The goal is to map out all the major email touch points.  Once you’ve done this, identify a contact in each group who has primary responsibility for email.  This is the beginning of your governance committee. 

Name one person or department in your organization to be responsible for overall administration of your company’s email efforts.  This individual or business unit should have a keen understanding of the email landscape, keep abreast of industry issues and trends, and have the power to make policy and decisions on the company’s use of email. 


Educate Groups on CAN-SPAM and Permission Practices

You must establish standards for legal compliance with the CAN-SPAM Act and any other laws (many of which are industry-specific) that may affect your email programs.  Establish levels of permission for the major types of emails you send and consider implementing a choice for a company-wide opt-out policy.   

Most of your messages fall under the CAN-SPAM definition of “commercial messages” and require elements such as your company’s postal address and a way for recipients to opt-out of future emails.  Is your sales department aware of this?  They should be, since individual salespersons act as agents of the company and are subject to compliance with the law.  Do your third party advertising email procedures include suppression of previous opt-outs from advertisers?  The law defines the advertiser as the sender because the content is about their product or service; and a main requirement of CAN-SPAM is that prior opt-outs requests must be honored.  It is likely that some individuals on your list previously have opted-out from the advertiser.

Some of your emails are likely to fall outside of CAN-SPAM requirements because they are “transactional messages” such as customer service replies to customers or order confirmations.  However, there are best practices for the content of these messages.  

You should document legal requirements and permission standards for your company.  It is a good idea to hold educational briefings so that all departments are aware of the law and the penalties for noncompliance.


Set Brand Standards

Your company’s emails should promote your brand consistently.  This starts with creating standards for fonts, logo use, terminology, and legal language.  It also includes establishing rules for departments.  Can they create their own emails or must they only use pre-approved templates?  For example, some organizations empower their salespeople to select email content from a series of pre-set messages.  This controls the messaging and presentation, but allows sales to make dynamic use of the email channel.

And, make sure that your templates and messaging are in alignment with your Web site, direct mail programs, print advertising and other communications.


Centralize Deployment for Most Touches

Ideally, you should use the same email deployment system for most of your messaging.   (Groups such as Customer Service and Public Relations may require different facilities.)  A centralized system allows you to provide consistent access to selection of email lists or subsets of email lists, and also ensures that opt-out activity is properly managed.  A good system also provides companies with the ability to control who has access to the system and what they can do within it.

The primary company administrator might be responsible for creating lists for various departments.  For example, product management might only have access to a list of registered users of a specific product, and the sales team might only have access to a list of prospects or customers added to the list in a given timeframe. 

In addition, don’t allow individual users to have full access to all email addresses in the system because it certainly will result in misuse or overuse of names.  And, you probably do not want to give these users the right to modify records within the system.


Establish Frequency Rules

It is natural that individual groups in your company suffer from tunnel vision.  Their email program has a particular mission and goal, and they may not be aware of all the other email activity taking place within the company.  Without governance, you could be inundating a customer or prospect with multiple emails in any given day. 

You should establish general frequency rules for email contacts.  If your newsletters are sent on Tuesdays and Thursdays, you may want to only send third party advertising emails on Mondays and Wednesdays.   Yes, there may be extenuating circumstances, but if all groups know the guidelines in advance you’ll have a stronger lists and suffer less churn.  Your administrator should be the final arbiter.


Ongoing Oversight and Monitoring

Your email administrator must also be responsible for ongoing oversight of your programs.  Monitor actual frequency, opt-outs by list type, spam complaints and other general performance metrics.  If there are problems caused by particular programs, they must be addressed.

Email corporate governance is not easy.  Companies that take a centralized approach and the time to develop guidelines and standards will be poised to effectively use the channel and reap rewards.  You’ll maximize your email communications and have a healthy list that will continue to deliver a return on investment.

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