Email article
That’s right. As of July 1st, the Canadian Anti Spam Legislation Act (CASL) has been brought into force. Failure to comply can result in fines between $1 million (for individuals) and $10 million (for businesses).
Mother of God! How can I be sure my mailings comply?
Fear not, that’s the easy bit:
- Did EVERYONE in your list subscribe to your mailings using a double opt-in sign-up form?
- Do you have records (IP address and subscription date) for each sign-up?
- Do you use E-goi (or any other ESP which auto-adds 1-click unsubscribe and a physical address to all your mailings)?
Check, check and check
Then you’re good to go! You’re following both email/SMS marketing best practices and CASL! Feel free to stop reading – go and celebrate your awesomeness with a nice sweet and tasty treat :)
Also be sure to share this cool infographic (see image on the right) with your friends so they too can make it to the top compliance spot!
What if I failed that checklist?
May God have mercy on your soul, because CASL won’t (not really, but you get the idea). It requires all commercial messages sent to Canadian citizens anywhere in the world to have prior recipient consent. This can be implied (eg. someone buying something from you) or express (people signing up to receive your mailings).
Under CASL, permission for implied consent goes stale after 24 months, which means a whole lot of businesses have been rushing to get opt-in confirmation from their Canadian contacts and customers. Check out this handy pic highlighting the differences:
If you’ve only been given implied consent from your Canadian contacts, there’s a nice easy way in E-goi to ask them to confirm their opt-in. Just use the “Help” menu in your account to give us a shout on how to do it. This will also have the added benefit of pruning your list down to those subscribers who are clearly engaged with your brand, ramping up your CTOR rates and maximizing your deliverability.
Got it. So is CASL a good or a bad thing?
Everything that helps curb spam is a good thing. CASL looks and sounds pretty much like EU’s own E-Privacy directive and, quite honestly, it was high time a major country in Northern America got in on the act, as CAN-SPAM is just a set of easily circumvented guidelines – CASL is an actually enforceable law. And all the better for it.
