If you are selling, doing lead or demand generation to any company or individual employee located in Canada – you need to pay attention to CASL coming into effect on July 1, 2014 because my friends, this could be very ugly.
1- Make no mistake that this legislation applies only to messages sent to consumers – It applies equally to B2B communications.
2- Unlike the US regulations that require (quite reasonably) that companies honor opt-out requests, this law ONLY permits you to send commercial emails – like lead generation, sales approaches, download and event invitations to organizations with whom you already have a relationship OR who have specifically opted IN to your messaging.
3- The legislation will not only impose very severe penalties for violators, it also opens up both companies and individuals to Private Right of Action – which- loosely interpreted means that you can be sued as well as fined.
Here is a link to a copy of the actual legislation:
While email will no longer be an option – and this act also applies to text messages sent to a phone – voicemail messages are specifically excluded from the act.