Deliverability and compliance
What you have to get right before the first send
Bulk texting in the US and Canada is governed by two separate things: the law, which is about consent, and the carriers, who decide independently whether to carry your traffic at all. You can satisfy one and fail the other. This is the order the problems arrive in.
This is a practical guide, not legal advice. If your use case is unusual or high risk, take proper counsel.
- 01
Get consent, and keep the record
Everything else follows from this. You need permission before the first message, and you need to be able to show it later. Keywords and the web opt-in widget record it for you; a spreadsheet typed up from a clipboard does not.
- 02
Register the number with the carriers
US carriers require application-to-person traffic to be registered against a named business and a described use case. It is not optional, it takes lead time, and unregistered traffic is filtered rather than delivered. Which route you take depends on whether your number is local or toll-free.
- 03
Check what you are allowed to send
Some categories are restricted or blocked outright by US and Canadian carriers regardless of how clean your consent is. Finding that out after you have built the campaign is the expensive way.
- 04
Handle opt-outs properly
STOP has to work, immediately and without argument. It is handled automatically here, and a contact who opts out is removed from bulk sends and one-to-one chat alike. The thing to understand is what that means for your list over time.
- 05
Read the delivery signals
A message that does not arrive usually says why. Error codes distinguish a bad number from a carrier block from a filtered campaign, and the fix is different in each case.
The short version
Only text people who asked you to. Keep the record of them asking. Register your number before you need it. Do not send anything in a restricted category. Make STOP work, which we do for you. Watch your delivery reports rather than assuming.
Complaint rate is the number that matters most, and it is downstream of relevance. The practical way to stay compliant is to send messages people want, to people who asked, using groups so the wrong people are not receiving the wrong thing.
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