250+ SMS spam words to skip for your next campaign

By Katie Helps

November 09, 2023

7 min read time.

Let’s not sugar coat it, you hate text message spam. And so do we. The average American hates it too — 76% of American adults have been irritated or frustrated by unsolicited text messages.

As a business, it’s important to understand and follow the rules. If you don’t, hefty fines and penalties could come your way – not to mention costly damage to your reputation. Because, you want to have loyal customers and brand trust, right?

Right.

So, how do you cook up a successful text messaging campaign?

In this article, we’ll give you all the ingredients to help you to make sure your messages aren’t spam.

Think of it like your SMS compliance recipe — without any ham in a can.

In this article you’ll find:

What’s a spam text message?
an overview of general Spam rules
200+ spam trigger words to avoid

Just so you know, we can’t give legal advice: This blog contains general information. The contents of this blog do not constitute legal advice, are not intended to be legal advice, and should not be relied on as such. It’s important to seek your own legal advice about text messaging rules and regulations.

What’s a spam text message?

Spam is unsolicited electronic marketing communication.

Spam can be sent via email, chat apps or text messaging. In this article, we’ll focus on SMS spam.

Defining text messaging spam

SMS spam is an unsolicited marketing text message. Basically, it’s a message you didn’t ask for or consent to receiving that advertises goods or services.

An SMS won’t be considered spam if it is an appointment or payment reminder, is about a service used by the customer or doesn’t contain an advertisement. These are considered transactional messages, see the difference between transactional and marketing SMS.

Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between spam and a scam – learn more about scams here.

Why businesses need to understand spam laws

If your business is sending marketing text messages to customers, understanding the spam laws is very important. And, could save you big-time.

It’s not all doom and gloom – SMS compliance isn’t hard, and we can help. Read on to find out how to send compliant messages.

Spam rules and tips

If you’re ready to create an SMS campaign, here is some information to help you stay compliant.

The rules

Check the regulations for different countries Each country has different legislation and policies for spam so you should always check what applies in the countries you are sending from and to.
Get consent Before you send text messages to your audience, you must get their consent, and although this can be express or implied in some places, we recommend you aim to get express consent and keep records of customer consent. Learn about SMS opt-ins: what you need to know about messaging and consent. You can also ask your SMS provider for help. Our support team is online 24/7 and are always happy to answer questions.
Make yourself known It’s best practice (and in most places it’s a legal requirement) to make yourself known when sending marketing SMS to customers. This could be as simple as including your business name in the actual text message or by using an eligible alpha tag that literally spells out your business name so that you’re instantly recognisable.

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Allow for people to opt-out If you’re planning on sending marketing or promotional messages, you must give customers an opportunity to opt-out without any fee. Your message should include instructions on how to unsubscribe. A common way to do this is to add ‘reply STOP to opt-out’ to your marketing messages. Once someone asks to opt-out, you must take them off your contact list or you can risk penalties.

At ClickSend, we give our customers a helping hand by managing opt-outs for marketing messages for free. It’s just one way we help you to stay compliant.

Tips

Avoid pre-checked boxes If you’re offering an opt-in form on your website, make sure the customer has to physically check the consent box to opt in. We call this an active opt in.
Limit special characters Special characters are symbols like $$$, *** or !!!!. Try to limit your use of these characters, just like all caps these characters can create urgency or FOMO. If you do want to use special characters, that’s ok — just limit it to one at a time.
Send varied, personalised messages Many spam messages are repetitive, you’ll often get the same message over and over again. So, it makes sense that sending the same message to the same group of people can trigger spam filters. You can combat this by personalising messages with customer names and other customer information.