Industry Leaders Join OTA In Support of User Centric Email Unsubscribe Best Practices
Businesses, industry and trade industry organizations join forces to help enhance trust in email marketing and raise the bar from compliance to user-centric stewardship. Join the effort and help put trust into the inbox! Email [email protected] to add your support!
Resources – Regulatory & Industry
“ESPC joins OTA in support of voluntary best practices which empower users and enhances their trust in email. The adoption of these best practices represents the industry’s commitment to self-regulation while working together to fight spam and malicious email which threatens to undermine online trust.” – Reed Freeman, outside counsel, Email Service & Providers Coalition.
“OTA’s best practices rightly focus on the consumer experience. By providing transparency and choice, marketers and the industry as a whole will benefit from increased consumer trust.” – Jason Kint, CEO, Online Publishers Association.
“Being relentless with customer care is one of the core values that defines Belk. Having an efficient, timely and reliable email unsubscribe process is more than a marketing practice to us. It is a way to deliver on our customer care commitment and always put the customer first” – Jon Pollack, EVP of marketing, sales promotion and eCommerce at Belk.
“Engaging and connecting with our customers relies on their trust and confidence on how we email, respect their privacy, honor their choices and secure their information. OTA’s unsubscribe best practices are an excellent road map for all marketers to adopt. They serve as the foundation of self-regulation which is critical to the long-term health of interactive marketing.” – Sal Tripi, Assistance Vice President, Digital Operations & Compliance, Publishers Clearing House
“Users depend on email every day for work and their personal lives. As a major email box provider with over 400 million users and as an email marketer, Microsoft recognizes it is increasingly important that marketers adopt discipline and unsubscribe practices to maximize their mail deliverability and their brand reputation. There is no reason why marketers cannot be adopting these best practices.” – John Scarrow, General Manager Safety Services, Microsoft Corporation.
“As a marketing automaton leader, Act-On supports the insight and findings of the OTA’s report. We are strong advocates of all known industry best practices and are committed to upholding these principles for our clients to keep digital channel viable for all.” – David Fowler, Head of Digital Compliance , Act-On
“To have an unsubscribe mechanism that is trusted, reliable, and easy to use is of utmost importance. That is why Constant Contact takes pride in providing a SafeUnsubscribe(™) link on every newsletter our customers send. We fully support and endorse the OTA’s unsubscribe best practices for anyone sending email marketing communications.” – Sam Silberman, Director of Standards, Constant Contact
“I commend OTA in its continued efforts to focus on best practices in the email marketing industry. Email suppression has become a major contributor to continued legal actions against advertisers, publishers and networks alike. The simple steps set out by OTA go a long way to eliminating costly court actions, improve reputation and comply with the legal requirements.” – Linda L. Goodman, Esq., GOODMAN LAW FIRM
Despite the rapidly evolving nature of email, one remaining constant is that subscribers will generally take the path of least resistance when they no longer wish to engage with a brand. Complying with the letter of the law shouldn’t be seen as a sole business requirement, instead, meeting the needs of subscribers should be the ultimate goal. Without an easily accessible and clear path to an unsubscribe process, there will undoubtedly be an increase in spam complaints. Giving subscribers clear options to both unsubscribe and manage their preferences enhances the subscriber experience while also providing marketers with actionable data that they can use to continuously refine their programs to better fit the needs of their subscribers. eBay Enterprise fully supports OTA’s efforts related to unsubscribe best practices.” – Steve Denton, Vice President, eBay Enterprise Marketing Solutions
In the age of the customer and cross-media, connected experiences it is essential to listen and respond even when the customer is saying “no” or “no more”. This makes the unsubscribe process an important and unfortunately, often overlooked, part of email marketing. As such these best practices are an important part of building customer trust and being good stewards of our customers’ data.” – Derek Harding, Managing Director, Javelin Labs
“Epsilon commends OTA for its ongoing commitment to enhance online trust while continuing to promote innovation in this evolving space. We support OTA’s unsubscribe best practices as an effective method to renew the marketers’ commitment to creating consumer centric practices that further industry self-regulation. We encourage leading marketers to follow OTA’s lead by implementing these best practices that serve to enhance consumer choice while enhancing brand integrity.” – Chris Ray, Chief Information Security Officer, Epsilon
