Not everyone whose phone number you have is someone you can text. A contact is any number in your database; a subscriber is someone who actually opted in to receive your text messages. The distinction sounds pedantic and it's the difference between a compliant program and a lawsuit, because texting contacts who never subscribed is exactly the unconsented contact the rules forbid. Here's why the two aren't the same.
What's the difference between a contact and a subscriber?
A contact is a data record, a phone number attached to a person, that you obtained somehow: a voter file match, an event signup, a donation, an import. A subscriber is a contact who took an action to opt in to your texts specifically. Every subscriber is a contact, but not every contact is a subscriber. The voter file gives you millions of contacts and zero subscribers; a keyword campaign turns some of those contacts into subscribers by capturing their consent.
Why does the distinction matter?
Because you can only text subscribers, not contacts. Having someone's number, a contact, is not permission to text it; the consent that makes them a subscriber is. Campaigns get into trouble precisely by blurring this: they treat their whole contact database as a texting list and blast it, which means texting people who never subscribed, the core violation. The whole discipline of growing a list is really about converting contacts into subscribers, one documented opt-in at a time.
How do you think about your list correctly?
Separate the two in your head and your data. Your contact database is a targeting resource, it tells you who's in your universe. Your subscriber list is your textable audience, the people who consented. You use the contacts to figure out who to reach and the subscribers as who you can actually text, and the job is moving people from the first category to the second through opt-ins. A campaign that keeps these straight never accidentally texts a non-subscriber; one that conflates them eventually does. It's a small vocabulary distinction that encodes the whole consent principle.
Frequently asked questions
What's the difference between a contact and a subscriber?
A contact is any phone number you have; a subscriber is a contact who opted in to your texts specifically. Every subscriber is a contact, but not every contact is a subscriber, and you can only text subscribers.
Can you text everyone in your contact database?
No. Having someone's number doesn't mean they consented to texts. You can only text subscribers, people who opted in. Blasting your whole contact database means texting non-subscribers, which is the core violation.
How do contacts become subscribers?
Through a documented opt-in, texting a keyword, scanning a QR code to a subscribe page, checking a box for texts. Growing a list is really converting contacts into subscribers, one consent at a time.
Keep reading: what is an opt-in? and what is opt-in rate?. For the rules, see the FCC.