Marketers appear to be having trouble keeping in compliance with federal Can-Spam Act.
One-third of e-mail marketing offers are not in compliance with the act, which took effect Jan. 1, according to research from JupiterResearch.
And only 64% of the e-mail tracked carried the street address of the sender, which is required by law. Almost one-quarter of the marketers continued to send e-mail marketing messages to addresses that had opted out and 16% sent messages after the legally prescribed 10-business-day period. Marketers reported suppressing requests for opt-out monthly, quarterly or never.
“E-mail marketers that are not complying with these most basic aspects of the law are leaving their company unnecessarily exposed to the risk of legislation, fines and doing what amounts to a virtual high wire act without a net,” David Daniels, research director at JupiterResearch, said in a statement.
The New York-based research firm advised marketers to diligently scrutinize offers, adopt automatic opt-out suppression routines and opt-out requests to comply with the law.
In the March report, more than 50 leading e-mail marketers were tracked in a number of industries including retail, travel, media and financial services about how well they complied with the act.
The Can Spam Act establishes the first national standards for commercial e-mail and includes tough civil and criminal penalties. The Act requires senders of commercial e-mail to include an enforceable opt-out mechanism, prohibits false and deceptive headers and subject lines and increases monetary damages imposed on spammers who engage in particularly nefarious spamming techniques. The bill was sponsored by Sens. Conrad Burns (R-MT) and Ron Wyden (D-OR).
Network
