls from people that you didn’t ask to get phone calls from or didn’t ask to get text messages from. But just because other people skirt the rules and don’t do the right thing, doesn’t mean that you can also. You need to do your due diligence as a business owner and make sure that you’re compliant. So TCPA compliance in the United States requires that businesses are given and express written consent from consumers using mobile devices before they’re allowed to send text message marketing. So what does this mean? It means that you have to actually opt in. It means that you have to send a text message saying, hey, is it OK that we start to send you marketing and you need to make sure that you’re complying with that. There’s also another rule in TCPA that says that text messages can only be sent between 8 a.m. and 9 p.m. in the recipient time zone. I actually haven’t heard of that one previously. So I would look into that, but this is just some stuff that I found on my Google search. And I have a way inside of my CRM and my automation software that I can specify. OK, only send this text message between these hours. And if your CRM or if your text messaging platform doesn’t have that and doesn’t do that, then it’s definitely something you need and we should have a conversation. You can email me hello@jilliankendrick.com and I would be glad to talk through that with you.
Another thing that you can do, and I’m doing this for my opt in as well, is I’m putting a disclaimer just underneath the opt in button that explains, you know, I’m providing my phone number. I consent to receive text message marketing from Jillian Kendrick. I can opt out at any time. We’re not going to spam you and we’re not going to sell your data. And that’s just a way of me covering all of my bases. I haven’t checked this over with a lawyer. I’ll do that very, very soon. But that’s just a great way of me covering my bases and explaining like, hey, you need to take responsibility to read the fine print to know what you’re opting in for. And that if anybody comes back and says, well, I didn’t know I was going to receive text messages. I can point them to this page and say, well, yes, you did. It’s right here in black and white.
SMS compliance is different for the US and the UK. So in the United Kingdom, businesses must get the recipient’s consent before sending them text messages exactly like in the US.
We have to do the same thing and businesses must also clearly identify themselves in the text message. So your very first text message to people should say, hey, this is Business ABC or hey, this is your name. It should say that so that the consumer can then go back and look at previous text message history and be like, oh, ok, I know who this is coming from. Another UK law businesses must also provide a way for the recipient to opt out of receiving further text messages at any time. Same thing as the United States, but you have to get consent.
You should link to your privacy policy in terms of service. If you haven’t already listened to my episode on the five things I wish I had in my business a long, long time ago. Privacy policy in terms of service is part of that. So go back and listen to that episode. I think it was a couple of episodes ago. It was really, really good, but you should include your privacy policy in terms of service links that disclose the way in which you share or sell data so that people can be aware of that. I always have those at the very bottom of my opt in pages and stuff. You can Google for and review all sorts of things about what qualifies as text message consent because those could be a little bit different for each country or even each state as well. You have to give them a way to opt out. Either by replying stop or having an unsubscribe link inside of your messages. You have to clearly identify yourself when you’re sending text messages. So your very first text message should say this is from so and so or this is from ABC dot com business. Or you can set up what’s known as an alphanumeric sender ID. This is where your brand or your name would automatically pop up on their device kind of in place of the phone number, I believe. And that way it can help you identify yourself as well.
And the UK actually has the same quiet hours ruled. So messages can only be sent between 9 a.m. and 8 p.m. And again, if your automated system, if your SMS system doesn’t have the ability to double check time zones or to automate the delay of sending a text message within a certain time period, then definitely talk to me and we can set you up with a much better system.
When it comes to Canadian SMS regulations and restrictions. Again, explicit opt-in consent is required before any marketing can be sent to a Canadian phone number, same thing as in the US. And what’s really interesting is the Canada and US rules state that express consent must be specific to SMS and cannot be inferred from consent or subscription to other marketing messages or channels. So in other words, if somebody opts in through your email, auto responder and then somehow they give you their phone number just because you have their phone number, doesn’t mean that you’re allowed to text message them under these Canadian and US laws. And I think the UK one could probably be applicable to the end user, has to absolutely and explicitly say that I am allowing you business owner to send me SMS or text message marketing. So just because they’ve opted in via email and they’ve given you consent to email them and then somehow you get their phone number, that doesn’t mean that you’re also allowed to text message them, right? Just because you have their phone number. And they’ve said yes, you can send me email marketing. That doesn’t mean that you’re allowed to send them text message marketing as well. And they have to have the ability to opt out at any time.
