Hi @armedandgorgeous - welcome to the community!

Thanks for bringing up this question, it’s an interesting one for brands to pay attention to. 

I had a similar discussion with a new client this week, and they were surprised to learn that Klaviyo offers integrations with Meta (aka FB Business Manager) and Google Ads. One of the under-utilized features of Klaviyo that many brands forget about, is this can serve as a more fundamental database for your business - in addition to powering your email/ SMS marketing. 

Any profile you have in Klaviyo is useful data that you can tap into, and should be protected so you can tap into it most effectively. If someone’s unable to receive emails because they’ve not opted in, you still have several different channels you can leverage to educate them about your brand and give relevant product recommendations. 

IF you integrate Klaviyo with Meta - you can sync audiences, so specific segments you create in Klaviyo can be used for ad targeting. This is similar to what happens when you integrate Klaviyo with Google Ads. (check these help doc links for more info)

One of my personal favorite tools is a platform called PostPilot, and they’re also available in the UK! PostPilot enables you to trigger a “flow” that sends a postcard, or a handwritten card, very similarly to how you’d send an email flow in Klaviyo. You integrate PostPilot with Klaviyo, and you can target your specific segments based on what you’re trying to accomplish. 

Example: send a Customer Winback postcard to reach lapsed customers, whether they’re opted in to receive emails or they’ve unsubscribed or never subscribed. There’s also an Abandoned Cart postcard automation that’s really interesting.

This customer database is one of the most important assets your business has, and one of my favorite things about Klaviyo is how easy it becomes to tap into your customer data - beyond just sending emails or SMS. 

Happy to answer any follow-up questions you have!

Warmly,

Gabrielle

Thanks for the reply, yes I am fully iintegrated and understand the importance of the data. 

But essentially you dont send emails to them? 

You’re welcome @armedandgorgeous!

It’s a gray area of consent depending on if your brand is in the EU and subject to GDPR (in which case you can’t email them) OR if your brand is in the states (more flexible here). Generally, it’s best to respect people’s preference and if they haven’t explicitly opted in to receiving your emails, you leave them alone. 

Think about how annoying it is when you get a spam call… it’s the same kind of experience for them. Better to let these people opt in when they’re ready, rather than annoy them now and risk losing them for good. 

When it comes to flow emails, this is where you may have a somewhat transactional touchpoint with an active profile that has a “soft optin” as you described in your original question. 

IF someone places an order, regardless of whether or not they’ve subscribed to your emails, that order event will trigger your post-purchase flow and Klaviyo will send them an email because they’re an “active” profile. That will continue until they unsubscribe, and become a “suppressed” profile in Klaviyo. 

Same thing applies to Abandoned Cart/ Browse Abandonment flows, or even a Customer Winback flow depending on how you configure the flow trigger. 

This is where that gray area comes in - you’re allowed to send these people emails related to their order. In some cases, you could take an opportunity here to offer a discount or other incentive to prompt them to explicitly sign up for your marketing emails.

It all depends on how much effort you want to put towards converting those implicit optins to explicit optins! I’d recommend you first focus your attention on improving the optin offer that’s shown to anyone visiting your site, since that’s the simplest to execute and will impact the highest volume of people as a first “low hanging fruit” step. 

Warmly,

Gabrielle