e-mail Marketing

A Permission Marketing Primer: Picking and Choosing

Permission email marketing has morphed from best practice to legal requirement in several countries. In the next three issues we'll explore what Karen Talavera, president of Sychronicity Marketing, refers to as the "Six Cs of Permission Email Marketing." Here are the first two:

Conscious consent

"Terms like affirmative consent, passive consent and third-party consent abound," writes Talavera. "But when it comes to genuine, 100 percent permission marketing, the only consent that matters is conscious consent." This means subscribers make an active decision to receive future communication. This is different from having the box for future messages pre-checked on a registration form and expecting subscribers to deselect it if they don't want future messages. For conscious consent, the subscriber must physically check the box and agree to your correspondence.

Choice

Let recipients set their preferences for the manner and types of communication they receive. Some might want news about your company but not promotions, or accept messages by email but not postal mail. Some sites let subscribers determine the frequency of contact. "It's fine to restrict choices solely to what you can realistically manage," says Talavera. "Aim your sights on under-promising and over-delivering rather than vice versa, and your customers will reward your efforts."

The Po!nt: Says Talavera, "With marketing channels of choice proliferating and messaging devices diversifying, it's not hard to imagine ... [a] future where permissions are granted not only by marketing channel ... but also by content, device, time and place."