Canada's new anti-spam law, how to flag email addresses

Aldera Chisholm

Re: Canada's Anti-Spam Law (CASL) we want to begin tracking those people for whom we have obtained expressed consent to send mass-email. Most of our email communications will fall under the exemptions, but we want to be pro-active for the future. Currently we enter email addresses into the constituent profile, and we will continue to do this as we still want to have that email address on file for regular communications, but we need to figure out how to put a flag or note on the account to let us know if they have consented to receive email that would fall under the CASL. If we do not have consent, we can use our existing solicit code that they are un-subscribed from mass-email. Any suggestions on the most efficient way to do this? My best idea right now is another Solicit code, but I'm certainly open to ideas! Thanks! Aldera

JoAnn Strommen

Aldera Chisholm:
Re: Canada's Anti-Spam Law (CASL) we want to begin tracking those people for whom we have obtained expressed consent to send mass-email. Most of our email communications will fall under the exemptions, but we want to be pro-active for the future. Currently we enter email addresses into the constituent profile, and we will continue to do this as we still want to have that email address on file for regular communications, but we need to figure out how to put a flag or note on the account to let us know if they have consented to receive email that would fall under the CASL. If we do not have consent, we can use our existing solicit code that they are un-subscribed from mass-email. Any suggestions on the most efficient way to do this? My best idea right now is another Solicit code, but I'm certainly open to ideas! Thanks! Aldera

Just trying to think 'outside the box' - might be too messy but might spur other ideas:  What about specific email type for those consenting?  "Email-consented" and different type for other.  Would mean pulling two types at times but also would allow for segmenting. ???  Just a thought.

Aldera Chisholm

JoAnn Strommen:
Just trying to think 'outside the box' - might be too messy but might spur other ideas:  What about specific email type for those consenting?  "Email-consented" and different type for other.  Would mean pulling two types at times but also would allow for segmenting. ???  Just a thought.

I can see how that has potential - I hate having loads of un-needed solicit codes, so this would certainly look cleaner. I like the idea of a system that is easy to maintain for when we have staff changeovers.

Valerie Weddell

Hi, I know this is long after the fact, but we are just starting on RE and wondering on best practices around CASL - has the 'email type' worked for you or have you reverted to using constituent codes?



Thanks!

Valerie

Aldera Chisholm

For now, our solution is that we have added a solicit code for "unsubscribed online". This way we can simply exclude them from query. That has worked really well for us. We are still debating adding specific email types, as I think it may be a better long-run solution, but I'll be doing a mass evaluation of our protocols in a few months, so I'm waiting to do a proper review. (If I'm going to make that change, I want to do it alongside a few other changes I'll be making.)

Along with that, I did clean up all our solicit codes, and created a chart for my staff with a quick reminder of what each one meant to help ensure they were being used correctly.