The unexpected happened—the FCC’s TCPA 1-to-1 consent rules were struck down at the last minute.
In this post, I’m going to cover what happened, what this means for you, what it means for us, and what we’re focused on moving forward.
What Happened?
The last two weeks have been a complete roller coaster with a looming TCPA 1-to-1 consent deadline, which was supposed to go into effect this Monday.
For many of you (whom I’ve personally worked closely with), it meant complex consent workflows where we pinged receiving systems and dynamically updated consent.
No easy feat for the engineers to build—we started this project months ago.
And for me, it meant 17+ hour days working on implementation, collecting new requirements, all while keeping the rest of the business running smoothly.
I was on a path to burnout; many of us were, as the risk of campaigns being shut down loomed over our heads.
I was fighting for all of us, in the trenches, making sure that even with the most complex use cases, you wouldn’t have to turn off your campaigns.
The idea that just one lead generator would be impacted kept me awake at night and glued to my desk, working tirelessly. I forgot to eat most days and lost 10 lbs.
But we did it.
After a lot of hard work, we became the first (and maybe only) lead capture tool with a solution and some really cool ping/post tech.
Then, Out of Nowhere…
Whispers started about a potential 60-day delay of the new 1-to-1 consent rules right as Trump took office.
Even a 10-day delay from a regulatory stay request would have given us all some breathing room.
By Friday evening, it wasn’t looking good. I accepted that the rules were going live and that I wouldn’t see my kids all next week as we dealt with an onslaught of last-minute inbound requests for help.
We were the only lead capture tool truly positioned to help (in most cases), but even then, it wasn’t easy.
Then something crazy happened.
I left my desk for the first time before 4 PM to take my 5-year-old to soccer —again, thinking the 1-to-1 consent rules were dropping for sure by Monday since it was late in the day in D.C.
Towards the end of my son’s practice, news broke from Eric J. Troutman over at TCPAworld .com about the stay request being granted. Surprised I didn’t break the TCPAworld site with the number of times I refreshed the screen, while waiting for updates.
Upon reading the news, I jumped out of my seat cheering. Everyone looked oddly at me because no goal was scored.
They didn’t know that I was cheering for the entire lead generation industry.
In that moment, I realized we could all breathe again.
Then, moments later, more news broke:
Struck down.
The Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals put an end to the 1-to-1 consent rules (for now at least).
Another huge win for the lead gen industry.
I was extremely happy for everyone, confused, and remained in a complete state of shock for the rest of the night until I passed out in my son’s bed, telling myself I’d figure out what to say and how to react the next day.
What Does This Mean for You?
Compliance Still Matters: Compliance obviously still matters. The amazing news is that many of you (and the LeadCapture.io team) can breathe again. For many of you, it means you can go back to capturing leads like you always have. (Please check with your legal team to confirm.)
Relief for All: For us, it means that the pressure of a deadline has been lifted off our shoulders. Building a great product is really hard when you’re bootstrapped, and building under a regulatory deadline was even tougher.
But Remember: Consent-based marketing and compliance aren’t going away. I’ll touch on that in a moment.
What Does This Mean for Us at LeadCapture.io?
Some of you might be wondering what this means for us. After all, we put a significant amount of time and effort into building features to ensure compliance with 1-to-1 consent.
Our Achievements:
- Our lead capture form builder was the first to have a seamless consent workflow that could dynamically ping the main lead distribution tools and pull the data back in.
- We built a comprehensive consent management workflow, making compliant lead capture easier than ever.
Looking Ahead: While I’m unsure what this means for dynamic consent workflows and our ping/post feature, I’m happier that the entire industry isn’t impacted by this disruptive ruling. I’m very proud of what we built and excited about the future.
Compliance-Focused Lead Capture Still Matters
Let’s celebrate this win, but also stay realistic.
TCPA Isn’t Going Away: Some sensationalized headlines might make it seem like TCPA was completely struck down, but it’s just the 1-to-1 consent rules that were overturned. All existing TCPA rules still apply:
- Don’t call people on a do-not-call list.
- Capture proof of consent.
- Store your records in case of litigation.
- And so on
The FCC and other regulators have emphasized the need for greater transparency and consumer choice in handling personal data. I don’t think this is the end. I expect new legislation to come, hopefully more sensible this time. When that happens, we’ll be here to help.
Next Steps
For Anyone Capturing Leads: Consider this a near-miss. We got really lucky that the 1-to-1 consent rules were struck down. My advice: Use this opportunity to tighten up your consent collection practices. We now have new features that can help!
For Us at LeadCapture.io:
- Finalize Compliance Features: We have a couple of compliance features still in the works that we’ll likely finish, as TCPA is still in effect and other data privacy regulations like GDPR and CCPA emphasize the importance of consent management.
- Focus on New Features: As the dust settles, we can shift our focus to features you’re all asking for sooner than we thought, such as:
- Finishing our point-of-capture email verification feature.
- Adding advanced conditional logic, the ability to block based on certain zip codes, and uploading blacklisted words.
- Revamping our templating system and improving the UX/UI of the form builder.
- Expanding to our landing page features.
- And much more to make capturing leads compliantly easier than ever.
Final Thoughts
I’ll be using the weekend to rest for the week ahead.
We still have a lot of work ahead of us.
The fire within me to build the best lead capture platform in the world is burning stronger than it ever has.
I’m excited to see what emerges in the compliance world and to keep building here.
Thank you and let me know if you have any questions or thoughts on all of this.
Talk soon,
John
Founder, LeadCapture.io
