The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is the name of the new privacy law which was implemented in Norway on the 20th of July 2018, two months after it was implemented in the EU. This resulted in a big change and it now means our individual privacy has a higher priority than before. This is, of course, great, but it can also be challenging. In the aftermath of the new regulation, a new workday is emerging for the people in the email marketing industry.
The changes mean you can no longer send out email marketing without having a voluntary, written and stored consent from the receiver.
Consequences
If you haven’t yet obtained consent from your subscribers, then, unfortunately, your mailing list doesn’t have much value anymore.
Luckily there are still some solutions to this problem. If you are using Mailchimp for your email marketing and automation needs, there are still many ways for how you can build your list today and in the future.
Over the last year, I have trained numerous Norwegian companies in Mailchimp and the best practices for email marketing. 8 out of 10 companies have built their mailing lists by importing email addresses into Mailchimp. These lists are not organic, meaning their subscribers have not signed up themselves, through a website or landing page for example. Unless the subscriber has consented to have their email address exported from a CRM system and into Mailchimp, this practice is no longer allowed now that GDPR is in effect.
So that raises the questions: Have you changed your routines?
Did you prepare in time? Has your signup form changed? How will your list grow from here?
Don’t Despair – There is Hope
There are many solutions available. With a GDPR configuration from Mailchimp activated and correctly configured, you have the basis of privacy policy ready for your subscribers. With this solution, you can easily see the time and date for when a subscriber gave their consent to receive information from you, and how they gave their consent (email, digital marketing channels, direct mail, etc.).
Landing pages, combined with automated campaigns, make the subscription and updating transition smooth and with a modal pop-up, you can retrieve consent from new subscribers in just a couple of steps.
Take Advantage of The Opportunities
Mailchimp offers endless opportunities and few limitations. This allows for integrations with other systems to be built, and email addresses and consent can easily be saved in a combination with a CRM system for instance.
This is just some of the options you have. A customized solution can take care of your company’s needs, whether you are a small start-up company or a large corporation. Contact us today to arrange a non-binding meeting, where we can discuss solutions for your company and your GDPR compatibility.
