C-O-N-S-E-N-T, find out what it means to me!

Succeeding in the art of email marketing hinges on a crucial understanding: consent is key. Seems straightforward, right? Either you agree to something, or you don’t. Here are three scenarios that could easily happen in real life, jokes aside. In full disclosure, much of this blog focuses on the "why" before sharing what marketers can do because without understanding the why, the what becomes near impossible to achieve.

Scenario 1 - Coerced consent

You decided to cut off your toxic brother after he insulted your guinea pig yet again. On Friday night, your sister invites you to her place, offering a shoulder (and some cedar bedding!) to cry on. When you arrive - guinea pig and prosecco in hand - the very brother you’re avoiding answers the door! You shoot a glare at Sis, who KNOWS you want nothing to do with him, but she only winks and says with a half-shrug, “Hey, you agreed to come to dinner!” You feel betrayed; tricking you into a confrontation is not something you appreciate.

Scenario 2 - Traded consent

You’re in line for a really popular nightclub. To get past security, you’ll need to consent to be searched. The bouncer asks, “ID? May I please pat you down?”. Obviously, you need to get inside – all your friends are there! The DJ is spinning the greatest hits of yesterday and today! So, you say, “Yeah, totally. Pat away!” handing over your licence. You’re subjected to a most invasive frisking, and then he says, “All set!” and returns your ID. “Whoa, bro!” is all you can sputter out, shocked by the interaction. The bouncer replies, “Hey man, you said I could!”

Scenario 3 - “Just kidding!” consent

An invitation arrives in the mail. “You are hereby cordially summoned to attend jury duty, this 17th of June, 2024.”, it says, and then in teensy-weensy print down below, “Terms & Conditions apply, check our Privacy Policy for details.” You show up on June 17, dreading the day ahead. During check-in you lament that you’d rather be anywhere but here (or on trial), and the receptionist looks at you quizzically. “You opted in! If you didn’t want to be here today, all you had to do was decline. Just visit your Juror portal, go to Settings, and untoggle the Jury Duty option! It’s all there, in our Terms & Conditions.” You head towards the door, but the receptionist blocks your exit. “Sorry, hon. It’s too late to decline now, but you’ll know for next time. Now get back in there and wait!”, she says firmly.

But doesn’t intent matter, too?

Think about the three scenarios above; what about the intent behind the consent?

• If agreement is coerced, is it really an agreement?

• If you give permission, but only because it’s required in order to receive something you need or want, are you truly consenting to what happens next?

• If you are “opted in” without being given the opportunity to decline, was it even optional?

These aren’t just philosophical or ethical considerations; recognizing authentic consent is integral to understanding your deliverability outcomes.

Email marketers routinely misunderstand the concept of permission, operating under the assumption that “opt-in” is a technical requirement.

While it may be a legal hurdle in many jurisdictions, blocklists like Spamhaus’ aren’t reviewing senders’ subscription processes to verify that consent has been appropriately obtained. Mailbox providers don’t review your terms and conditions to verify that email consent is listed in the fine print. They don’t need to - and it doesn’t matter anyway! True permission can only be freely given, and an agreement entered into involuntarily will inevitably reveal itself in the data: bounces, block listings, spam folder placement, and even low engagement are all frequently traced back to a lack of explicit, voluntary consent.

Requiring consent can hurt your reputation

When site visitors, app users, and store browsers are pressured to part with their precious email addresses, they will deploy devious tactics that have harmful effects on deliverability. Here are some of the most common ways that requiring an email address can negatively impact your reputation, and even contribute to the collection of spam traps that cause Spamhaus listings:

The reluctant recipient: Some people will provide their legitimate primary email address because they want something from you (like a coupon) despite having no interest in marketing messages. If they begin receiving promotional emails without having sincerely volunteered for them, their engagement will wane. If the emails are frequent or persistent, those users may even reach for the “this is spam” button, the strongest signal of displeasure from a recipient.

Similarly, when someone provides consent to receive emails because it’s a required field or part of the terms & conditions during account creation/registration, they aren’t necessarily volunteering to receive daily sales emails. Permission should be considered within the context it was initially provided, not interpreted as enthusiastic affection for your marketing campaigns.

The alternate address: Since email addresses are free and easy to create, it’s become common for users to establish multiple accounts with discrete uses, such as a Gmail account for personal communications and one at Yahoo for coupons, or even multiple accounts at one provider for varying uses. I have several Gmail accounts, plus a Yahoo and another at Hotmail, for research purposes (and for those sweet signup incentives, like free shipping and 20% off!). A secondary address is not only much less likely to exhibit consistent positive engagement, but may eventually exceed capacity and bounce, and could even ultimately become a recycled spam trap if left unmonitored long enough.

The keyboard bash: If users are certain that they don’t need any mail from your brand, they might just pound out pure gibberish and qwertyuiop their way to the “submit” button. These addresses could bounce off your mailing list, but they could also be spam traps. Some smashed submissions might even be deliverable addresses that belong to another person altogether. When that person receives your email, they have no idea why and either ignore it, unsubscribe, or report it as spam.

The deliberate deception: Email addresses use a standard format, but there are infinite options for both the local part and the domain. Thanks to this familiar flexibility, users can easily elude unwanted emails by merely changing a few characters. With one minor modification, alison@gmail.com becomes allison@gmail.com, and some other schmuck ends up with the spam I successfully sidestepped. A stray swipe and alison@gmail.com turns into alison@gmial.com, which isn’t Gmail but another destination altogether. That domain could belong to the Great Magical International Association of Librarians, or it could be a trap domain: typos of well-known domains are commonly used as spam traps.

Consent is critical to sender reputation because legitimate interest propels positive recipient engagement, and mailbox providers make delivery decisions based on actual recipient behavior over time. In other words, your deliverability isn’t dependent on whether you obtained an email address, but on whether its owner wanted to give it to you.

Anyone can enthusiastically say “yes” when put in a precarious position. It’s easy for people to click “I agree” when they lack full context of what exactly they’re agreeing to. Valid consent comes from people with a genuine interest in hearing from you. Someone who really wants to engage with your email will give you an address that can receive it, not one that bounces or gets you blocklisted.

What should marketers do, then?

• Instead of obliging or tricking users to “opt in” to your mailing list, create content so compelling that people truly desire it.

• Rather than requiring that users agree to emails when they have to check the “terms & conditions” box, build a brand so appealing that people ask to be on your mailing list.

• Don’t bury consent in a menu somewhere! Put it front-and-center and give people ample opportunity to interact without being trapped on a list they didn’t knowingly sign up for in the first place.

Sing it with me now, C-O-N-S-E-N-T, for deliver-a-bil-i-ty! Louder for those in the back!

If you haven’t seen Alison’s posts on LinkedIn, they’re funny and engaging, and she is simply brilliant—go give her a follow. You won’t regret it!