Ever been annoyed by an unexpected text message (or five) during the busiest part of your workday? We get it, and so do your clients. That’s why laws like the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) require businesses to obtain consent to send marketing text messages to current and prospective customers or risk costly fines.
Apptoto has introduced a simple solution to help your business collect consent from clients to text them appointment reminders and other messages. This update allows your company to comply with the latest regulations, builds trust and transparency with clients, and helps improve customer engagement.
What's New?
Initial Consent Messaging:
Apptoto makes it simple to send initial consent messages to your clients before you text them their first appointment booking confirmation or reminder. The message informs your clients that your business uses Apptoto to send appointment reminders and allows them to opt out by replying STOP. If clients do not respond, they’ll receive texts. If clients reply STOP, they’ll be placed on your Text Opt-Out List and receive voice or email reminder messages instead.
Double Opt-In Messaging:
Taking client consent a step further, Apptoto also allows you to require double opt-in. Clients must reply “YES” to opt into receiving texts from your business, ensuring that only those who are genuinely interested and engaged receive your messages.How to Implement?
Initial Consent Setup:
Navigate to your Messaging
tab and Consent
settings in Apptoto. Find the “Initial Consent Message” section and click the checkbox to automatically send a consent message to new contacts before they receive their first reminder. Update the consent message and preview it before saving your changes. 
Double Opt-In Configuration:
In the same “Initial Consent Message” section, you can activate the double opt-in feature by checking “Require Double Opt-in before sending actual messages.” The Double Opt-In message requires the recipient to respond “YES” if they want to receive your text messages. If they answer no or do not respond, they will not receive any text messages from your business (appointment reminder or otherwise).
IMPORTANT: You may update the initial consent/double-opt-in messages to reflect your brand voice. However, doing so could result in carrier violations and your messages being filtered/not received.
For more information, please check out our latest blog on text messaging consent or visit our step-by-step walkthrough on implementing initial consent and double-opt-in in our Knowledge Base. Please contact our support team or visit our Help Center for further assistance.
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THIS INFORMATION IS NOT TO BE USED AS A SUBSTITUTE FOR LEGAL COUNSEL. You are responsible for abiding by federal and state laws applicable to your use of Apptoto (Go-Cort, Inc.) services. Please refer to the Terms of Service and EULA for more information.