Happy New Year! Hope you enjoyed a wonderful and safe holiday season and new year.

Last year was a bit of a slow year here at EmailKarma.net, but I’m looking to change that in 2012. We are starting a new year and a new attitude and perspective for writing. I’m planning on increasing the number of guest posts this year after the success of last years guest posts (I’ll be drafting some guidelines around these in the coming days), and maybe a few tips on surviving the upcoming apocalypse (kidding).

Instead of a list of predictions for 2012, I’m going to give you a few ideas to jumpstart your marketing efforts this year:

  • Start thinking about the Canadian Anti-Spam Legislation (CASL) – How will your email program will need to be updated to comply with this new law. Remember CASL applies to all mail sent TO, FROM, or THROUGH Canada. Know where your recipients are and how your mail is getting to them, and remember more Canadians visit the US than any other nation (Stats Canada 2009) – so they are probably on your lists already.
  • Sun setting emails – CASL has an implied data collection clause for existing business relationships, but when this is used for data collection the consent only last for 2 years – think about how you will track this and how you plan on dealing with these members in 2014.
  • Account Compromises: Sadly these will likely continue into 2012 – and possibly beyond – building an individual action plan of password protection/updates is highly recommended. Consider using an encrypted password keeper to help you build strong passwords and prevent the common reuse of a single password across multiple accounts – ex: Lastpass can generate password at a set length(10+ characters recommended), with CAPS, lower case, numbers and special characters for you. Lastpass also has plugins for all major browsers and mobile devices.
  • Mobile – The Next Frontier. There are millions of text messages being sent each day (billions globally), look to build a mobile experience for your customers/readers. to get you started, check out the MMA for ideas – they had a local event here in Toronto this past fall and some of the case studies were simple in there execution and had amazing results.

Also I’ve added a few new ways to get in touch with me here:

    EmailKarma.net is now on Google+
    Along with the Google+ account my list of +1’s are available here – lots of different things here across other interest than just digital marketing) like this: “This Black Bun Darth Vader Burger Looks More Awesome Than The Phantom Menace”

      I’ve revamped the contact form, I was getting too much spam from the addresses published on the site. However please fee free to continue emailing me at the addresses you have.