Stage 5: Selecting Permission Levels: What Does Opt-In Really Mean?

This is important. We covered the merits of opt-in and opt-out as part of the introduction to permission marketing in Chapter 2, but what does opt-in mean in practice, at the level of boxes on forms and associated wording? In making these decisions, what we have to achieve is a balance between obtaining quality profiles and legal and ethical constraints. Many e-mail marketing gurus and legal advisers say that e-mail must be opt-in, and this is the received wisdom. But when faced with the reality of designing a form for collecting prospects, the reality is not this simple. Despite the opt-in mantra, many companies are not practising true opt-in: it all depends on how the forms are designed.

True opt-in requires the potential customer to agree proactively that they are prepared to receive future communications by selecting the option using a tick-box or ratio-button. Opt-out is where the person completing the form has to decline proactively the offer of receiving further communications. Consider the alternatives in Figure 4.13. Which is opt-in? Figure 4.13(a) is clearly an opt-in form, whereas Figure 4.13(b) is an opt-out design, but what about Figure 4.13(c)? This is less clear: it uses an opt-out approach, but it is more subtle. The implication is, from the way in which the question is phrased, that it is agreed that future information can be received.

Figure 4.13: Options for obtaining opt-in

Permission...