CAN-SPAM COMPLIANCE FAQs
Do you have questions about compliance with using Website Visitor Intelligence? Here’s a few answers to some of our most popular questions to help ease your mind.
Is Website Visitor Intelligence CAN-SPAM Act Compliant?
The most important thing to understand about CAN-SPAM Compliance is that it doesn’t have anything to do with email address collection. CAN-SPAM sets rules for sending email messages, primarily to give recipients the ability to easily opt-out of your marketing messages.
Since you are sending your own emails, you have complete control over your CAN-SPAM Compliance. If you are working with a 3rd party who sends emails on your behalf, it is your responsibility to communicate with your 3rd party to ensure your marketing emails are CAN-SPAM Compliant.
A few things to follow to make sure you’re compliant with CAN-SPAM:
- Don’t use false or misleading information in your emails. Your email message must be accurate and identify the person or business sending the message.
- Are you sending advertisements? In your email message or subject line, you must disclose that the email is an advertisement.
- Tell recipients where you’re located. Include your physical address in the footer of your marketing emails.
- Give recipients the ability to opt-out of receiving future emails. Messages must include a clear and conspicuous explanation of how to opt-out of getting emails from you in the future. Give a return email address or an easy internet-based link to opt-out of future emails.
- Honor opt-out requests promptly. You must honor a request to opt-out within 10 business days of the request. You may not charge a fee or require any personal information from the client to opt-out.
Is Website Visitor Intelligence GDPR Compliant?
Website Visitor Intelligence is not GDPR Compliant. Our database only contains and collects email addresses in the U.S. so we aren’t required to follow the European Union’s GDPR Compliance regulations.
Do people opt in?
Since you’ve probably been told many times that people MUST opt-in to marketing messages, you’ll probably be surprised to learn that according to the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003, email recipients do NOT need to opt-in to send emails within the USA. Things are different in the European Union (this is where GDPR comes into play), but in the U.S., opt-ins actually aren’t required.
To be in line with the CAN-SPAM Act, you DO have to give recipients an easy link to be able to opt-out of your marketing messages.
But what if we told you these users DO opt-in?
When you use Website Visitor Intelligence, you’re tapping into our network of email addresses. The email addresses in our network are associated with people who have already opted in to having their information shared for marketing emails.
In addition, with many Website Visitor Intelligence users who send their own email marketing messages to recipients they’ve collected, we are seeing above average open rates and below average spam complaints.
Privacy Policy
We want to make sure you understand that this is a legal way to collect email addresses. If you want to really make sure you’ve covered all of your bases, here’s a look at what is required in your website’s privacy policy:
You probably already have a privacy policy on your website, so while you’re using Website Visitor Intelligence, you need to update your privacy policy to inform your website users of the placement of pixel tags and your intended use of any data collected. Your privacy policy should also comply with all data and privacy laws and should provide your website users with a link to the privacy policy. It’s also important to let your users know that there is an opportunity for opting out of your email messages after data is collected (you should already be allowing an opt out as part of the CAN-SPAM Act Compliance).
Keep in mind, you can only use the Website Visitor Intelligence code on websites owned by you.