In the USA, Double opt-in has been regarded now as Best Practice for many a year. However, many of you may be Central-African-Republic Email List surprised to know that double opt-in is not a CAN-SPAM requirement, nor is it a requirement of countries which have the tightest legislations.
So why then double opt-in? What are the benefits of double opt-in and why haven’t other countries embraced it as Best Practice as heartily as the USA?
In a nutshell, I believe that it is to do with the amount of spamming a country produces. Whilst there are some other benefits of double opt-in, the main benefit is that you have foolproof evidence that a subscriber has signed up.
This is beneficial within the USA for 2 reasons:
1: The USA in general has an Opt out legislation.
2: The USA has the 2nd highest amount of spammers worldwide.
The results of the above is that generally speaking, recipients in the USA tend to hit the ‘this is spam’ button rather than the ‘unsubscribe’ link, due to the more lax legislation, which requires recipients to unsubscribe rather than subscribe.
Therefore, if you use double opt-in and are accused with spamming, you can, armed with your irrefutable double opt-in information for the complainant, approach the ISP when you’re blacklisted and refute the charge.
