Text Message Marketing Consent (Carrier 10DLC & TCR)

To use text message marketing, companies must comply with mobile carrier TCR (Trust, Compliance, and Registration) and 10DLC (10 Digit Long Code) regulations—specifically opt-ins on your website must implement certain consent and disclosure mechanisms when collecting a phone number for text message marketing.

Carrot sites have a one-click feature to automate this compliance for each form. Here we’ll show you how to use this built-in feature. If you’d prefer to add an opt-in checkbox manually, check out this tutorial.

Below we’ll guide you through assessing your need for this opt-in and how to achieve TCR/10DLC compliance for websites to the best of our knowledge.*

Preface: Consider Impact on Conversion Rates

It is important to note that our decade of conversion rate testing shows that adding more checkboxes and fields can decrease your form’s conversion rate. Knowing this, we do not enable this option by default. Consider asking for a phone number on your “Step-2 form” to ensure your initial opt-in flow is as simple as possible, and only activate this feature if you are planning to use text message marketing with these leads.

Step 1: Which Forms Accept Phone Numbers?

Understand which forms on your site collect a phone number, plan to locate each and enable the consent feature in the form settings:

Step One Form: If your website collects phone numbers, follow step 2 of this tutorial to implement pre-built TCR/10DLC compliant checkboxes to your form.
Step Two Form: If your initial form does not request a phone number, the opt-in consent checkbox is not required until the user progresses to a step that involves providing their phone number. If a phone number is collected on step 2 and not on step 1, follow step 2 of this tutorial to implement pre-built TCR/10DLC compliant checkboxes to your form.
Note: If no phone number is collected on either form, then no consent checkboxes are necessary in order to comply.

Step 2: Add Consent Checkboxes To Each Form

First, open your form list: go to Site Dashboard > Content > Forms
Click to open a form’s “Form Settings”
Here is an example of going to the Home Page’s form on a motivated seller template:

Check the boxes for both the Enable SMS Consent Field and the Enable Privacy Policy Consent Field beneath the Form’s Description. (Both are necessary to fully comply with TCR/10DLC’s guidelines.)

Screenshot of Carrot's Form dashboard showing where to enable SMS consent field and privacy policy consent fields.

Save: Scroll down and save your updated form settings
Verify: Return to your website to view the updated form and verify the checkboxes are visible

Repeat these checkbox activation steps for each form that accepts a phone number for SMS marketing purposes.

Step 3 (optional): Customize and Hyperlink the Consent Field Text

To help cover the varying requirements of SMS messaging platforms and CRMs that span across multiple industries, the text within consent fields are fully customizable. You can add hyperlinks or adjust the style of the text within the consent form to align with your needs or requirements.

In the example below, under the Privacy Consent Field text, the words “Terms & Conditions” and “Privacy Policy” have been hyperlinked to the website’s default Privacy page.

To add a hyperlink, simply highlight the words with your cursor and click the link icon 🔗 in the toolbar:

This screenshot shows how you can hyperlink text in the privacy consent field.

🚨 NOTE: Your Carrot website comes with a default Privacy page, but you should review and update it to ensure that it’s relevant to your business and local laws.

If you’d like to create a Terms and Conditions page, you can do so by duplicating the default Privacy page and updating the content on the page:

Screenshot showing how to duplicate a privacy policy page on a Carrot website.

Check out some guidance on what info to include on your Privacy Policy or Terms and Conditions pages:

Example Preview

Here’s a front-end view of what this will look like to visitors on your site:

Here’s a back-end view of what a lead will look like in your Carrot dashboard when submitted on your site after Consent is added:

🚨 NOTE: *This is built upon our knowledge of the current regulations and doesn’t ensure the approval of your brand or messaging campaign. Please remember to consult your messaging provider for any potential additional requirements they might have.

Conclusion

A2P 10DLC compliance is a new standard for businesses sending SMS text messages to customers via phone numbers. Compliance with these regulations is important for businesses in the U.S. as it will help ensure that your text messages are delivered and help you avoid potential legal issues.

We’ve added a one-click feature to Carrot websites to make it easy to comply with A2P 10DLC. You’ll need to update your default Privacy Policy page that we provide you, and you may want to create an additional Terms and Conditions page as well with information that reflects your own business practices and local laws.