Further to our post on Mobile Text Marketing, I found this infographic about text message spam.

Personal Text Marketing Spam

It was quite timely since I have received three messages in 24 hours from different mobile numbers offering to manage my debt or get me a cheap loan. I don’t recall signing up or opting in for any such reminders so I would definitely view these as text marketing spam.

And there’s my problem. I was under the impression that mobile marketing was about giving consent but, according to this article from Social Media Examiner about mobile marketing opt-ins, the very fact that you have filled in your mobile phone number on a form where a point of contact is solicited, this is considered permission for that brand to send you voice or text messages.

Apparently, there is a Mobile Marketing Association to monitor how technology should manage opt ins.

If you text a keyword to a shortcode – five digit telephone number – or enter your phone number into a web form, this consitutes a legitimate opt in as long as consumers receive a compliant confirmation message in real time.

However ring tones and other chargeable premium services are subject to a double opt in, which means that there is a confirmation message which needs to be acknowledged.

Why These Text Marketing Messages Are Spam

But going back to the offers to solve my debt solution, the fact is that I don’t have any debt and so I certainly did not enter my phone number on a website relating thereto.

I can only assume that someone is already selling on databases of mobile phone numbers.

I have sent the word STOP back to two of the three companies – two had numbers that looked fairly similar and similarly styled content so I suspect they may have come from the same source. The third contained a website address so if I receive any further communications, I shall be contacting them via that about their text marketing spam and the compliance rules.

Originally posted 2011-10-21 12:24:51. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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Tags: Mobile Text Message Spam

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 7th, 2013 at 12:51 pm and is filed under Mobile Marketing, Mobile Phones. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.