Lisa B
Prospecting and Lead-Gen Expert - List Broker, Google Adwords Professional
best practices regarding e-mail subscription popups on blogs
More and more often I'm seeing pop-up boxes requesting an email subscription when I check out new blogs. This seems to be a new "best practice" to collect email addresses and I'm thinking about trying it myself.
I'm wondering: Can a blog-subscription email list be used for general company announcements and email newsletter blasts? It seems to me that by the CAN-SPAM Act it would have to be kept separate just for this one purpose and cannot be folded into your main enewsletter list. Also, interestingly I'm not seeing a link to privacy policies on these popups...
I'd love to hear others' feedback about this.
Answers (6)
Candice Katayama (
Restructure Strategist Consultant - BioTech at candicek.com
Best Answers in: Change Management (1), Labor Relations (1)
I have wondered about how SPAM is regulated. It seems as though there is a disregard in general of these laws. I am noticing that many companies are jumping into bringing their marketing in-house without the expertise, and not understanding permission based marketing and the laws surrounding SPAM. I have done a Google-search on cases of consequence for companies and individuals in violation of SPAM and I did not find anything. There seems to be a greater responsibility or consciousness for those in the "business" such as marketing and advertising companies, Constant Contact, or such as yourself as a lead provider. Personally, I really dislike pop-up's, but I do not mind giving minimal information (email, name) to get to content that I am seeking. Thanks for your question. I think it is a very relevant trend to clarify best practices.
Lisa,
While I'm no lawyer, the CAN-SPAM Act is a factor in my everyday activities.
The CAN SPAM act does not have anything against an entity sharing or selling e-mail addresses to another. So if a blog (especially one with no privacy policy) is able to capture an e-mail address, it's welcome to share that with the corporate parent or even a completely unrelated company.
What you can NOT do is sell/share the e-mail addresses of those that opt out of your messages. From the law once someone opts out:
"You cannot help another entity send email to that address, or have another entity send email on your behalf to that address. Finally, it's illegal for you to sell or transfer the email addresses of people who choose not to receive your email, even in the form of a mailing list, unless you transfer the addresses so another entity can comply with the law."
Side note: Website pop-up boxes will dramatically increase the rate in which you will collect relevant e-mail addresses.
Regards,
Patrick
Twitter: patrickrcahill
Links:
Boris M
Email Marketing Coach, YourEzineCoach.com
Best Answers in: Internet Marketing (6), Direct Marketing (2), Financial Regulation (1), Business Development (1), Organizational Development (1), E-Commerce (1), Web Development (1)
I personally separate the two types of subscribers and recommend that my clients do so as well. Although this practice may be perfectly legal under CAN-SPAM, I consider it not very ethical.
However, depending on how you phrase the ad copy in your pop-up, you may get away with it, e.g.if you say: "Sign up for updates from my blog and also receive my ezine."
Problem arises when somebody opts out. Because these two lists are handled (usually) by two separate systems, you need to manually update one or the other. Ideally, your email service provider would have some sort of RSS Feed plugin or connectivity. Email Service Provider MadMimi recently introduced this upgrade to their very slick email publishing platform. iContact has it, Aweber, too, I think. GetResonse also has a limited feature which allows you to send an automated email to your ezine subscribers announcing the new content is available on your blog, but it doesn't actually deliver that contact as an email.
I use FeedBurner for handling email subscriptions to my blog and it can only collect the email address, not the name of the subscriber. This is just one of the reasons I wouldn't use the blog subscribers list as any of my other confirmed opt-in email marketing lists.
I'd like to hear what blogging superstars Denise Wakeman and Patsi Krakoff have to say on this subject, so I am tagging them as experts here.
Boris Mahovac - Email Marketing Coach/Consultant
http://YourEzineCoach.com
Links:
- http://www.yourezinecoach.com/2009/sending-email-blasts-not-much-fun-withou...
- http://YourEzineCoach.com/recommends/iContact
- http://YourEzineCoach.com/recommends/Aweber
Boris M also suggests these experts on this topic:
Clarification added 5 months ago:
this sentence "but it doesn't actually deliver that contact as an email. "
should read "but it doesn't actually deliver that CONTENT as an email."
I'm no legal expert, but being in the email marketing industry since the last 5 years, I can offer you some best practices of handling subscriptions.
The simple answer to your question is, no you mustn't assume subscription to your blog as a subscription any other campaign(s) that you run. A best practice in this case would be to offer interested subscribers a list of other campaigns that they can subscribe to, during the blog-email subscription process.
Assuming default subscription to other campaigns would mean diluting your targeting and ultimately subscriber fatigue.
Even if you don't see some others provide a privacy policy, it is a best practice to provide one or at the least a disclaimer comforting subscribers that they will only receive communication that they've signed up for and their contact information is safe with you.
Hope this helps
Thanks
Naresh Bhagtani
Bill A
CEO / Ideopia Advertising + Interactive
Best Answers in: Advertising (1), Direct Marketing (1), Internet Marketing (1), Graphic Design (1), Branding (1), E-Commerce (1), Web Development (1)
I won't comment on the legal issues, but I will say that pop-ups of all sorts are generally considered bad user interface. They annoy users, and depending on the users browser settings they may not work. A far better approach is to provide an attractive button or tease on the page, which causes a form to layover or drop down when clicked. Also, depending layout, I don't object to forms or calls to action being included in the post itself. I think it would be smarter to put all this energy into creating content that's so engaging that the user will opt-in no matter what. See Jakob Nielsen's discussion of pop-up in the link below.
Links:
I use Ad-impact -- awesome service, complies with spam laws
