Integration

MCP for Attentive: the straight answer, and what actually helps your SMS programme.

You run SMS on Attentive. The list is growing, the shopping-behaviour journeys are earning their keep, and the last thing you want is a compliance misstep. Texting is unforgiving about consent in a way email never was. So before you touch anything you sanity-check the journey logic, mind the quiet-hours and STOP-keyword rails, and reread the message one more time, because every character on a phone costs trust. Ask Claude for help and it gives you good advice about all of it. Generic advice. It doesn't carry the lifecycle protocol a practitioner does, and it won't notice when your plan quietly assumes consent you haven't captured. If you searched "MCP for Attentive" hoping to close that gap, this page owes you the honest version of what's on the other side of the search. Then the genuinely useful part.

What "MCP" actually means here.

MCP stands for Model Context Protocol, an open standard from Anthropic that lets Claude reach outside the chat window: a plugin system where the plugins give Claude real capabilities. Two facts before any pitch, because you deserve them up front. First: Attentive publishes no first-party MCP server, and we won't recommend the community wrappers on npm. After a fake postmark-mcp package backdoored roughly 300 organisations in September 2025, handing an unofficial package the credential to a consented phone list is not a risk we'll put our name to. Second: Orbit does not yet ship direct Attentive API tools. Nothing in Orbit takes an Attentive key. What Orbit is, is an MCP for lifecycle work: the skills, calculators, and local email pipeline a practitioner runs beside a platform like Attentive, all of it working without a credential from anyone. The full walk-through of what an MCP is and how it changes the work lives on the MCP for marketing page →.

What Orbit does beside Attentive today.

No hand-waving. Every "works" row below runs on your machine with no credential from anyone; the row that depends on your account data says exactly how the data arrives; and the row that doesn't exist says so. Narrower than a fictional integration would look, and a great deal more useful, because you can run all of it this afternoon.

Hold the TCPA and CTIA rails

Works today: no key

Express written consent, quiet hours, STOP and HELP handling, 10DLC: Claude holds the compliance mechanics next to whatever you're designing, and flags the flow that would text before the signup unit fires. Knowledge, not legal advice, and it needs no key.

Review a journey's logic

Works today: no key

Paste or export a journey's triggers and branches and Claude reviews the shape: timing, exit criteria, consent posture, the branch nobody tested. The same review a senior lifecycle lead gives, run on the flow you actually built.

Write and score the message

Works today: no key

SMS copy discipline: one idea per text, opt-out language intact, segment-count awareness so a 161st character doesn't double your send cost. Plus subject and preheader scoring for the email side of your Attentive programme.

Build the email side end-to-end

Works today: no key

Attentive sends email too. Orbit's local pipeline composes, compiles MJML to dark-mode-safe HTML, and runs a render QA gate before anything ships, all on your machine, no credential involved.

Run the lifecycle maths

Works today: no key

Sample size for a fair test, holdout design, replenishment timing, RFM cuts: the calculators a real programme decision needs, rather than a gut call dressed as strategy.

Analyse your account data

Partial: named limit

No live read. Orbit has no connection to your Attentive account. Export a segment or paste the numbers and Claude reasons over the real data. The analysis is genuine; the transport is your clipboard, and we'd rather name that than imply an integration.

Call Attentive's API

Not shipped

Not shipped, full stop. No Orbit tool reads or writes an Attentive account today. If that changes, this page changes the same day. We won't promise a date we haven't earned.

The short version: the thinking layer is real and complete, compliance reasoning, journey review, copy discipline, the maths, and the plumbing into your account doesn't exist yet, from Orbit or from anyone official. We'd rather hand you a sharp consultant today than a fictional integration.

The compliance reality of SMS.

This is where SMS diverges hardest from email. A text lands in the same inbox as a message from someone's mother, so the rules are stricter and the penalties are real. Orbit reasons about the rails. It does not give legal advice, and a question specific to your programme belongs with your own counsel. But the mechanics are worth stating plainly.

  • Express written consent comes first. Under the US TCPA, a marketing text needs the recipient's prior express written consent, typically captured by a signup unit before the first message. You can't import a list and start texting. Claude holds this rule against any flow you design: the signup unit fires before the first message, always, and a plan that assumes otherwise gets flagged.
  • Quiet hours and STOP / HELP. Marketing texts are restricted to reasonable local hours, and STOP, UNSUBSCRIBE, and HELP keywords must be honoured immediately. Attentive enforces much of this at the platform, quiet hours and opt-out handling are built in, which is one reason it's a strong SMS home. Orbit reasons on top of those rails rather than trying to reimplement them.
  • 10DLC and the carrier layer. Application-to-person SMS in the US runs over registered 10DLC numbers, and the CTIA guidelines shape what carriers will actually deliver. This lives below any API, but it's the reason a well-formed message can still be filtered, context Claude can hold when it reasons about your programme.

None of this needs an API connection at all. The compliance layer is knowledge, and knowledge doesn't ask for a key.

How to set it up.

There is no key step, because there is nothing to connect. Install Orbit, it's free, and everything on this page runs immediately: the compliance reasoning, the journey review, the email pipeline, the calculators. Your Attentive credentials stay in Attentive.

  • Nothing to scope, nothing to revoke. The usual first question about an MCP is simple: how much can this key do? Here, the answer is pleasant: there is no key. Orbit can't touch your subscriber list because no tool in it connects to Attentive.
  • Bring your data when you want analysis. Export a segment or paste a journey's trigger logic and Claude works from it directly. You decide what crosses the desk, every time.

