When marketing a business of any kind, laws such as the GDPR seem scary for good reason. There are massive fines and repercussions for each violation. Failure to comply with the growing number of regulations could take down entire companies. So, of course, it is a no-brainer to do everything possible to remain compliant; however, compliance can be complicated.
GDPR compliance has uprooted many traditional practices related to tracking and communicating with consumers. Under the GDPR law, individuals have the right to know what is going on with their data. Also, businesses need to oblige when consumers want to opt out of them using their personal data. Businesses handling consumer data are required to put in security measures. We were like the majority of marketers that thought GDPR compliance would stunt marketing. We were pleasantly surprised when we learned it actually helped.
Although we have always had strict opt-in standards for our email list, we decided to implement boberdoo leadQC Certificates in anticipation of the GDPR start date. leadQC Certificates allowed us to take automatic screenshots of our newsletter subscription page to provide definitive proof of each opt-in. We implemented this opt-in strategy for both new subscribers as well as all existing subscribers we were asking to re-opt into our list. By implementing this practice, our newsletter's email list was cut by 79% after the law went into effect. This seems like a very scary drop and for us it was. Our list was carefully curated over many years and something we considered one of our top marketing assets. Once we finally emailed our newly cleaned list for the first time, it turned out that the number of opens and clicks only went down a little, which caused percentages to skyrocket In March, before clearing the list, the percentage of opens versus emails sent was 14.85% and clicks versus the same were 2.08%. The month after the GDPR took effect, those percentages skyrocketed to 44.67% and 3.94%! The following months followed this trend as well.
All uninterested subscribers on our list were weeded out by not re-opting into our newsletter. This allows for more targeted marketing, especially when everyone receiving the newsletter is actually interested in receiving it. The open and click percentages will ebb and flow more aggressively with fewer people, but knowing what is working will be more blatantly obvious.
We tell you this story not to convince you that you need to clean your email list, but rather to think about the silver lining of this new regulation. New laws are not passed to kill lead generation. They are passed to protect consumers. In the lead industry where consumer data is king, what is good for the consumer and what keeps their data safe is good for lead companies.
In the same way that GDPR marketing compliance has not killed marketing, security for data laws will not kill lead generation either. Data security is a huge part of the GDPR, as well as other bills such as the recently passed
Vermont Data Broker Law. Security measures are going to keep climbing until users feel that their data is safe. You should not see this as a roadblock for your business. You should see this as an opportunity to provide the best data security policy not just to protect consumers, but to protect your business as well.