Consent for calls, texts and email

What each channel needs

With Require consent for calls and texts on, the default for new campaigns, ACR calls or texts a shopper only when an opt-in for that channel is on record from a source the campaign accepts. Email follows the Email choice below it: Only shoppers who opted in to email (the default) or Any shopper who has not unsubscribed. Both are under Advanced > Compliance in the campaign's setup.

A recorded opt-out blocks its channel whatever the settings say.

When none of the campaign's channels passes, the lead does not start a run, and the reason reads “The lead has not consented to any channel this campaign uses.” When one channel passes, the run starts and steps on the others are skipped with the note no_consent.

Turning the requirement off

With Require consent for calls and texts off, calls and texts need no opt-in. Email keeps its own rule: the Email choice applies either way. Opt-outs still block. The screen warns that in the US, marketing calls and texts made with AI voices or automated systems generally need prior written consent.

Consent that counts

The campaign accepts consent from the sources ticked under Consent that counts. All eleven are ticked on a new campaign, and each says where the consent comes from:

• Shopify checkout checkbox: the SMS and email boxes a shopper ticks at checkout
• Shopify customer record: consent saved on the Shopify customer, including consent an app such as Klaviyo syncs into Shopify
• Klaviyo sign-up forms and pop-ups: the SMS and email consent on the shopper's Klaviyo profile
• Pop-up SMS step (Growth Dept Email): the phone number and consent to texts and calls from the pop-up's SMS step, with the wording version the shopper saw
• Your own system (Custom API, Zapier, Make)
• Imported file
• Recorded by a person in ACR
• Omnisend subscription status
• NextCommerce marketing opt-in
• CheckoutChamp contact opt-in
• An opt-in field from your CRM

A pop-up SMS step sign-up counts for texts, and for calls once Growth Dept Email's call consent field is set (until then, through SMS consent covers calls). It counts only for the number it was given for and never undoes an opt-out; an opt-out from Growth Dept Email or from ACR always wins. ACR reads it in Growth Dept Email at the moment it decides to call or text, and a read that fails never counts as consent. Both ways in are switched on under Settings, Integrations, Growth Dept Email.

ACR keeps a source for each channel: the one that last recorded that channel's consent, with the time and method the source gave when it gave one. Unticking a source stops the channels whose consent came from it, and only those. When the store reads consent from Klaviyo, ACR looks up each shopper's Klaviyo profile before a checkout or cart starts a campaign; see Klaviyo.

Shopify shoppers and calls

Shopify checkouts record SMS and email marketing consent and nothing about calls. With the template's defaults, a Shopify shopper who ticked SMS marketing gets texts, one who ticked email marketing gets emails, and neither gets calls.

The SMS consent covers calls switch, below Consent that counts on the Compliance step, counts an SMS opt-in as consent to calls when no call consent is on record (calls_consent_from_sms in the store API). Turn it on only when the consent wording names calls. The FCC's 2024 ruling treats AI-generated voices as artificial voices under the TCPA, so AI calls to mobile numbers need prior express consent, and telemarketing calls need prior express written consent.

With the switch on, Text consent that counts for calls lists the accepted sources (calls_consent_sources). Untick a source whose wording names texts only. A Klaviyo pop-up usually asks for texts alone, unless you added calls to its wording; the checkout box below names both. An SMS opt-out from any source still blocks calls.

The switch starts on for a campaign whose brand uses ACR's recommended checkout wording, below, because that wording names calls. It starts off for every other campaign.

The checkout wording ACR recommends

Use Shopify's own SMS box at checkout, unchecked, with this wording. It names texts and calls, and a store has passed US carrier review with exactly these words, so keep them word for word:

1. In Shopify, open Settings > Checkout. Under Marketing options, set SMS to Checkout only. Shopify always shows this box unchecked.
2. Press Edit checkbox label next to SMS. It opens the published theme's default content at Checkout & system.
3. Paste the label into Accept SMS checkbox label and the second text into Checkout marketing sms disclaimer > Description html, then save.
4. Open Settings > Policies > Privacy policy and add a Text messages section. ACR's text for it ends with the two sentences carriers look for: “Mobile information will not be shared with third parties or affiliates for marketing or promotional purposes. Text messaging originator opt-in data and consent will not be shared with any third parties.”

The Text message sign-up card on the brand's Information page under Brands has all three texts with copy buttons, including the privacy section with your brand's name. When the checkbox label and the text shown once ticked are empty, the card fills them in with this wording; it is saved when you save the brand, so change it first if your checkout says something else.

Once the brand's checkbox label is this wording, its draft campaigns that nobody has set on the Compliance step get SMS consent covers calls on, and so does every campaign created for the brand afterwards. A published campaign, or one whose Compliance step someone saved, keeps its setting. Check pages on the same page looks for the two privacy sentences.

The label and disclosure live in the published theme. Publishing a different theme brings back that theme's wording, so set it again there.

Where consent comes from

• Shopify: the checkout's SMS and email marketing boxes, and the customer's marketing states. Subscribed is an opt-in, unsubscribed an opt-out, anything else unknown.
• Custom API: a consent object on the event, with sms, calls and email set to true or false. See Custom API.
• Connectors: Omnisend's subscription status, NextCommerce's marketing opt-in and CheckoutChamp's contact opt-in. For a CRM or Klaviyo, only an opt-in field you map on the campaign's trigger; see Custom field mapping.
• CSV import: the sms_consent, call_consent and email_consent columns take yes, no, true, false, 1 or 0; empty means unknown. See Add leads.
• By hand: the Add a lead form (Leads management > Add lead > Add one lead) has Consent recorded boxes for Calls, Text messages and Email, saved with the source manual. The Edit form has no consent boxes; the store API can record consent on an existing lead.

A new yes or no replaces what is stored for that channel, with its source, and an empty value never clears it. To see what is on record, open the lead and press Metadata: it lists consent to calls, texts and email, each with the source that recorded it. A STOP or unsubscribe also puts the shopper on the suppression list, which a later opt-in does not lift.