Receiving email & SMS marketing opt-in with Shopify

To build a successful customer list that you can send campaigns to, it's mandatory to get the customer's permission before they can receive marketing emails and/or SMS from your store. Permission is required by International Law (including GDPR, TCPA, TCIA & CCPA) and our Terms of Use. 

As mentioned in the SMS Marketing Compliance Introduction and GDPR Introduction, to collect SMS and Email Marketing opt-in from your customers, there may be some changes that you need to make to your Shopify store.

In this article

⚠️ Important: If you are using another app for sign-up forms, it is very important to update your forms to also include a disclaimer that lets the customer know that by submitting the form, they are opting-in to receive both email and SMS marketing from your store. 

The customer will then be automatically added to your Shopify and Marsello database, and they will be eligible to receive email and SMS marketing from your store.

If the customer doesn't accept marketing:

The staff member will enter their name, email address, mobile number and make sure their Accepts marketing preferences remains OFF. 

The customer will be automatically added to your Shopify and Marsello database, but will not be eligible to receive email and SMS marketing from your store.

✔️ At checkout: Allow your customers to enter their mobile number

✔️ At checkout: Allow your customers to give consent to receive marketing

✔️ At checkout: Update your privacy policy

✔️ At checkout: Update your checkout footer

✔️ At account creation: Allow your customers to give consent to receive marketing

⚠️ Important: The below changes are vital steps towards compliance. Please follow and complete each section.

✔️ At checkout: Allow your customers to enter their mobile number

1. In your Shopify admin, go to Settings > Checkout

2. Scroll down to the Marketing Consent > SMS marketing and select show an option to subscribe at checkout to add a sign-up checkbox to your checkout

3. Scroll to the Customer contact section, then select Customers can check out using either their phone number or email

4. Scroll to the Form options section, under Shipping address phone number, select Optional

5. Click Save

📝 Note: If your payment provider or shipping carrier requires that the customer provides a phone number to complete the checkout, then set the phone number to Required.

6. Scroll to the Checkout language section, then click Manage checkout language

7. Under Language, enter Phone label into the filter text bar

8. Under both Phone label and Optional phone label enter the below text:
Mobile phone number for news and exclusive offers

9. Click Save
Your customer will then have the option to check out with their email address or mobile number. 

✔️ Edit your checkout so customers can give consent to receive marketing

1. In your Shopify admin, go to Settings > Checkout 

2. Scroll down to the Marketing Consent >  Email marketing and select show an option to subscribe at checkout to add a sign-up checkbox to your checkout

💡Pro tip: Leave the Preselect the sign-up option unselected. This is important to ensure that your customers' opt-in themselves.

3. Click Save

4. Scroll to the Checkout language section, then click Manage checkout language

5. Under Language, enter Checkout Marketing into the filter text bar

6. Under Accept Marketing checkout label enter the text: 
Subscribe to stay up to date on news and exclusive offers via email and text messages

7. Click Save
8. Under Contact Information on your store's online checkout, the customer will now be able to opt-in to receive marketing emails and SMS from your store by selecting the checkbox. 

This will automatically update the customer's accept marketing preferences in both Shopify and Marsello. 

✔️ Update your privacy policy

1. In your Shopify admin, go to Settings > Legal

2. Under Legal pages, scroll to Privacy Policy

3. Add the following text to your privacy policy:
Text Marketing and notifications: By subscribing to text notifications you agree to receive recurring automated marketing text messages at the phone number provided. Consent is not a condition of purchase. Msg and data rates may apply.

4. Click Save

✔️  Configure checkout footer

1. In your Shopify admin, go to Online Store > Themes

2. Next to your Current Theme, click Actions > Edit language

3. Under Language, enter Checkout shop policies into the filter text bar

4. Under both Privacy Policy enter the text and edit to include your store's name: 
By checking this box, I consent to receive automated marketing from [YOUR STORE NAME] by email and text message at the email address and mobile number provided. Consent is not a condition to purchase.

5. Click Save

✔️  How to edit your store account creation process

When the customer clicks through your loyalty widget or clicks the account icon on your online store to creates a store account, it opens a sign-up form for the customer to enter their first name, last name, email address and create a password.

In order for customers to be able to opt-in to receive your email and SMS marketing, you will need to edit your Shopify account creation sign-up form to add a checkbox to that lets customers indicate whether they want to receive marketing from your store.

1. In your Shopify admin, go to Online Store > Themes

2. Next to your Current Theme, click Actions > Edit code

3. In the Templates directory, search for customers/register.liquid and then click into the customers/register.liquid

4. Find the code that contains the password form field.
The code will look similar to this:
<label for="CreatePassword" class="label--hidden">{{ 'customer.register.password' | t }}</label><input type="password" name="customer[password]" id="CreatePassword" class="input-full {% if form.errors contains 'password' %} input--error{% endif %}" placeholder="{{ 'customer.register.password' | t }}">

5. Below the code that contains the password field, and above the {% endform %} liquid tag, add the following code:
<div><input type="hidden" name="customer[accepts_marketing]" value="" />  <input type="checkbox" name="customer[accepts_marketing]" checked="checked" />  Subscribe to stay updated on news and exclusive offers via email and text message</div>

6. Click Save.
This will update your customer account creation form to have the checkbox to allow customers to opt-in to receive marketing emails and SMS messages from your store.

When you have made all of the above updates, in order to get the customer's permission so they can receive marketing emails and SMS from your store, you then need to confirm that you've made the changes in Marsello.

1. In your Marsello Admin, under Campaigns > SMS Campaign

2. In the pop-up, select the checkbox I confirm that I’ve made the required changes to my online store and read both the SMS Compliance Introduction and Marsello’s Terms of Use.

⚠️ Important: Please make sure you're also familiar with SMS Marketing Compliance Introduction and Marsello's Terms of Use before confirming the above.

3. Click Create SMS Campaign

🎉 Congratulations you can now start collecting customers' consent to receive email and SMS marketing via Marsello and Shopify POS & eCommerce

Disclaimer: The information provided here is intended to be educational and should not be construed as legal advice. Marsello encourages all of our users — and all eCommerce merchants – to seek legal advice for counsel on how they specifically should prepare for GDPR, TCPA and TCIA.