TrustFabric, that created South Africa’s first independently run direct marketing opt-out list has recently launched a mobile version of the service on Mxit. In November 2011, we exclusively reported that TrustFabric was receiving an investment from World of Avatar to make Mxit safer and now we can see a product of that deal. TrustFabric has reported that the service received 32, 000 registrations within the first 10 days of launch and are very happy with the rate at which users are joining the service.
TrustFabric’s Opt-out mobile service was launched on 1 April, one year after the Consumer Protection Act (CPA) came into effect which gives South Africans the right to block direct marketing.
TrustFabric CEO Joe Botha, was motivated to create the service as someone who, like many South Africans is “frustrated with random sales calls and daily SMS spam.”
In terms of partnering with Mxit, Botha says that “Mxit users love to support a good cause – after the voting for Table Mountain project I had a feeling they would support and anti-spam project.” And they certainly are showing their support.
Users can join the TrustFabric Opt-out service in three ways: by using Mxit and adding the “TrustFabric” contact, by using the Mxit mobi site or through the TrustFabric website. Users can then block receiving direct marketing content by adding their contact details to the Opt-out list.
In addition to the current TrustFabric Opt-out list, there is another existing list in South Africa. This list, operated by the Direct Marketing Association of South Africa (DMASA) made headlines last year when its 39, 000 records were leaked. As a result and due to a number of complaints received from South Africans about the conflict of interest in giving a group of direct marketing companies control of such information, the National Consumer Council (NCC) decided against appointing the DMASA list as the official opt-out list in South Africa. Funding constraints have prevented the NCC from building its own list which could amount to as much as R5 million.
Without an official list citizens are without the protections against direct marketing which are defined in the CPA and so last year, TrustFabric submitted a proposal to the NCC to operate the national opt-out list stating that the service is free for all citizens and was developed without any costs to government.
Should the NCC accept TrustFabric’s proposal, marketing companies will be legally forced to check if a number is on the opt-out list before they are allowed to phone or SMS people. TrustFabric’s list never shares any contact details with marketing companies, but rather lets them upload a batch of numbers they plan to contact and filters their lists based on user preferences.
Botha comments that, “We have registered about the same number of users in 10 days as the DMASA’s service managed to do in five years. It’s clear from the numbers that people are frustrated with spam. By making our opt-out service more accessible using Mxit and mobile phones, a much wider group of citizens are now able to block direct marketing.”
TrustFabric also operates a Child Protect service which offers marketing companies a way to avoid sending adult content like alcohol and tobacco marketing material to minors. This service, works in a similar way to the opt-out service but simply checks if a mobile number belongs to a user over 18 years old.
Update: TrustFabric has informed us that the service now has 62, 363 opt-out registrations. The TrustFabric Child Protect service currently has a total of 26 million date of birth records.
