Selling email list - legal or not?

[theduv1]

I have a list of 800 key contacts within the wind turbine industry which I obtained from attending an annual global event. I subsequently spent time generating their email addresses from google searches and other means which I used for the purpose of selling my own services.

Can I now legally sell this list that I generated to marketing departments?

Thanks

Dave

 

[OldWelshGuy]

so it is not an opt in list then? you can legally sell anything, but if there is as a result of your sale, any legal action against the buyer they might come back and grab you as being liable.

 

[DataDealer]

In order to sell on email lists you must have permission from the person that supplied the email address, essentially asking them to 'opt in' to receiving emails from third party suppliers.
A lot of companies will get round this by collecting your data when you complete an on line submit form, there will usually be a small tick box saying tick here if you do not want your info passed on to third party companies. Nine times out of ten people forget to tick this box or change it if it is already ticked by default, its a sneaky way of collecting opt in data.
In your case it would not comply with the data protection act if you were to sell on your list as you have not asked permission to do so.

 

[Adam Loveday]

@ Data Dealer. That is indeed true with respect to consumer email marketing under current PEC regulations. You must have the express opt-in of each individual and be able to provide a date/time of opt-in and url (if web site opt-in). Even with the opt-in PEC regulations will still dictate whether or not you can actually sell on (transfer) the email addresses & opt-in to third parties. This is why, for consumer email , the majority of bona fide opt-in list providers/managers will not release an opt-in consumer list to third partues but manage the broadcast themeselves on behalf of the client using client creatives. This enables the list owner to be compliant through effective management of any unsubscribe requests, removal of hard bounces and subject access requests.

The OP is actually talking about business data and the landscape is different. In the UK it is currently legal under Article 13 of the 2003 European Directive on Privacy and Electronic Communications to send unsolicited emails to a personal email address within a business such as john.smith:at:comapnyname.co.uk (as opposed to a consumer email address) providing that you clearly include a free of charge mechanism to unsubscribe within the email and that you remove anyone that opts out from any future mailings (failure to act on unsubscribes from a B2B list can render you liable to a fine under the same regs). Be aware that some small businesses use gmail or aol addresses for contact and these fall under consumer marketing rules!

This is also assumptive that all the B2B data is for individuals with a UK based email address. If there are European contacts within the list and you are looking at cross border marketing via email then under the PEC regulations the laws aplicable to the company in which the email will be received will apply (gets complicated, doesn't it!!!).

The OP has built this B2B list, including emails, from his own endeavors and could use that for his own marketing purposes quite legally within the UK as long as he adheres to PEC regs (and I am, of course, assuming the data hasn't been appropriated from an online directory service).

If he was considering selling this list I would counsel that most data companies/end-users would still require an opt-in from each individual on the list: (1) because it shows diligence (2) it will likely be more responsive and (3) if anybody does 'complain' the complaint can be better resolved with the opt-in information.

If the OP is still considering monetizing this list I would thoroughly recommend investing some more time to contact the individuals on the list and gather the opt-in permission. I don't envisage the list being an attractive proposition without the opt-in, either for an end-user or a list management company.

Hope that assists

Adam

 

[webgeek]

It is my understanding, from a decent IP attorney (who could be mistaken), that if these email addresses are corporate, you're fine, no worries, rock and roll.

If, however, non-company email addresses are being handled, then the game changes completely and the statements above about getting your fingers burned would apply.

Please correct me if I'm wrong...

 

[Data Rich Australia]

Unfortunately it's not an opt in list so I wouldn't recommend on-selling it. You could however call them to get their permission to receive certain information. If you put together an attractive short script then you have their permission and can on-sell it from there!

 

[fisicx]

Unless it is a published business email address in which case you can send them as much junk as you like.

 

[AshleyWhiteBusiness]

I prefer sending updates to people who really opt in my site.

 

[rentallease]

sounds dirty but it is very legal

 

[pinklaura1234]

Surely if it is mentioned in your T&Cs then it is ok??

 

[TCCuk]

depends if there is a privacy policy involved, I think you should be ok if you went out and obtained them all yourself, but if they signed up to something and you had a privacy policy stating none of there details would be sold on, you will be liable.

 

[jane p]

I had a free forum which is no more. I didnt make any money from it it was just a hobby?

I have a list of email addresses can imake any money from them?

 

[DomainsRegistrar]

@the OP - I am just selling your contact details on to 100 companies is that ok?

 

[jane p]

How about a proper answer like whether its legal or not? Irrelevant asto whether I would like it or not?

Maybe i could send the members an email directing them to another similar site and charge for that if any site owners are interested?

 

[Pixel Egg]

This depends and there are a lot of grey areas.

Here's my understanding:

you have to have an opt in or opt out on sign-up mentioning you may pass details on to 3rd parties, unless as stated above, you have corporate email address'. Anything with a name in is not considered corporate.

considering you acquired these email address' from googling contacts names would suggest there was no opt in/out and therefore if used by a 3rd party company can come back and bite you in the bum big time. Especially if the 3rd party doesn't follow the anti-spam laws.

Anyone silly enough to buy a 3rd party list for email campaigns should be savvy enough to ask the provider for a warranty of the data from the provider (you)

Personally I wouldn't as the penalties can be rather harsh and no one likes spam?

 

[Sue2012]

Well, despite the legibility problem, if you don't make people subscribe into your list voluntarily, the conversion rate might be not that positive and might cause harm to the senders' reputation...Ｔhat is why those big companies only send emails only to those who opt in themselves. I believe that "Money is on the lists", however, I would suggest you to deal with this subtlety in order to generate great return without hurting your image. By the way, KoobooMail provides pretty good email campaign service with very low price, try it if you wish. Good luck!

 

[Adam Loveday]

I already answered the OP in an earlier post in this thread. Happy to expand further if its still unclear.

@janep.
If the email list you have is a consumer list e.g .the emails have a consumer domain (@gmail, @yahoo, @virginmedia, @aol etc) then you would need to demonstrate that at the point of sign-up to the forum there was a permission statement/privcy policy in place detailing what there data could be used for and giving them the chance to opt-in to having their details used for third party marketing activity/transfer etc. You can't retrospectively apply a permission statement to the data. Without the specific opt-in statement and a log of time, date and source of opt-in the list cannot be used for email marketing under existing legislation.

If it's business email adrress eg a personal name at a corporate domain (eg [email protected]) then the picture is different. My earlier post in this thread should assist.

All the best
Adam

 

[printnstyle]

I agree with the others here. If it is not an opt-in list, whether it is legal or not, specially if it is not a company email, I would find it quite unethical to be selling it to other people. So I would strongly discourage it.

 

[Mr D]

That's a lot of wind turbine industry contacts in Arkansas.

 

[pen2670]

As alluded to above, if you sold on my business details without permission I'd be pretty annoyed.

If you sell a list and a significant percentage of potential customers are annoyed and do the logical thing of marking the message as spam most reputable bulk emailers (have a read up on MailChimp, iContact, etcs tcs &c's and canspam policy) would penalise the sender most likely ban them from using their services.

Depending on how they sent the emails the sender may also find their ip or domain on a block list as a spammer and their day to day emails being deleted or spammed instead of delivered.

Whilst other posters have confirmed legalities, how would you react to a claim for money back and compensation if your list crippled your customers business as above?

 

[kulture]

This is a 2012 thread woken up by a spammer. I am closing it, but leaving up the last post as it is as valid today as it would have been in 2012