Every business wants a healthy email list for communication. One of the ways to ensure this is having double opt-in implemented. This step-by-step guide will help you to create a double opt-in scenario for your website.

Watch this short introductory video about this feature:

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A prerequisite for using the double opt-in is to have email value as ID.

Why you should use double opt-in

When someone fills in an email address into your website’s signup field, you shouldn’t sign them up directly. Instead, it is strongly recommended to send a confirmation email to their inbox to double check they are the owners of that email address.

This way, your email database will be healthier, containing a larger percentage of active users. This improves your sender reputation, deliverability and significantly decreases any risks related to GDPR-related complaints.

How to do this in Bloomreach Engagement

We will show you how to create an automatic Scenario that will send a confirmation email to the subscriber. When they click "confirm subscription" in the email, the appropriate consents will be assigned to their profile.

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This scenario works only if you identify your customers (registered) by their email address. If not, contact us for more information.

{
    "customer_ids": {"registered": "[email protected]"},
    "event_type": "double_opt_in",
    "properties": {
        "action": "new",
        "email": "[email protected]",
		"consent_list": [  
			{
			"action": "accept", 
			"category":"newsletter", 
			"valid_until":"unlimited" 
			}, 
			{
			"action": "accept", 
			"category":"sms", 
			"valid_until":"unlimited" 
			}
		]
    }
}

exponea.track('double_opt_in', {
    action: 'new',
    email: '[email protected]', // you need to adjust the email here
    source: 'subscription banner', // adjust this to have more information about where the consent comes from
    consent_list: [  // adjust the consents and their attributes here
    {
        action: "accept", 
        category:"newsletter", 
        valid_until:"unlimited" 
    }, 
    {
        action: "accept", 
        category:"sms", 
        valid_until:"unlimited" 
    }
    ] 
});

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Read more about tracking objects here.
Read more about the structure of consent events here.

{
    "commands": [
        {
            "name": "customers/events",
            "data": {
                "customer_ids": {
                    "registered": "{{ event.email }}"
                },
                "event_type": "double_opt_in",
                "properties": {
                    "action": "transferred",
                    "email": "{{ event.email }}",
                    "source": "{{ event.source }}",
                    "consent_list": {{ event.consent_list | json }}
                }
            }
        }
    ]
}

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The webhooks are set according to the Batch commands request to Bloomreach Engagement Data API.

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You might want to use campaign_id instead of campaign_name. Click here to learn more.

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Warning about spam filter bots

Tracking the consent event triggered by a campaign click event have certain limitations.
Namely, certain email domains might use spam filter bots, which could automatically scan and click through all email links.

In Bloomreach Engagement, these campaign clicks are indistinguishable from human clicks and therefore some campaign clicks used in double opt-in setup might not originate from the targeted human customer. Thus, for some customers, these false automatic clicks can reduce double opt-in to just single opt-in.

If you want to be more certain, that only a real human confirmed your email, instead of the trigger by campaign click, you can implement a small confirmation page with a submit button.
After submitting, this page would track the consent event directly (replacing this and the following step).

{
    "commands": [
        {
            "name": "customers",
            "data": {
                "customer_ids": {
                    "registered": "{{ customer_ids.registered }}"
                },
                "properties": {
                    "email": "{{ aggregates['5c125e43e9f1d9001501be08'] }}"
               }
            }
        },
    {% set consent_list = aggregates["5bae01a6defa930014bd5e38"] %}
    {% for item in consent_list %}
        {
            "name": "customers/events",
            "data": {
                "customer_ids": {
                    "registered": "{{ customer_ids.registered }}"
                },
                "event_type": "consent",
                "properties": {
                    "action": "{{ item.action }}",
                    "category": "{{ item.category }}",
                    "valid_until": "{{ item.valid_until }}"
                }
            }
        }

        {% if not loop.last %}
        ,
        {% endif %}

    {% endfor %}
    
    ]
}

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Great job!

Your scenario is now ready to be launched. Don't forget to test this yourself first.

Technical reference

The webhooks are set according to the Batch commands request to Bloomreach Engagement Data API.

Why do you need to use the webhooks instead of a simple scenario?
Using webhooks ensures the highest GDPR-compliant standards to protect your customers' data in case someone else would try to use their email address.

So what exactly the webhooks do?
This first webhook essentially creates a customer with a hard ID that equals the entered email. If the current user is already identified, they will be automatically merged. If he or she is anonymous (meaning not identified by hard ID), then the new customer in Bloomreach Engagement will be different than the one browsing and submitting the email. This webhook then tracks the event "double_opt_in" with "action = transferred" to that customer.

Once they click "confirm" in the email, these 2 customers are merged, which is done in the webhook "Track consents".