Cochrane Groups typically communicate with contributors and interested members of the public in two ways:

• Newsletters and mailing lists
• Task emails related to the review production process (see (5) Task emails and other non-marketing communications)

Newsletters and mailing lists

Under most data protection regulations, newsletters and most mass mailings are considered to be marketing communications. People must actively consent (opt in) to marketing communications. You must assume no one has asked to receive messages from you unless they have actively subscribed. The fact that people have received a newsletter in the past does not count as consent. If you are in any doubt you should remove people from your mailing list and write to them to ask them to re-subscribe. Please contact support@cochrane.org for assistance with this.

Groups can manage their own mailing lists, and should adhere to the standards below. Thematic Groups should contact support@cochrane.org as they have slightly different mailing lists that are managed centrally.

The following guidance is not exhaustive and groups should check their responsibilities.

1. Use dedicated email marketing platforms such as Brevo or MailChimp for your newsletter. Many have a good free offer - check the limits for number of contacts, and number of emails that can be sent to make sure you choose one that is right for your needs. Some platforms allow you to have several different lists that people can shoose (for example one for a general newsletter, one for promoting volunteering opportunities).
2. You should not keep a spreadsheet of mailing list subscribers as this will go out of date as people change their email addresses. We recommend you store the personal data of your subscribers in an email marketing platform.
3. Take appropriate technical and organisational measures to prevent unauthorised access to the data; protect your Group’s account on any email marketing platform with a suitably strong password.
4. You must not create a new mailing list from existing mailing lists you use – people must subscribe to your mailing list. You can write to people to inform them about your mailing list, but you must not add people to mailing lists by default. Contact support@cochrane.org for assistance with this. They can arrange for a one-off email to be sent to people who have an interest in your group who are also opted into communications from Cochrane.
5. Any consent to marketing emails must be explicit, clear, and recorded. You can send potential subscribers a link to sign up to the mailing list and incorporate a message about your newsletter into standard communications to people joining your Group. If you use an email marketing platform it will handle the recording of consent and will not send newsletters to people who have unsubscribed.
6. Do not use or share the recipients' details for any purpose other than to send the emails that the recipients chose to receive.
7. Advertise your newsletter sign-up link on your webpage if you have one. You can also promote your newsletter through social media channels.
8. Visit the useful Community Branding page to check branding guidance.
9. People must be able to unsubscribe by clicking a button or hyperlink in the email. The following disclaimer must be included next to, or directly below the unsubscribe button / link.

"Please note: unsubscribing will remove you from the Cochrane XXXXX Group's mailing list, but it will not automatically unsubscribe you from other Cochrane Groups' mailing lists or from Cochrane’s organizational mailing lists which you can manage at account.cochrane.org."

If you'd like Cochrane to send an email on your behalf to people who are opted in to communications, please use this form to make a request and the Support Team will be in touch. We can create mailing lists based on roles, location, interests, so for example could send to: people in your group; and/or in a certain country; and/or who are interested in a certain health topic; and/or who speak a certain language.

Discussion lists

Cochrane has previously used MailMan/ListServe lists to facilitate discussion between group members in different groups across the Community. MailMan / List Serve is not compliant with data protection regulations as it allows people to have access to other people’s contact details and makes it difficult to process a person’s right to be removed from Cochrane's systems.

To replace these discussion lists we are encouraging groups to use alternatives such as Community Slack where possible. If you would like to explore using these tools, or for any other questions, please contact support@cochrane.org.