If you are an email marketer, there are several regulations you need to follow and the most critical is the CAN-SPAM Act. CAN-SPAM Act stands for The Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography And Marketing Act that was implemented in 2003. This Act was set up in order to protect customers from unwanted emails on wireless devices such as mobile phones, unnecessary bulk of emails, from many brands and businesses.
Let’s dig deeper to understand about this Act, its guidelines, requirements, and penalties regarding the delivery of commercial bulk emails.
What is the CAN-SPAM Act?
The CAN-SPAM Act comprises of various rules and regulations that define appropriate and inappropriate actions related to commercial electronic mails. It is intended to put down stricter requirements on the commercial emails rather than transactional emails.
This Act set up rules that are required to be followed by businesses with a commitment of sending a relevant email to potential customers. It empowers customers to avoid marketing they don’t want to receive. Email marketing is the most important part of every business to achieve higher customer satisfaction and customer retention. Therefore, it has to be managed properly by businesses to avoid significant fines.
The CAN-SPAM Act regulates commercial email and defines some points that need to be considered when marketers want to make the most out of the Salesforce Marketing Cloud.
What are the requirements of the CAN-SPAM Act for the Marketing Cloud?
The CAN-SPAM Act establishes requirements for commercial emails and its main objective is to deliver accurate commercial content that meets the following criteria.
- Recognize the sender accurately from the header information.
- Leverage Subject line that precisely defines the content of the email.
- Identify the message as an advertisement, until and unless you have express consent (opt-in) from the subscriber.
- Provide a method for the recipient to unsubscribe.
- Include the sender’s valid physical postal address.
- Honor unsubscribe requests timely. It means that marketers must enable an opt-out request within 10 days and keep the unsubscribe mechanism operational for at least 30 days after the mailing.
- Avoid sending emails that have empty bodies i.e. marketers need to include some content in the email.
- Not safe for work (NSFW) Content does have to be labeled clearly so that users can decide whether or not to view it before they take any action.
Penalties for Non-Compliance
There are tough penalties for violating the CAN-SPAM Act. If marketers violate the CAN-SPAM Act, the fine of tens of thousands of dollars for each individual instance will be imposed on them. Each individual email could propose a penalty of up to US$41,484. The CAN-SPAM Act applies to business-to-business emails as well as business-to-consumer emails.
Additionally, a CAN-SPAM violation can be defined as a criminal offense, meaning penalties like jail time within the scope of potential consequences for non-compliance.
How Mass Mailer can help marketers with CAN-SPAM compliance?
Mass Mailer (an app on AppExchange) is one of the best solutions for Salesforce CRM to send bulk emails without any limits via Mass Email Wizard and campaigns. With Mass mailer’s support for Salesforce templates, it ensures that every email you send follows THE CAN-SPAM requirements.
Mass Mailer provides an efficient way for the marketing and sales teams to easily manage subscriptions and unsubscribes, track mailing list performance, and send out emails based on user-related interest. Furthermore, the best part is that these features are easy to use and can be fully automated. Marketers can also verify emails for validity and Whitelabel their domain for campaign performance to ensure their emails reach their prospects’ inboxes.
Using the Mass Mailer templates, you can include several things such as the company’s address, unsubscribe links, and correct email sender. MassMailer can automatically manage unsubscribes ensuring that customers don’t receive unnecessary emails.
By using Mass Mailer, you can upgrade your compliance with CAN-SPAM regulations and also keep your Salesforce email lists up-to-date through the MassMailer Email Verification feature.
Example of CAN-SPAM compliant email
The requirements that are followed are given below:
- Labeled that this email is an ad
- Recognized that the company in the “form” line and email address
- Provided recipients a method to unsubscribe
- Provided a valid mailing address
- Involved a second approach through which recipients can unsubscribe
Example of CAN-SPAM non-compliant email
The requirements that are not followed are:
- The subject line doesn’t clearly define the content of the message
- Doesn’t mention that it is an ad
- Fraudulent sender name
- No way to unsubscribe
- It doesn’t include any address.
If marketers make these mistakes while sending an email, they are likely to be considered as a spammer.
Note: Be careful while creating your emails to make sure that you include necessary features and follow the requirements in order to comply with the CAN-SPAM Act.
Conclusion
The CAN-SPAM Act was intended to protect consumers. Businesses must adhere to its policies as it also develops a transparent and honest relationship between their brand or business and the customers on your email lists. Moreover, the more relevant your emails look, the easier it is to retain the target audience, and there is a minimum chance for your emails to be marked as spam or junk. Finally, the CAN-SPAM Act describes the importance of understanding the law, communicating the requirements, and training your team members in what is required and acceptable under the law.
Ajay Dubedi
CEO | Founder
Ajay Dubedi, the founder and CEO of Cloud Analogy, is a prominent Salesforce Sales, Service, and Marketing cloud Consultant with a rich expertise in handling challenging business models. Ajay has assisted and implemented solutions in industries comprising Banking, Health Care, Networking, Education, Telecommunication and Manufacturing. Ajay is globally acclaimed for his extensive experience in APEX Programming, VisualForce pages, Triggers, Workflows, Page Layouts, Roles, Profiles, Reports & Dashboards.Hire the best Salesforce Implementation Partner. Choose Cloud Analogy, the world's most preferred Salesforce Implementation Company that provides custom CRM Implementation services.
Great article. The blog post is very detailed and informative.Thanks!
Hey Rajni Goswami, Thanks for your kind words. We’re glad you found our content informative and helpful, and we look forward to sharing more with you.
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Great insights, so clear and easy to read. This article information will be definitely helpful to understand about this CAN-SPAM Act, its guidelines and requirements.
Hey Mark, Thanks for your kind words. We’re glad you found our content informative and helpful, and we look forward to sharing more with you.
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great resource on CAN-SPAM.
Hey Brandon, Thanks for your kind words. We’re glad you found our content informative and helpful, and we look forward to sharing more with you.
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Keep updating and sharing. Thank you.
Hey Rodolfo, Thanks for your kind words. We’re glad you found our content informative and helpful, and we look forward to sharing more with you.
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