What is GDPR?
It stands for General Data Protection Regulation and it went into effect today: May 25, 2018.
If you’re a blogger that collects or could potentially collect information from people living in the European Union, then you need to put more privacy settings in place.
It doesn’t matter if your main audience isn’t from the EU, if you have a form on your website that lets people opt into your email list, you need to follow these legally binding new rules because your blog is on the world wide web and available to everyone.
Disclaimer: Elaine Rau founder of LadyBossBlogger cannot be held liable for anything you do. I am NOT a lawyer or a GDPR expert, nor do I pretend to be one on the internet. The following is simply a summary of my findings on the subject. Consult with an attorney for your business for proper legal advice.
First off, DON’T PANIC
These new laws are simply making us better bloggers and marketers to ensure that the people we are emailing want to be on our email list. That’s it!
The biggest thing is don’t freak out. Simply educate yourself. Keep to clean (not shady) email list building strategies and you’ll be totally fine.
What You Need To Do To Become GDPR Compliant
- Enable GDPR compliant opt-in forms. Your email service provider should have new forms available for you, if they don’t, you need to change email providers.
- Make sure you don’t have anyone on your list from the EU that doesn’t want to be on there or who hasn’t given you their consent to get your emails.
How To Enable GDPR Compliant Forms On Your Blog
I use ConvertKit as my email provider. If you don’t use ConvertKit yet, I would highly recommend them. They are the #1 email service provider for bloggers.
In general, regardless of your email service provider, the new opt-in forms should be in your settings.
Here is how to adjust your settings in ConvertKit.
- Click on your profile picture in the top right hand corner
- Go to Account Settings
- Select the second or third choice
The new subscriber forms that ConvertKit is coming out with will have more options for opt-ins. This allows new subscribers to make the choice to either only receive your freebie or to also be added to your newsletter list.
Bloggers often design forms with freebies to entice people to sign up, then they send more emails to them in regards to their own blog posts, products and services. This is now illegal to do to people living in the EU… IF your form doesn’t explicitly state that they are also agreeing to subscribe to your newsletter.
While it is still ok to do this in the US, Australia and most other parts of the world, it’s good to give your readers a choice on what kind of communication they will receive from you.
What To Do With Old Non-GDPR Compliant Forms?
You will have to go in and change what your current forms and landing pages say in order to be GDPR compliant.
It would be good to turn on the double opt-in option on your forms. What a double opt-in can do if you do get audited is demonstrate that you got their permission and clear consent to send them emails.
You do this in ConvertKit by going to Forms -> Settings -> Incentive Email -> Click Double Opt In.
You can also add link triggers to the incentive email they get asking if they would like to continue receiving emails from you which they will agree to if they download the freebie.
If you have a form where it’s clear that they are signing up for your newsletter, like the one below, you’re totally fine because they are expecting to receive more emails from you.
Passion versus Purpose
Grab the free 13-page ebook. Join 150,000+ other female entrepreneurs.
Now, if for some reason you do get audited, which is highly rare and unlikely, but if you do, ConvertKit has got you covered. Go to: Convertkit.com/gdpr and they will help you through the entire process.
Once again, PLEASE don’t worry.
The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has made it clear that they aren’t interested in handing out fines, although they have the power to do so. They are more interested in making sure that your information is being shared with people who want to receive it.
In general, that is simply good marketing.
We are going to continue to see more laws set in place to keep malpractices at bay, so get used to seeing stuff like this if you want to be a blogger and stay in business!
How To Write A Privacy Policy?
Reference mine here or find a lawyer to help you write one according to the specifications of your business.
If you found this post useful, share it with all your blogger friends to make sure we all stay GDPR compliant!
If you have any questions about GDPR, feel free to reach out to me at ladybossblogger@gmail.com, and I would be glad to answer any questions you may have!
If you loved this post, please PIN the pic below!
Much Love,
<3 Elaine Rau
Trendmebeauty says
Great post, thanks for breaking it down!!
XO,
Trendmebeauty
http://www.trendmebeauty.ca
Elaine Rau says
My pleasure! Don’t want anyone to be too stressed about it!
iiipphy says
Thank you very much for this very helpful and insightful post. I was literally freaking out. I don’t use opt-in forms I use jetpack subscriber form and it only sends out new blog posts and not campaigns, so although I have updated my privacy policy I can’t send out mails to inform my readers hope this is not a problem?
Elaine Rau says
You are totally fine, the people who have subscribed to your list know that they are subscribing to get your updates. This applies to people who provide freebies in exchange for people’s email address without indicating that they will also be sending them newsletter updates. Let me know if you have more questions!
Simone says
Thank you for clearing this up. I was wondering what this was all about.
Elaine Rau says
My pleasure! 🙂
Jason says
Hi,
Been looking at GDPR information for a while now. This post is very informative and really like the part where you talk about being calm. Lots of people are a bit uptight about it.
Thanks for sharing and educating.
Elaine Rau says
My pleasure!! Even the people who put the laws in place didn’t do so to scare us, they simply want a better system, we just need to adapt to it!
Faraz Ahmad says
Beautiful post, very helpful. Thanks for sharing.
Elaine Rau says
😀
Sowmyasri says
Great info…thanks for sharing…
Elaine Rau says
My pleasure!!!