If Orbit ships direct Attentive tools later, the connection step will appear here, and it will start read-only, because that's the posture everywhere else Orbit connects.

Where Orbit is deepest, and where it isn't.

Straight talk, because SMS is where over-claiming would be easiest. Orbit's lifecycle depth is email-first: its MJML pipeline, its render-and-QA gate, its subject-line and preheader scoring are all built for the email inbox. Its deepest single-platform integration is Braze, where a handful of tools are built around concepts that only exist there: Canvas flows, Content Blocks, its media library.

For Attentive, that shapes an honest fit: Orbit is genuinely useful beside your SMS programme, holding the compliance rails, reviewing the journeys, disciplining the copy, and bringing the lifecycle craft that makes a text worth sending, but Attentive is the SMS-native specialist, and Orbit doesn't pretend to replace it. The portable work travels; the channel expertise stays with the platform built for it.

The part that was never about an API.

Everything above is knowledge and local tooling, which is exactly why it works without a connection. Orbit ships 88 lifecycle skills, structured protocols for the actual jobs: reviewing a journey, laddering a win-back, writing a message that respects the channel, scoring the hook. Those are channel-agnostic; the discipline of a good lifecycle programme is the same whether the send is a text or an email.

Underneath sit 136 tools: the calculators a real test needs: sample size, holdout, replenishment timing, the maths behind an RFM cut. Attentive gives you the SMS channel and the consent rails. Orbit is the practitioner sitting next to them, reasoning about the programme the same way you do.

Is this for you?

This is for the ecommerce marketer who runs SMS on Attentive and wants a sharper practitioner beside it, the person minding the consent posture, questioning the journey logic, and making sure every message earns its place on someone's phone. If that's your week, Orbit hands you a Claude that carries the lifecycle protocol instead of improvising it, and tells you plainly what it can't see. It's a weaker fit if what you want is a live pipe into your Attentive account. That doesn't exist yet, from us or from anyone official, and we won't dress a clipboard up as one. What you get is a Claude that works like a lifecycle practitioner instead of a search engine, and a straight answer about what's real, which is rarer than it should be.

Try it.

Every Orbit plan includes every skill and tool, on every ESP. Install it and the whole layer runs the same afternoon: no Attentive key, no signup on their side, nothing to revoke later.

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Run a different platform?

The same honest treatment, per platform:

Frequently asked.

What is an MCP for Attentive?

MCP stands for Model Context Protocol, an open standard from Anthropic. It gives Claude real tools instead of general knowledge. The straight answer for Attentive: Orbit ships no direct Attentive API tools today, and nothing in Orbit takes an Attentive key. What Orbit is, is an MCP for lifecycle work: the skills, calculators, and local email pipeline a practitioner runs beside an SMS platform. Every part of it works without a credential from anyone. If direct Attentive tools ship later, this page changes that day. Orbit is not an official Attentive product either way; it is an independent MCP, and Attentive has no hand in building or supporting it.

Is there an official Attentive MCP?

No. Attentive publishes no first-party MCP server. Community wrappers exist on npm, and we recommend against pasting your Attentive key into any of them: in September 2025 a fake postmark-mcp package backdoored roughly 300 organisations before it was caught, and an unofficial package holding the credential to a consented phone list is the same shape of risk. The key to your SMS list deserves more paranoia than a weekend install.

Is SMS different from email here?

Yes, and it's the whole point of this page. SMS carries a heavier consent and compliance load than email: express written consent before the first marketing text, quiet-hours rules, and mandatory STOP and HELP handling. So the useful work beside Attentive leans toward consent reasoning and journey review, not a deliverability teardown. And the honest caveat runs the other way too: Orbit's own lifecycle depth is email-first. It is genuinely useful next to an SMS programme, holding the compliance rails, reviewing journey logic, disciplining the copy, but it is not an SMS-native platform, and Attentive is. We would rather say that plainly than oversell.

How does Orbit handle SMS consent and compliance?

It reasons about the rails; it does not read your consent records and it does not give legal advice. US SMS marketing runs under the TCPA and the CTIA guidelines: express written consent before a marketing text, sends restricted to reasonable local hours, STOP and HELP keywords honoured, and 10DLC registration for A2P traffic. Attentive enforces much of this at the platform. Quiet hours and opt-out keywords are built in. Orbit's part is to hold those rules next to the journey you're designing: flag a flow that could text before the signup unit fires, question a win-back that ignores quiet hours, keep the opt-out language in every draft. The mechanics, surfaced; a compliance question for your programme still belongs with your own counsel.

Can Orbit read my Attentive subscribers or send a text?

Neither. Orbit has no connection to your Attentive account: no reads, no writes, no key. What it can do is work from what you bring: export a subscriber segment or paste a journey's trigger logic and Claude reasons over the real data, the way a consultant works from the report you hand across the desk. The analysis is genuine; the transport is your clipboard, and we'd rather name that plainly than imply a live integration that doesn't exist.

Is Attentive the right home for a whole lifecycle programme?

Attentive is strongest as an SMS-native ecommerce channel: the layer that grows a subscriber list through signup units, runs consent and quiet hours correctly, and turns shopping behaviour into sends through its journeys. For SMS, it is the specialist. Where a programme needs deep, cross-channel journeys that weave email and SMS together, or true incrementality testing across a large audience, a lifecycle-native platform like Braze is the graduation. Orbit is deepest on Braze and email-first overall, so it sits well beside Attentive on the strategy, consent, and copy side, and the discipline travels with you if the programme grows.