.png)
The Data (Use and Access) Bill is now law in the UK, meaning soft opt-ins to mailing lists are now a reality for charities.
Under the new legislation, if a person’s contact details are collected as the result of signing a petition or making a donation, charities can now follow up with marketing communications - using the recipient’s implied consent.
Commercial businesses have long been able to soft opt-in people to marketing communications when personal information is collected during a sale, but for our sector this legislation marks a big, new, overdue opportunity. Albeit one that you need to navigate carefully. Here we walk you through the ins and outs of soft opt-ins:
How does it work?
As charities you can use implied consent to send marketing communications, under a set of conditions:
- That you are a registered charity
- That your direct marketing aims to further your charity’s charitable purposes
- That the data was collected in the process of expressing interest in, offering support for, or providing support to the charity
- That you offer a simple a simple way to opt-out of marketing emails at the point of sign up, and in each subsequent communication
Provided those criteria are met, you can now send direct digital marketing communications across SMS, WhatsApp and email.
Until now charities could only use soft opt-ins for phone and print communications, so this new legislation brings digital communications in line with those channels (reducing cost and improving interactions), and brings the charity sector up to speed with other commercial industries.
What does this mean for charities?
According to the Direct Marketing Association this change in legislation could increase annual donations to charities by an estimated £290 million. This is a big opportunity for our sector, where we’re already grappling with soaring demand and tightening budgets.
Here are a few ways the change could provide a much-needed boost to your efforts:
Grow your email and phone subscribers faster and for less
If you are running events on paid social or search, you should get more subscribers per pound spent. Which, in a landscape where costs per lead are rising year on year and paid platforms are becoming more fractured and volatile, this is good news. You also save on replacing expensive print communications with digital ones.
More money, more advocacy, more impact
The additional £290m a year from the new marketing contacts charities will be able to acquire is no small figure. But more than this there are so many valuable actions a supporter can take to support your mission, if you are able to give them a real role to play. A newsletter subscriber might be more likely to attend a protest, sign a petition or volunteer at a stall, providing real tangible benefits to your charity’s goals.
WATCH: Our Webinar with Forward Action on navigating Soft opt-ins
Do you need to be careful?
In short: yes. There’s a number of pitfalls to overburdening people with marketing communications that they don’t remember signing up to.
Too many sales-y comms = less trust
If people feel overwhelmed by communications they don’t remember signing up to, you can risk damaging your reputation and the wider sector. And once that trust is broken, it can be hard to remedy. This is often why more reputational industries like healthcare prefer to stick to hard opt-ins.
Deliverability can suffer with unresponsive lists or spam reports
The less people read your emails, the less your emails will make it into people’s inboxes. Strong deliverability is important. Without a good sender reputation, you risk hitting spam filters. Hard opt-ins, or double opt-ins where a confirmation link needs to be clicked can help prevent this. It’s worth being strategic about when you decide to use soft opt-ins, consider building a reputation with good deliverability and hard opt-ins first.
If you don’t have a CRM to manage the data, you could find yourself in trouble
It’s important that if you dive into this new opportunity, your CRM is set up correctly. You’ll need to be able to tag your records with the correct type of opt-in and individual has, and that you’re able to segment accordingly. Movement is ready to support different consent options for your supporters.
What’s Movement’s stance?
The Data (Use and Access) Bill’s change in data regulation for charities and in particular soft opt-ins is a massive boost to the charity sector.
As a charity you should take full advantage of this new opportunity to bring more people to your cause. Use the new legislation to increase your supporter lists, your donations and ultimately drive more action from newly engaged followers.
For years, businesses have been able to use soft opt-in rules.Charities, however, were excluded from this provision, required to obtain explicit consent at the point of data collection. A process that, while well-intentioned, often resulted in lost opportunities to build lasting relationships with donors and supporters. Now we believe it's time you make full use of what's available.
We do stress caution in the communications you send. Make sure you offer real value in every email and SMS so that people want to receive your communications and their inbox provider doesn’t mark you as spam, or your reputation isn’t damaged.
Executed well however this should drive progressive campaigns forward to a new chapter. At Movement we’re a bit nerdy when it comes to email, SMS and WhatsApp marketing, so we’re ready to help navigate clients and friends through the new soft opt-in options.
If you’d like guidance on soft opt-ins with Movement then feel free to get in touch by hitting the Get Started button and booking a call. One of our team will be able to guide you through the process and get you set up to win.
