The CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 rewrote the rules of e-mail marketing, and those who ignore the Act do so at their peril. They risk not only legal action, but also alienating the audience they're trying so hard to reach.

To comply with the CAN-SPAM Act, make sure you that you are conscientious about:

• Misrepresentation. Don't try and lure your newsletter recipient into opening your e-mail with false information in the subject line. Similarly, don't misrepresent who is sending the e-mail.
• Company address. Your e-mail must have your physical company address. P.O. boxes are not acceptable.
• Disclosure. If you're sending a commercial e-mail to people who have not asked to receive it, you must state that the e-mail is an advertisement. If recipients have opted in, you're exempt from this rule.
• Unsubscribe. Readers must be able to unsubscribe easily from your e-mail. You must remove them from your mailing list within 10 days of their request.
• E-mail sharing. You cannot share the e-mail address of a person who has unsubscribed from your list.
• E-mail harvesting. Don't collect e-mail addresses from other sources or randomly generate email addresses.

Those are the legal requirements, but what about the business requirements?

Your goal should be to make your e-mail newsletters as attractive as possible to potential customers. Most e-mail recipients are extremely spam-sensitive and are unlikely to open up e-mails from senders they don't recognize. And they use filters to sort spam from their regular e-mail. As a result, you've got to provide value to your customers to make it stand out from the countless unsolicited e-mails they receive. If recipients feel that your e-mails provide value, they'll look forward to receiving them and will always open them. Also, providing an incentive — a special offer, for instance — will also motivate recipients to open your e-mails.

Read the full text of the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 online.