“Harland Clarke Digital is committed to providing safe email experiences for our clients and their customers. We believe an honest and effective unsubscribe process is the key to building and sustaining customer trust in the digital age. We support OTA’s continued efforts to promote unsubscribe best practices and industry-wide self-regulation to enhance online trust.” – Mike Ferguson, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Harland Clarke Digital
“At LashBack, we have long been an advocate for email best practices. We have been monitoring and providing safe email unsubscribes for more than a decade. Email marketing is unmatched in its effectiveness, but sustainable success requires that it is a properly managed, positive consumer experience. The Online Trust Alliance is always seeking to raise the bar on industry practices and we were pleased to contribute to their email unsubscribe best practices effort. As with all markets, it is an ongoing effort, but this document should help to publicize and clarify steps that can be taken to enhance practices and ensure the continued success of the channel. – Pete Wilson, CEO Lashback
“It is great to see the OTA develop meaningful best practices that are based on real-world data. Although it is clear that anti-spam laws require an unsubscribe mechanism in marketing communications, these best practices fill in the gaps with insight on how to operationalize this requirement in a manner that respects consumers and improves sender reputation.” – Shaun Brown, Partner, nNovation LLP
“Optizmo has long been the leading email compliance and opt-out management company for large brands, networks, and agencies. This is in large part, because of our ongoing participation in the Online Trust Alliance. The OTA has been an advocate for unsubscribe best practice and stewardship in data security and it is our privilege to have contributed to the formation of their best practices model. I highly recommend the OTA as a viable resource for companies focused on brand integrity and as a member of the OTA, Optizmo is also committed to facilitating best practice for any and all fellow members.” – Khris Thayer, CEO and Co-Founder, OPTIZMO
“As a leading Email Service Provider, Maropost commends OTA’s initiative in defining industry standard unsubscribe best practices which will empower end users and enhance openness, transparency and trust in email marketing. We constantly educate our customers that legislations like CASL, CAN-SPAM are bare minimum thresholds, however, best practices like this one are more likely to earn consumer trust potentially leading to better ROI.” – Sanket Jain, Director of Abuse and Privacy, Maropost
“Permission has always been the backbone of email marketing and increasingly is becoming the standard in other forms of marketing. So it follows that consumers’ ability to withdraw permission needs to be honored – swiftly, easily and without hesitation. This is a place where companies need to follow the spirit, not the letter, of the laws and create policies and procedures that are focused on people’s desire to have control over their digital communications. Taking this kind of consumer’s-eye perspective has a positive impact for brand reputation and ultimately leads to better business results.” – Matt Blumberg, CEO and Chairman, Return Path
“Following generally agreed upon email unsubscribe best practices is not only about complying with applicable laws, but also, and most importantly, maintaining trust with subscribers and customers that extends to other email programs and channels that are key to maintain in an omni-channel environment.” – Loren McDonald, VP of Industry Relations, Silverpop, an IBM Company:
“Trust is paramount to engaging and retaining customers, accordingly marketers must honor customer requests to deliver a satisfying relationship. The OTA’s unsubscribe best practices provide the necessary tactics to demonstrate consumer trust and validate the brands commitment to integrity.” – David Daniels – CEO, The Relevancy Group
“Sailthru stresses to our customers that CAN-SPAM is not the pinnacle, but rather a barrier to entry for email marketing. We applaud the OTA’s efforts to highlight and honor those senders that have a finely-tuned opt out process. Sailthru encourages all senders to take a fresh look at their practices, put the subscribers first and make the opt out process simple and uncomplicated.” – Ken Pfeiffer, Global Director of Deliverability, Sailthru
“Trust is the foundation of the internet built on best practices and a commitment of businesses leaders moving from compliance to stewardship. TrustSphere joins the call for businesses of all size to embrace OTA’s unsubscribe best practices and help improve the integrity of interactive marketing.” – Manish Goel, CEO TrustSphere