Summary of the CAN-SPAM Act Provisions

Here is a summary of the CAN-SPAM Act Provisions.

This is NOT an exhaustive explanation of the CAN-SPAM Act laws, and should not be taken as legal advice. Make sure you always consult an attorney about any legal aspects of your business.

Here are the highlights of the CAN-SPAM Act which affect you as an online marketer using e-mail or affiliate marker doing e-mail.

* A visible unsubscribe mechanism must be present in all emails.
* All opt-out links must work.
* Opt-out requests must be honored within 10 days.
* Opt-out lists must be only used for compliance purposes. Opt-out lists cannot be sold, rented or given to other marketers or List Company.
* Advertising email must contain an accurate “From” line. You cannot use a false name or pretend to be a different person or company in the “From” line.
* Subject lines must be relevant to content.
* You must have a legitimate physical address for you, the advertiser, it must be included in the email.
* A warning label must be present if the content is Adult in nature.
* An advertising email can not be sent through an open relay server. (Open relay servers are a favorite tool of Spammers, since they allow Spammers to “hide” and bypass blocks against them.)
* An advertising email can not be sent to a harvested email address. (“Harvesting” email addresses includes trading lists with other Spammers, as well as using “bots,” which are small programs that crawl the Internet and copy email addresses from web pages, email list archives, forums, etc.)
* An advertising email cannot contain a false email header. (The header must contain your email address, your recipient’s email address, and the server routing data.)
* The FTC is responsible for enforcing the CAN-SPAM Act.

Enforcement of The CAN-SPAM Act

Spammers can be reported to the FTC. Spammers can also be reported to the ISPs through which they send their SPAM. However, prosecution of Spammers tends to be difficult and lengthy.

Nevertheless, some Spammers have been prosecuted since 2004, including a few high-profile prosecutions of Spammers who served jail time and paid thousands of dollars in fines, and some even millions.

On May 13, 2008, Sanford Wallace and Walter Rines were found guilty of sending pornography and gambling spam to MySpace users. They were ordered to pay $230 million to MySpace, the largest CAN-SPAM damages award to date.

CAN-SPAM Limitations

Not all marketing email is SPAM. When consumers explicitly agree to receive marketing emails from merchants or affiliate marketers, those marketing emails are not classified as SPAM.

The CAN-SPAM laws are the reason double optin is so important for you as an e-mail marketer.

Amazon Changes That Effect Internet Marketing

Changes That Effect Internet Marketing such as Amazon.com  deciding to change its Associate’s Program Policies for Associates promoting products in the USA and Canada
can really effect your profits online. If you are running a direct linking campaign as a Amazon affiliate start setting up your landing page or website now!
As of May 1, 2009, Amazon is not allowing anymore DIRECT LINKING of
PPC traffic to their products. That means you will not get paid even if you make affiliate sales of their products using PPC.

Here is the notice current Amazon
Associates are now receiving.

************************

Dear Amazon Associate:

We’re writing to let you know about
a change to the Amazon Associates
Program. After careful review of
how we are investing our advertising
resources, we have made the decision
to no longer pay referral fees to
Associates who send users to www.amazon.com,
www.amazon.ca, or www.endless.com
through keyword bidding and other paid
search on Google, Yahoo, MSN, and other
search engines, and their extended search
networks. If you’re not sure if this
change affects you, please visit this
page for FAQs.

As of May 1, 2009, Associates will not
be paid referral fees for paid search
traffic. Also, in connection with this
change, as of May 1, 2009, Amazon will
no longer make data feeds available to
Associates for the purpose of sending
users to the Amazon websites in the
US or Canada via paid search.

This change applies only to the Associates
programs in North America. If you are
conducting paid search activities in
connection with one of Amazon’s Associates
Programs outside of the US and Canada,
please refer to the applicable country’s
Associates Program Operating Agreement
for relevant terms and conditions.

We appreciate your continued support and
participation in this advertising Program.

If you have questions or concerns, please
write to us by using the Contact Us form
available on Associates Central.

Sincerely,

The Amazon Associates Program

Affiliate Marketing and The CAN-SPAM Act

One of the things affiliate marketers have to deal with is the value of e-mail marketing. It is a proven fact that an e-mail list is very valuable and can really effect your profits, this can put you in the Red or the Black. However wither you are a Internet newbie or an experienced affiliate marketer or you sell your own products the CAN-SPAM Act will effect you.

The CAN-SPAM Act of 2004 is a Law that changed Internet E-mail Marketing, It is not what you call exciting reading but. Even if you never intend to be an e-mail affiliate marketer,  the CAN-SPAM Act governs all commercial email communications so if you are an online business it can effect you.

http://uscode.house.gov/download/pls/15C103.txt
FTC Summary of the CAN-SPAM Act

http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/business/ecommerce/bus61.shtm

Summary of the CAN-SPAM Provisions

Tomarrow I will cover the highlights of the CAN-SPAM law.

To Your Financial Success