It happened, after four years of work, almost noiseless. The European Parliament has recently approved new measures that give civils more control about the digital use of their personal data. We take a second to have a look at the consequences on the terms of email marketing.
The new guidelines replace those that are effective since 1995. That package was executed quite quickly in order to protect the Europeans in the rapidly emerging world of smartDevices, ecommerce and email marketing. You mainly have to see this new law as a newly improved version of the existing measures. The regulation came into effect 20 days after publication in the EU Official Journal. We still have a little time to conform, because only within 2 years the regulation will be applicable. The member states receive the same amount of time to set up the guideline in national legislation.
Valid for whole Europe
Important is that this legislation is valid as a minimum package for whole Europe. So the minimum protection for the whole European community becomes equal. Sending emails from another country with a liberal legislation – mainly for Belgium towards The Netherlands, this was seen alternatively – is now over. So also the foreign email marketing platforms will have to conform to this European law.
Prior authorization
One of the main elements is of course the permission that the owner of the data has to give. In practice that means that an opt-in is applicable more than ever. Moreover, you clearly have to mention to the supplier of the email address what you are doing with these data. Indicating that you are sending a newsletter in a certain frequency is sufficient. But then you can only send newsletters.
Profiles
But email marketing is, a long time already, more than just sending a newsletter. After all, we can perfectly deduct a certain profile from the reading and clicking behaviour and thus better segment. Well, that is new about this legislation. You explicitly have to mention that in the question to permission. And of course, you are obligated, after the request from the contact, to grant access to the things that you keep.
Right to be forgotten
We all knew this, at least when it comes to search engines. But that right is now extended to the complete digital world, so for digital memories in our email marketing platform as well. In the future the contact can simply request to remove his complete profile and history and to deliver a proof of that. Something that is not evident, when your email platform is foreseen.
Security
In every country, there is a supervisor that you as a company have to mention your database to. You spontaneously have to mention every incident with your e-marketing list to this supervisor. When you are hacked, … Finally, the package consists of a guideline for the use of data through investigative authorities.
