Has this ever happened to you?You are a small business owner who has asked someone to send you and your colleagues something by e-mail and, you either find it in your Bulk items folder, or worse, you never got it?

Chances are high that your email program thought it was spam, and that is why. Spam is any mail that’s unsolicited, period. Whether it’s a bulk message or not. makes no difference. Just thought I’d make it clear, since creepy advertisers and spammers tend to confuse the two.

It’s not just annoying, it’s against the law…isn’t that kind of harsh though?

Yes, I know what you’re thinking… “I’ve already requested to be added!” OK. But confirming your request in this process is required as part of the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003. This act was a ruling of the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) which was recently enacted as a federal law. It deals with electronic mail communications and conduct.The way people communicate via the internet and electronic mail is largely unregulated, and thus, enforcement of the Can Spam Act is not as stringent as you’d think it should be. Spam laws, therefore, are widely misused and misinterpreted. This causes the definitions of spam to be blurry and causes consumers frustration.

Which in turn unfortunately makes it open season for creepy advertisers to keep sending you junk.
On the flip side of the coin, this makes it even harder for businesses who rely on direct marketing via mail as well as e-mail, to get their word out even through legitimate channels such as ‘opt-in’. It also makes it difficult for businesses to take advantage of such a great technology which feeds our “gimme”, culture of current consumers, whose needs are instantly satisfied in many other ways with instant digital cameras instead of 1 hour photo processing, high speed internet and ordering everything online from gifts to groceries.

Careful what you ask for…you WILL get it!

The process described above for requesting, then confirming, is called “double opt-in”. Anyone not following the double opt-in process when sending electronic mail (creepy advertisers and otherwise) is most likely spamming you, and according to the CAN SPAM act, they are breaking federal law.

The law is not clear on the methods the person may have used to “opt you in”, however. This makes it difficult to determine if the sender is a bona fide spam artist or if they are just sending along a friendly announcement. So that part is up to you. Next time you receive a message, think of whether you actually asked for it (hmmm…did I??).

Unfortunately the process is also not correctly recognized by email programs, because messages that are sent to you from someone who is not on your list of senders (your address list/book) go into your trash bin without you knowng it just because the mail program THINKS it’s spam…and it does make it a bit harder for you to get e-mails you really want (see next paragraph for more on this).

Wait! I want to READ THAT ONE!

You already know about how many ISP’s and hosting companies will filter e-mail to keep spam out of your inbox, treating many messages as spam and either deleting or mis-filing the message. This is a good thing for stuff you never asked for, but you don’t want e-mail you requested to go straight into the trash bin!

I can help show you how to do this. I’m working up an article on how to set up filters and whitelists. Whitelists are the opposite of blacklists, in that the list contains “friendly users”, or senders who may send bulk messages or messages that appear to be ads but are those which you DO want to receive.

Don’t you feel smarter already?

Now that you’re aware of the laws related to e-mail, you have a greater understanding of online communications in general. My newsletters are jam-packed with articles like these which I hope will help people understand how the web affects them and their small business. You just completed a crucial step in becoming a more web-savvy business owner!
Bobbi Jo Woods is a full time web designer & computer guru who runs B. Woods Design, a web design company based in St. Paul, MN.

For more articles like this, click here http://www.bwoodsdesign.com/index.php?id=69.
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