Canada's New Anti-Spam Legislation

If you live in Canada, you probably have been receiving a torrent of emails latel from companies and organizations asking you to confirm your intention to receive email news. Canada's new anti-spam legislation (CASL) goes into effect in a few days (July 1, 2014), hence the flurry of emails.

I have got a bunch of emails from organizations that I'm fairly sure I previously expressly consented to be added to their email list, so I have been surprised to receive so many emails asking me to (re) confirm my intention to stay on their mailing list.

I find email newsletters to be an invaluable source of info for me so I have taken the time to respond to my deluge to confirm. But today a friend posted a note about this topic on Facebook that started a fascinating discussion on the issue.

It turns out that a lot of businesses are confused about the new legislation and are probably being more cautious than they have to be. Nonetheless, I do think the official communication around this issue from the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC)could have been better.CRTC's website does a good job in communicating the new legislation, through such things as infographics, FAQ page and even spam quizzes. But there's a lot to weed through. 

Thanks to my friend's Facebook thread, I found a couple clear and succinct articles on the topic:

• Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation: What You Need to Know by Émilie Couture
• Company directors need to care about CASL by Mark Blevis.

From a marketing perspective, most of the emails I have received asking me to confirm my intention to stay on the email list have looked rather like spam themselves - i.e. wordy, generic notices that I quickly scanned and ignored. Many organizations had to send me two such notices before I responded - in the meantime I became more aware of CASL so I made the effort to notice such email. But this email from Shoppers was the most effective, I received so I thought I'd share it.

Visually this is very clear and noticeable. But Shoppers did make a big mistake when they sent this. I don't automatically allow images when I receive emails (except for ones from friends). As almost all the content from the Shoppers email was in an image file, the message was lost until I turned the image on. It's really simple to provide alt text or other text solutions to rectify this.

I'd say it's as important to not look like spam as it is to follow the new rules.