Re: Does this not make "Capturing Email Addresses" worthless??

> However, it was always my understanding that once someone becomes a
> customer, you can email them -- in fact, once they open the line of
> communication by contacting you with questions or whatever, you can email
> them.

Nope. Sorry. It all depends on if the owner of the email address gave it to you with informed consent to the purpose you'd be using it for.

> The way I read it, you are taking a huge risk if you send email to:

> = customers...

Depends.

> = anyone who downloaded something free, giving their email address in the
> process (i.e., you "captured" their email, albeit willingly)...

Depends.

> = anyone who subscribed to something free, giving their email address in
> the process...

Depends.

> = anyone who contacted you about your web site or products...

Certainly not acceptable to email these addresses, since they could not have given their informed concent since you didn't tell them before they contacted you what you would do with their address.

> ... unless all of the above have specifically asked to be put on your
> mailing list or sent future offers or whatever.

Exactly! And you also have to run a closed loop confirmation process to make sure the OWNER of the address is the one who submitted it to your web form (if that's how you collect addresses) and it's not a prank.

This is all explained quite well here:

http://www.mail-abuse.com/an_listmgntgdlines.html

> That puts a HUGE damper on many things -- including people who
> contact/market to Ebayers who have bid on their products, people who give
> away free ebooks with the intent of later marketing to those who
> downloaded it, etc.

Exactly. An email address is a thing of value. You have to explain to what use you're going to put it AT THE TIME OF COLLECTION. You can't change your mind later and send ads for widgets, for instance, if they originally signed up for a newsletter about froofroo.

The term for this sort of address list abuse is RE-PURPOSING.

> Obviously when someone subscribes, your new offers go out in the thing
> they subscribed to -- but in the case of a free e-book, you will have new
> offers in the future, and with CAN-SPAM, you cannot send those just
> because they gave their email address to get the free e-book.

Exactly. Unless your posted policy, they they agreed to and confirmed, was that you could do it later. Then you have proof that they agreed.

> And when you take your orders through a third party rather than your own
> order form, I don't believe you have a way to add such a button. I suppose
> in your "Thank You" note you could say, "If you do NOT want
> to receive future offers..." -- but does that cover it, since they
> never asked to receive future offers in the first place?

Nobody should have to take action to get off a list they didn't agree to be on in the first place. The only acceptable way is to send a single email - "we will add you to this other list ONLY IF you click here to confirm. If you do nothing, you will not be added to this list for this other purpose."

> 1. Am I right, or am I missing something here?

You got it. It's HARD to do ethical email marketing nowadays.

> 2. Does putting one of those check boxes at the end of your "email
> capture" form ("please inform me of updates" or something)
> cover you?

1) Only if you also confirm the address with a closed loop process.

2) It's considered better (informed consent, not trickery) if the box is NOT checked. The victim ... I mean the owner of the email address ... needs to take positive action, not simply fail through distraction or laziness or bad eyesight to UNCHECK a pre-checked box. Pre-checked boxes are considered evidence of black-hat marketing nowadays.

> 3. What is the best way to word that to cover the most number of bases,
> without causing the obvious outcome (i.e., nobody checks it and you still
> end up with no mailing list)?

I have no ideas. I certainly don't cough up my address if the privacy policy says they can misuse it any way they feel like, now or in the future.

> I'm sure there must be other people who have these same concerns (or maybe
> I'm just worrying too much, like I do with so many things, but the fines
> are horrifying).

And so's the Roadie's wrath. :-)

You're not worrying too much. Ethical marketers wrestle with these issues every day.

I've tracked some spam back to people who automatically snag EVERY inbound "from" address in their inbox, not caring (or knowing) that a lot of spam and viruses use forged "from" addresses. Since some of my addresses sometimes end up forged into spam runs by the sleazeballs, you can imagine these sorts of inbox address harvesters get my goat.