Improve engagement and compliance with double opt-in
In this unit, we'll learn about how to improve engagement with your communications, and meet compliance requirements with double opt-in.
What is double opt-in?
The double opt-in process (also known as confirmed opt-in), ensures that contacts who sign up for new Purposes or Topics confirm their request by clicking a link sent to their registered email address. This method helps verify that the request is intentional, and the email address provided is legitimate and functional.
Double opt-in works when a contact or lead fills out a form to provide consent. After submitting the form, the contact is instructed to check their email for a confirmation message containing a link. Selecting the link in the email confirms the request, and the system records or updates the contact’s information.
Who should use double opt-in?
There are a few reasons to use double opt-in:
Countries with Specific Regulations: Organizations operating in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland may need to use double opt-in to comply with local laws.
Privacy Law Compliance: Entities subject to privacy regulations may require double opt-in.
Global Trend: Even businesses outside of privacy law jurisdictions are increasingly adopting double opt-in to ensure informed consent and validate email addresses, improving data accuracy and lead quality.
Enable double opt-in (preview)
To enable double opt-in for real-time journeys:
Go to Settings > Other settings > Feature switches
Toggle Double Opt-in to On.
Click Save in the top right corner of the page.
Important
Enabling the feature switch doesn't automatically turn on double opt-in for all form submissions. It merely enables the capability. Additional setup is required to enable double opt-in for the different compliance profiles in the system.
Set up double opt-in for a compliance profile
Once the double opt-in feature switch is enabled, follow these steps to set up double opt-in for a compliance profile:
Navigate to the Double Opt-in tab within the compliance profile.
Click Setup. The system automatically creates a confirmation email and a triggered journey to send it to contacts who submit the form. The journey is published and live, however, it won't target any user until the toggle for the double opt-in is enabled for the compliance profile.
The setup process runs in the background, allowing you to work on other areas while it’s running. You can return to the setup process to monitor the progress.
After setup, review and edit the automatically generated confirmation email to suit your needs.
Decide whether to send the confirmation email to all form submitters or only new customers. In this instance, a customer is considered new if there is no contact point consent for the customer’s email address linked to the selected compliance profile.
Finalize the message displayed to customers after confirming their preferences in their confirmation email. Choose either a system-hosted confirmation page or redirect them to a custom URL.
Once reviewed, go to the Double Opt-in tab and enable the feature for the compliance profile to trigger the double opt-in flow for any new form submissions that capture consent.
Note
Once the feature switch for Double Opt-In is turned on from Settings > Feature Switches, any new form created in the system is automatically eligible for double opt-in once double opt-in is enabled for the associated compliance profile.
Important
Currently, double opt-in doesn't work for event registration forms or preference center forms.
Form level override for double opt-in
There are some scenarios where you may want to override the double opt-in flow for specific forms, even if it is enabled for the compliance profile. Users with the necessary permissions (edit privileges on both the forms and compliance profiles), can disable double opt-in for a particular form from within the form settings. Once disabled, the double opt-in process remains off for that form, regardless of the settings in the compliance profile. This allows for flexibility in managing forms that may not require the double opt-in process.
Double opt-in confirmation email
The system automatically generates a double opt-in confirmation email for each compliance profile when you set up double opt-in. Key features of this email include:
The email lists the content type of the confirmation message and notes it can’t be changed.
The email’s compliance profile is set to the compliance profile for which double opt-in setup was initiated, and the purpose is set to the transactional purpose of the compliance profile.
The email follows a naming convention that incorporates the name of the compliance profile in its name to enable you to easily find it in the list of all emails in the system.
The email contains three key personalization attributes:
A list of the purposes or topics the user opted into
The company address of the compliance profile
A confirmation preferences button with a personalized confirmation link
The email uses the default brand profile and sender settings.
Important
Don’t delete the Confirmation preferences button or {{OptedinPurposes&Topics}} token as you'll have to restart from the double opt-in template to get them back.
Important
In cases where the default brand profile doesn’t exist for the entire org or for the specific business unit, then the email creation fails and won't resolve unless a default brand profile is created.
Important
If the email is deleted, then the double opt-in journey won’t function properly.
Important
The link in the confirmation email remains valid for only 28 days. After that period, the user who received the email can't confirm their opt-in.
Double opt-in confirmation journey
The system generates a confirmation journey when you set up double opt-in. While the default journey will achieve the double opt-in behavior, you can also customize the journey to fit your business needs. A few customizations include sending a reminder email to users who haven’t confirmed their opt-in within a specified time or sending a different confirmation email to a specific set of customers.
Note
For any form that has double opt-in enabled, you can see additional analytics that represent how many users have confirmed their preferences and how many are pending.