Bill C-28, Canada’s antispam legislation, was recently passed and will go into effect later this year. While misleading forms of spam are their intended target, Canadian small and medium-sized businesses should be aware of the Act to ensure compliance when contacting potential customers, establishing contacts, and developing marketing campaigns. The following are the important aspects of Bill C-28 that you and your employees should know:

Definition of spam

Spam is generally considered bulk, unsolicited email from unknown or unjustified senders. However, the new legislation applies to the sending of “commercial electronic messages”, which may include email, instant or text messaging and social media messages and other forms that we cannot consider spam. Often times, the information that is sent may not be considered spam by the sender, but the recipient may see it as spam. It is important to think about how the message will be received at the other end before sending it. Hopefully the regulations that have yet to be released will provide some additional details or thresholds to more easily define the scope of this term.

Express and implicit consent

Electronic messages are not considered spam if the recipient consented to receive the message, so it is important that you first determine whether or not you have the recipient’s approval to send the message. Consent comes in two forms: express and implicit.

Express consent, as defined in the Law, is what is known as “opt-in” consent, by which the person or corporation expressly agrees to be contacted before sending any communication. Typically this would come in the form of subscribing to a newsletter, adding an email address to a written or electronic list, or checking a box to receive more information. This is a more viable option for business owners because a problem is less likely to arise from those who have clearly indicated their interest.

Implied consent has a broader use, which can actually be beneficial for marketers and small business owners, but it could also be more difficult to prove if problems arise. Under the new law, implicit consent occurs when “[t]the person who sends the message, the person who causes it to be sent or the person who allows it to be sent has an existing business relationship or an existing non-business relationship with the person to whom it is sent; ” (Bill C-28 Sec. 9a).

If a customer has bought products or services from your business in the past two years, it is considered that there is an existing commercial relationship between you and your client, which would be implicit consent. There are Without time limit on the status of the relationship if the client has given their express consent for future contact. In terms of express and implicit consent, it is better to err on the side of caution and try to obtain the express consent of all users whenever possible..

ID

The messages must clearly express to the recipient who the message comes from, being consistent with the brand used when the recipient made the initial contact with the company. There should not be any misleading information in the subject line that distorts the message or the sender. All messages must include active contact information and the sender’s postal address.

Unsubscribe option

Companies that have an email newsletter should have an unsubscribe option that is clearly stated in each message so that users can easily stop future correspondence at any time. Some users may not know how to use the unsubscribe link, so including your company contact information is important to ensure that recipients can contact you in another form to be removed from the mailing list. If a customer contacts you through other means to be removed from the list, manually unsubscribe the user and notify you of the removal immediately.

Tips for small businesses

If you have a newsletter subscription area on your website, make sure your database stores important information such as name and date of registration, not just email address, so that you can demonstrate your consent if a problem arises. . Always provide your customers with your contact information in any message sent, as well as the option to “unsubscribe” or “unsubscribe” at any time. Customers should not be automatically placed in an email database, they should be able to choose whether or not they want to receive information from you. Don’t bombard your customers with messages, you can easily frustrate your customers if their inbox is constantly filled with messages from you. Setting up an account with email marketing software can ensure that your messages comply with government regulations. Senders who do not comply with the new regulations can face serious penalties, so make sure your messages are useful or informative to the user in some way, this will make customers look forward to your correspondence and grow your database.

There will be more to come on this important topic when the regulations are released.