SMS good practices and consent: who you may send to and how to let people opt out

The short answer: only text people who gave you their number and agreed to receive messages; keep a record of when and how they agreed; always say who is sending; and offer a simple way to stop receiving, written in the message itself, because named senders cannot receive replies. Anyone who asks to leave is removed at once. The rules in Mozambique are covered in SMS marketing: Sender ID and the rules here.

Who you may send to

Situation	Can you send?
A customer who gave their number for a purchase or appointment	Yes, notices about that purchase or appointment (transactional SMS).
A customer who ticked “I want news and offers”	Yes, promotions, within what you told them they would get.
A customer who gave their number only for a delivery	Delivery notices, yes. Promotions, no, not without asking first.
A list you bought, borrowed or copied from the internet	No.
Numbers from business cards or chat groups	No, not without asking first.
Anyone who asked to stop receiving	No. Remove them at once.

How to ask and keep a record

1	Ask separately and clearly. At the counter, on your website form or on the customer card, with its own box that the customer ticks and that is not ticked in advance.

2	Say what you will send and how often. Order notices are one thing, weekly promotions are another.

3	Record when and how they agreed. The date, the place (counter, website, paper form) and what they agreed to. Each contact's notes field is there for this.

4	Split them into groups. For example “Notices” and “Promotions”: anyone who only agreed to notices never goes into a campaign.

A ready-made line for your form or counter:

Where	Text
Form or customer card	I agree to receive SMS from [COMPANY] with news and offers, no more than [N] a month. I can stop at any time via [PHONE] or [E-MAIL].
At the counter	Would you like to get our offers by SMS? It is no more than [N] a month, and you can stop whenever you like.

In every message

Say who is sending. Put your company name in the text, even with a Sender ID: the sender name has 11 characters at most and does not always say it all. Say how to leave. Since there are no replies, write a contact. A few short options:

Way out	At the end of the message
Phone	To stop receiving these: [PHONE].
E-mail	Leave the list: [E-MAIL].
Website	Rather not receive these? Tell us at [WEBSITE].

And pick the time with care: working days, business hours, never at night. A text at eleven at night is the quickest way to lose a customer.

When someone asks to leave

1	Remove them at once from the promotions group, or delete the contact if there is nothing else to send them.

2	Record the request in the contact's notes, with the date.

3	If you send through the API, add the number to the list of numbers that do not receive SMS, with POST /v1/sms/opt-outs: an API send to that number is then refused with number_opted_out.

4	Do not bring them back by accident. When importing an old CSV, check that people who left are not added again.

Never buy lists of numbers. People who get a text from a company they do not know complain, and your message reaches people who never gave you their number. That is money spent on credits and reputation lost.

Fewer messages, more attention. A few promotions that are worth reading keep a list alive. Service notices, on the other hand, are what customers always want.

Is your list in order? See the prices and send only to people who want to hear from you.

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