Double opt-in

[jhollidge]

Hello, 

Looking forward to when GDPR hits, I am investigating double opt-in and how we can ensure that nobody recieves an email from us that has not confirmed they have allowed us to do so.

I have two questions, firstly:

On the 'How to set up double opt-in' page https://knowledge.hubspot.com/email-user-guide-v2/how-to-set-up-double-opt-in it states that:

Contacts who have previously been sent emails from your HubSpot account count as "confirmed contacts" and, therefore, do not need to go through this double opt-in process to receive emails after enabling this feature.

Is there a way of turning this off?  As we dont want the system to asssume permission just because we have sent them an email before... as we can not be 100% sure that best practise has been applied to previous email campaigns.

And secondly (which might only be relevent if the first part is doable)

When setting up the standard opt-in email (as per the guide above) you can (have to) insert a 'email confirmation link' which creates a bit of code like so

<a target="_blank" href="{{subscription_confirmation_url}}" style="undefined" data-emailoptin="true">confirm your subscription</a>

Can this same bit of code be used in a regular email... that I intend on sending to past subscribers that have requested information before the double opt-in was set up... so they can, in effect double opt in?

[Anonymous]

Hey @jhollidge when you add contacts to your database by import it must be confirmed that these contacts have your permission. If there are any contacts who have not done so you would need to add them to an Opt-Out list so the system knows that they are not yet subscribers. Check out this knowledge article: How to import an opt-out list into your account

So in answer to your first question, you cannot turn this process off, but contacts in your opt-out list will not be subject to emails they have not opted in to. 

In answer to your second question, I don't beleive this is possible. But it might be woth testing on an internal contact?

[jhollidge]

Thankyou for getting back to me on this.

My issue is that I have a range of original sign-up methods from multiple systems, so it is all a bit messy.

In an ideal world we would have all of our provable consent in one place - Hubspot - and this is what I am trying to achieve. and double opt in looks like the safest method

What I would like to do is contact all the people I have consent to mail (but consent that is not Hubspot related) and ask them to confirm they are happy to continue receiving mailers and better yet send them the double opt in link so I can implement double opt in.... but at the moment it seems like double opt in is difficult to implement from my start point.

Any suggestions would be welcome.

James

[Anonymous]

I see! @cbsembler, @Phil_Vallender what would you advise in this case?

Perhaps a Permission Pass email might be of help to you @jhollidge. Check out this article: How can I run a permission pass campaign in HubSpot?

[cbsembler · Accepted solution]

@jhollidge, 

To get this process started you will want to run the Permission Pass Campaign that was suggested above. As for the contacts that you already imported to HubSpot if they were not eligible for email they should have come in as the Opt-Out List which is why the Double Opt In feature does state that those who have already received email from HubSpot should be considered opted-in. 

I would run the Pass Campaign that way you can get a good sense of where your contacts are and enable Double-Opt in moving forward as we wait for GDPR. 

Best, 

Courtney 

[Phil_Vallender]

Thanks for the mention @Anonymous

@jhollidge I can't add much to what @Anonymous and @cbsembler have already said. 

And I haven't yet worked with the double opt-in features of HubSpot. 

All I know is this is going to be really challenging. 

GDPR requires that all existing and new personal data be compliant. So yes, we most likely need to run all our existing data through an explicit opt-in process and otherwise opt it out of all marketing emails - this is what the double opt-in tool in HubSpot will do. This will decimate most business' email data as, when given the option, most people will choose not to receive emails, regardless of their feeling toward the sender. 

The issue that concerns me most is that I keep reading that the rules around explicit opt-in will not apply to business email addresses. For B2B marketers, like me, this sounds great. But if an individual or sole trader downloads my content, if it's on me to apply GDRP to them, I have to apply it to all to be compliant. 

What a mess. 

Interesting article for reference: https://dma.org.uk/article/b2b-marketing-and-the-gdpr