Email, SMS and In-App Messaging: Getting Marketing Consent Right

If you run an online business, you probably rely on:

  • email – onboarding sequences, newsletters, product updates
  • SMS – one-time codes, delivery updates, promotions
  • in-app messages – prompts, nudges, release notes, upsell flows

Most teams handle consent for all of this with one small line on a form:

☑ I agree to receive updates.

That's rarely enough in practice.

From a user and regulator perspective, there's an important distinction between:

  • service messages – needed to deliver what the user signed up for
  • marketing messages – designed to promote, upsell or re-engage

And from an operational perspective, you want to know:

  • what each person actually agreed to
  • through which channel
  • when they changed their mind

This article walks through how to think about email, SMS and in-app messaging consent in a more deliberate way, and how a system like SolidWraps can help you keep it all provable.

(This is not legal advice. It's a practical framework to discuss with your own advisers.)

1. Service vs marketing: start with the basics

Before you worry about checkboxes and flows, get clear on what kind of messages you're sending.

Service (or transactional) messages

These are messages that are necessary to provide the service the user signed up for, for example:

  • account creation and verification emails
  • password resets and security alerts
  • purchase confirmations and invoices
  • shipping and delivery updates
  • essential changes to the product or terms

Users generally expect these messages once they sign up or buy from you. In many cases, you rely on contract or legitimate interests rather than marketing consent for them (subject to local law and guidance).

Marketing messages

Marketing messages promote something beyond the immediate service the user is already using, for example:

  • newsletters and general product updates
  • special offers, discounts and campaigns
  • cross-sell and upsell suggestions
  • win-back campaigns after inactivity

These typically do require some form of consent or clear opt-out patterns, depending on the jurisdiction and channel. Laws and guidance vary by region (for example, rules for marketing by email or SMS can be stricter than for some other channels), but the broad idea is the same: don't send promotional content without a proper basis and a clear way to stop it.

A healthy system treats these two categories differently, both in how you ask and how you log.

2. Don't hide multiple channels behind one checkbox

A common pattern is a single checkbox or line that tries to cover everything:

☑ I agree to receive emails and SMS updates and marketing communications.

It's simple to implement, but it hides a few important details:

  • some users are happy with email but not SMS
  • some are comfortable with product updates but not ongoing promotions
  • regulators and platforms often treat SMS and email differently from a consent and anti-spam perspective

Over time, this makes it hard to honour preferences or explain what you're doing.

A clearer way to think about it

Separately consider:

  • channels – email, SMS, in-app, push notifications
  • purpose – service/operational vs marketing/promotional

You don't have to create a separate checkbox for every possible combination, but you should:

  • avoid bundling significantly different channels and purposes into one vague "updates" box
  • be honest and specific about what people are signing up to
  • make it easy for them to adjust those choices later

3. Patterns for collecting marketing consent at key points

You generally collect marketing consent at a few predictable points in your product:

  • account sign-up
  • checkout or purchase
  • newsletter sign-up
  • in-app preference centres and settings

Here are some practical patterns for each.

a) At account sign-up

Typical sign-up form fields:

  • email (required)
  • password
  • sometimes phone number (for 2FA or SMS)

You might add a separate, optional checkbox like:

☑ Send me product tips, news and occasional offers by email.

Key things to note:

  • Make it clearly optional – don't make marketing consent a condition of creating an account unless you have a strong, well-advised basis.
  • Use plain language about what they'll receive.
  • Keep service messages out of this checkbox – you can explain elsewhere that you'll send necessary service communications as part of running the account.

If you also want SMS marketing, consider a second, clearly separate checkbox:

☑ Send me offers and updates by SMS.

That way you can distinguish later between:

  • email marketing consent
  • SMS marketing consent

… instead of assuming one implies the other.

b) At checkout or purchase

At checkout, users often expect:

  • service emails (receipts, shipping updates)
  • service SMS (delivery time slots, two-factor codes)

You can offer marketing sign-up there too, but keep it clearly distinct from necessary communications. For example:

We'll send you order and delivery updates by email (and SMS if you provided a mobile number).

☑ I'd also like to receive news and special offers by email.
☑ I'd also like to receive offers and updates by SMS.

This makes it clearer that:

  • operational messages are part of fulfilling the order
  • marketing is an additional, optional layer

c) Newsletter sign-up

If you have a standalone newsletter sign-up (e.g. in your footer or blog), consent is simpler:

  • you're clearly asking for email marketing
  • the box can be implied by the act of entering an email and clicking "Subscribe", as long as the purpose is clear

Still, be explicit in your copy:

Enter your email to receive our monthly newsletter with product updates, resources and occasional offers. You can unsubscribe at any time.

The important part is that it's obvious this is promotional in nature, not a precondition of using the product.

d) In-app preference centres

Once people are using your product, give them a place to manage their choices, for example:

  • "Communication preferences" in account settings

  • toggles for:

    • product updates and announcements
    • educational content / tips
    • promotions and offers
    • SMS vs email vs in-app messages

This is good both for:

  • user experience (people can tailor what they receive), and
  • compliance (easier to show that you honour opt-outs and changed minds)

It also makes your consent log a living system, not a one-time capture at sign-up.