So I just looked up the rules for France in terms of SMS compliance. And the French mobile networks actually block SMS traffic between 10 p.m. and 8 p.m. on Sundays and during French public holidays. So even if you were to send messages during that time, they would block them. You can’t do it. The same thing in Germany only communication is allowed during the end users daytime hours. Unless there’s some sort of urgency, you have to allow them to opt out. Australia, however, does not have time restrictions. So that’s interesting. They do have content restrictions. You can’t send adult explicit material, religious material, political or gambling type of content. Any type of spam or suspicious links can be detected by their systems and then blocked by the operator. So you wanna make sure that you are using the best SEO tactics. That your website has an SSL certificate. And that you’re doing everything that you can in terms of the content on your website, and the traffic to your website, so that the URL doesn’t get blocked or looks spammy for Australia. Yes, users must opt in to your services and all marketing messages must include a stop option that they can opt out at any time. So they’re all kind of the same. They’re all pretty much exactly the same, which is good to know.
Florida was actually one of the original states to come up with the Telemarketing Act. It prohibits telemarketers from sending text message or SMS marketing to Florida phone numbers using automation unless they have gotten prior consent. But at this point, almost all of the US states have adopted the same laws. And it seems based on the limited research that I’ve been doing this morning, pretty much every country is agreeable in that you need to have consent. It has to be expressed written or SMS consent. Just because you have consent to send them emails, doesn’t mean you have consent to send them text messages. So you need to get both. Don’t send any messages before 8 a.m. or after 9 p.m. in their specific time zone. Always give them a way that they can opt out. Don’t spam them. And if you’re gonna sell their data or do something like that or share their data, it needs to be part of your privacy policy and your terms and conditions. That seems to be the general consensus. Don’t listen to me though. Go talk to a lawyer and make sure that you are protected.
I would say also as a marketer, this isn’t necessarily a law, but I think it’s good marketing best practices, don’t send them a text message unless there’s something actionable. Don’t send them a text message unless you actually want them to do something and it’s applicable to them. And it’s interesting and it’s important. A lot of people are very protective of their mobile devices. And even though you might have gotten consent from them to market to them through SMS, even though you might have gotten that express written consent, even though you might have sent them marketing before any time somebody doesn’t like something, they can market a spam. Period. And maybe you wouldn’t consider the message to be spam. But if they do then it’s spam. So do your best to be selective about when you text message, people make it important, make it actionable, make it beneficial to them, text message, reminders. Last call for sales confirmations of things.
These are all good ways to use text message, marketing. And I would highly recommend, don’t text every day. Text once a week, maybe at the most, twice a week. When you text every day, it becomes less important and people will ignore you and they will opt out.
And again before you do anything, talk to a lawyer. Make sure that somebody has looked this over and that you are in compliance as far as the legal side of things are concerned. If you don’t have a good text message marketing platform or a good CRM or automation software. Talk to me, email me hello@jilliankendrick.com and I would be happy to walk you through the exact system that we use that we love so, so, so much.
And thank you as always for joining me on this episode of the Momentum Marketing Podcast. If listening to this has brought you value, improved your life, or given you any insight on how you can build your own momentum in your business, then please share it with a friend and I’ll see you on the next episode.
The Momentum Marketing Podcast
By Jillian Kendrick
Episode: # 25
Topic: SMS Marketing Basics
Contact: hello@jilliankendrick.com
Follow IG: instagram.com/automatedmama
jilliankendrick.com/webinar
