New Anti-Spam Laws in Canada (CASL)

Do you use email to contact a list of clients or sent out newsletters?  Starting July 1, 2014, Canada's new Anti-Spam legislation takes affect and could impact how you are allowed to get in touch with your contact lists via mass email and other electronic communications.

According to this great post from Mailchimp.com (our preferred Email Campaign manager), you may need to get express consent from the contacts on your mailing list to legally send them notifications from now on.  The good news is, in many cases this may not be necessary.

From Mailchimp.com's article:

Consent can be implied in the following situations:

• The recipient has within the previous 24 months purchased a product, service, or made some other business deal with you, been a party to a contract with you, or has had a membership with your organization.
• You are either a registered charity or political organization and the recipient has made a donation or gift, volunteered for, or attended a meeting organized by you.
• The message sent is related to the recipient’s professional or official role, and the recipient has not told you or published that they don’t want to receive unsolicited messages, and the recipient has either directly given you their address or has conspicuously published it.

If you send regular mass email correspondence, make sure you read the whole article, or familiarize yourself with the actual legislation on the Government of Canada website to make sure you are in compliance.  Way to go, Government of Canada, for standing up for the Canadian consumer in this case!