We switched last October to using contact point purposes to record email preferences, and in doing so, we also began relying on the checkbox on the TNEW account creation page to have patrons opt into our mailing list. If they checked the checkbox, their e-address was assigned contact point purposes and thus received newsletters, and if not, their email address was not assigned contact point purposes and thus they did not receive newsletters.
In the last few months, we've heard from some of our new members that they're not getting emails from us. We checked their records, and for all of them it was the case that they had neglected to opt into our mailing list by checking that checkbox.
We're now considering moving back to having patrons opt out, since it seems having patrons opt in is resulting in some of our members not receiving our follow-up emails.
Is there anything else we should be considering here? I guess I'm wondering whether in the wake of GDPR there are legal reasons why we should stay with having patrons opt in.
Hi Alex,
Per GDPR you must receive explicit consent from the patron that they want to receive communications from you. Not even a pre-ticked box. The CAN-SPAM law it's not illegal to email without consent (it's highly frowned upon) but you must provide a clear and simple way to opt-out. If a user reports you and you are found to be violation of CAN-SPAM you can be fined upwards of $40k PER EMAIL, so, something to keep in the back of your head.
https://litmus.com/blog/the-ultimate-guide-to-international-email-law-infographic
https://litmus.com/blog/5-things-you-must-know-about-email-consent-under-gdpr
You will also find that a lot of ESPs (Mailchimp, WordFly, etc) have it written in their terms of use that you must receive explicit permission from users to send them email, not email them until they say stop.
Hope that helps.
Thanks, Jennifer. This is really helpful!