4. In-app messaging: consent vs legitimate interest

In-app messages sit in an interesting middle ground:

  • They're often seen as part of the product experience (guidance, onboarding, announcements).
  • Some in-app content is clearly promotional (upsell prompts, discount offers, cross-sell cards).

From a practical standpoint:

  • Service-like in-app messages (explaining features, onboarding, changes needed to keep using the product safely) may not require separate marketing consent, though you should still be transparent about them.
  • Overtly promotional in-app messages are closer to marketing, especially if they feel persistent or interruptive.

Even where explicit marketing consent is not strictly required for all in-app content, it's good practice to:

  • give users the ability to mute or reduce promotional or "nudge" messages
  • avoid designs that feel manipulative or overly intrusive
  • include in-app messaging in your privacy and communications explanations, so users understand what to expect

Treat it as part of respecting choices, not just meeting the minimum legal bar.

5. Logging consent across email, SMS and in-app

Collecting consent is only half the story. You also need to be able to show what happened when someone asks:

  • "Why am I receiving these emails or SMS messages?"
  • "What did I agree to?"
  • "When did I change my preferences?"

A useful consent log for marketing typically records, per event:

  • who – user/customer identifier

  • what – the specific thing they agreed to or changed, for example:

    • email_marketing: accepted
    • sms_marketing: withdrawn
    • inapp_promos: muted

  • when – timestamp (in a consistent standard, like UTC)

  • where – IP address and approximate region (helps explain regional logic)

  • channel – web, in-app, mobile, support-assisted

  • surface/flow – sign-up, checkout, settings, unsubscribe link

Over time you get a timeline like:

  • 2025-01-10 – user signed up; email marketing consent accepted at sign-up
  • 2025-02-05 – user opted into SMS marketing via account settings
  • 2025-03-20 – user unsubscribed from email via link; email marketing consent withdrawn
  • 2025-04-01 – in-app preference updated to reduce promotional prompts

That's far more useful than a single marketing_opt_in = true flag with no history.

6. Make unsubscribe and opt-out easy (and recorded)

Users should be able to:

  • unsubscribe from marketing emails via a clear link
  • opt out of SMS marketing with a simple, documented pattern (e.g. replying STOP where supported)
  • change app and notification settings without hunting through multiple screens

From an operational point of view:

  • treat unsubscribe/withdrawal as just as important to log as consent
  • avoid leaving gaps where someone can unsubscribe from one system but stay labelled as "opted-in" in another
  • make sure your marketing tools and your core consent log are aligned

Clean, easy unsubscribe behaviour is good for:

  • user trust
  • spam complaint rates and deliverability
  • telling a coherent story if you're ever challenged on your marketing practices

7. How SolidWraps fits into marketing consent

You can build your own marketing consent infrastructure, but as channels and regions grow it becomes harder to:

  • keep a single, reliable picture of each person's communication permissions
  • show how those permissions relate to your terms and privacy policies
  • answer questions quickly when someone challenges your marketing practices

SolidWraps is designed to help with the consent and policy side of this picture.

1. Structured consent events for multiple channels

When you integrate your sign-up forms, checkout pages and preference centres with SolidWraps, you can record consent events such as:

  • email marketing accepted/withdrawn
  • SMS marketing accepted/withdrawn
  • in-app promotional messaging preferences

Each event is linked to:

  • the user's identifier (where provided)
  • timestamp and context (IP, region, surface, channel)
  • any related policy or notice versions

This gives you a central timeline for each user, even if you use different tools for sending messages.

2. Linking marketing consent to policy and region context

Because SolidWraps also manages your Policies (e.g. Terms, Privacy, Cookies), you can:

  • keep marketing consent in step with the explanations in your privacy and cookie documents
  • show which version of your privacy policy was in effect when someone consented to marketing
  • manage regional variants where marketing consent rules differ (e.g. GDPR-style explicit consent vs opt-out patterns)

This helps you tell a coherent story about what users were told and what they agreed to, across both your legal documents and your marketing practices.

Bringing it together

Marketing consent doesn't have to be complicated, but it does need to be deliberate:

  • distinguish between service messages (usually okay to send as part of the relationship) and marketing messages (typically need consent or clear opt-out)
  • separate channels (email, SMS, in-app) and purposes (service vs marketing) instead of bundling everything into one vague checkbox
  • collect consent at the right moments (sign-up, checkout, preference centres) with clear, honest language
  • log consent as events with context (who, what, when, where, how) rather than just storing a single true/false flag
  • make unsubscribe and preference changes easy, and record those changes too

Whether you build this yourself or use a consent management system like SolidWraps, treating marketing consent as a structured, logged system rather than a one-time checkbox makes it easier to stay compliant, honour user choices, and explain your practices when you need to.