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Emailing customers: the basics

The federal CAN-SPAM basics for a small company writing to prospective customers, cited to the FTC, plus guidance on writing a short, useful message.

  • Winning work
  • 3 min read
  • October 6, 2026

This is general, preliminary information to help you get started. It isn’t legal, tax, insurance or financial advice, and rules differ by state, city and situation. Before you decide anything, check with a lawyer, an accountant and a business advisor. They have the final say.

Email is a quick way to introduce your company to a manager or a board. This guide covers the federal rules for commercial email, each one cited to its source, and a few habits that make a message worth reading.

What the rules cover

Read this section first. It decides whether the rest applies to the message you are about to send.

  • The FTC enforces the CAN-SPAM Act and the CAN-SPAM Rule. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)
  • A commercial message is an email whose primary purpose is advertising or promoting a commercial product or service. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)
  • CAN-SPAM covers all commercial email, not just bulk, and makes no exception for business-to-business email. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)
  • A purely transactional or relationship message may not have false routing information but is otherwise exempt from most CAN-SPAM provisions. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)

What every message needs

Build these into your template once, so no message goes out without them.

  • Do not use false or misleading header information; From, To, Reply-To and routing must be accurate. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)
  • Do not use deceptive subject lines; the subject must reflect the message content. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)
  • Identify the message as an ad, clearly and conspicuously. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)
  • Include a valid physical postal address (street address, a registered PO box, or a registered private mailbox). (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)
  • Include a clear and conspicuous explanation of how the recipient can opt out of future marketing email. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)

When someone asks you to stop

Keep one list of the people who have asked, and check every send against it.

  • Honor an opt-out request within 10 business days; the opt-out mechanism must work for at least 30 days after sending. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)
  • You cannot charge a fee or require more than an email address to honor an opt-out. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)
  • After an opt-out you cannot sell or transfer the address, even as part of a mailing list (a compliance vendor excepted). (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)

Where the addresses come from, and who sends

Write to people whose addresses you collected yourself: a manager who gave you a card, a board member who filled in your form, a customer who referred you.

  • CAN-SPAM treats harvesting email addresses or generating them by dictionary attack as an aggravated violation. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)
  • The FTC warns that buying email lists is risky: addresses may already have opted out, or the list may have been built by address harvesting. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)
  • You cannot contract away legal responsibility for email a vendor sends on your behalf. (Federal Trade Commission, as of Oct 6, 2026)

Write a message worth opening

This is guidance. Say who you are and which communities you already serve. Name the pool, the building or the service you are writing about.

Keep it short, and make one clear ask: a call, a walk of the property, or a chance to send a proposal.

Have a lawyer read your template before you send it to anyone.

Keep going:

Keep reading

Sources

Official pages change. Each line shows the day we last read it.

Keep reading

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