The GDPR for small businesses can feel like a marketing death sentence. Its robust rules and regulations backed by hefty penalties in the form of UK GDPR fines for noncompliance are truly daunting.
Many companies question whether or not it’s beneficial to their model and are forced to adapt it to the new regulations. So we’ve done some research and have a few insights into implementing a business model that should minimise your chances of a GDPR breach fine within UK and EU territories.
But first, let’s examine the GDPR, its pitfalls and benefits and how it can impact your business model.
The GDPR
Newly implemented by the European Union (EU), the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is a sophisticated data protection policy. The GDPR governs the protection of natural persons in the EU where personal data are processed and the free flow of such data. It is an extensive set of rules spanning 99 articles that outline its parameters and the penalties for noncompliance.
The Benefits of GDPR
GDPR for small businesses benefits consumers more than it helps actual companies. However, that’s not to say that there are no significant benefits to GDPR-compliant firms.
It Inadvertently Builds Good Client Relations
Article 5 of the GDPR lays out the rules for exchanging personal information between data processors and controllers. This article covers the six data management principles:
- Integrity and confidentiality
- Data minimisation
- Lawfulness, fairness, and transparency
- Purpose limitation
- Storage limitation
- Accuracy
By adhering to these principles, businesses must carefully vet their information suppliers while ensuring that their client’s information remains compliant and safe. The company and their collaborators are subject to a GDPR breach fine within UK and EU territories if either party is non-compliant.
The assurance that both parties carefully manage and process data reassure your clients and individuals that their relationship with your business is sound. This increases their trust in you and your credibility status.
Improves Innovation And Efficiency
As customers can withdraw consent anytime, your business must be innovative when developing your data management processes. To do so, you’ll need to ensure efficient data collection and removal processes.
It may seem like the regulations tie your hands, but there is an additional benefit. Businesses collect as much data as possible now, and the bulk of this data is irrelevant. Instead of creating a bank of irrelevant or hardly helpful information, these regulations help you compact that data bank and prioritise the essential bits. As a result, it makes your marketing decisions much more efficient and swift.
Improved Reputation
Many large companies currently have a bad rap for poor data collection and processing qualities. When showcasing your GDPR compliance actively, it signals to consumers, prospective collaborators and, most importantly, the EU that your company possesses great integrity. It further implies that you prioritise the safety of all individuals.
How GDPR Regulations Impact a Business Model
As businesses adopt cloud computing for their day-to-day operations, many wonder how GDPR for small businesses will impact their business model. Companies have had to look at their applications, business processes, and forms to ensure they follow the rules for double opt-in and the best practices for email marketing.
Prospects must now fill out a form or check a box to sign up for communication. They will then get an email asking them to confirm that they did this. Doing so wholly removes the implied consent method companies usually use when pushing content through their marketing funnels.
GDPR will transform many business processes, like how sales teams find new customers or execute marketing activities. The possibility of UK GDPR fines is not to be ignored. Companies could incur a penalty of as low as 4% of their total annual revenue up to a maximum of €20 million.
Creating A Business Model That Revolves Around GDPR
One central pillar of the GDPR for small businesses and large corporations is privacy by design. Privacy by design requires that all business departments carefully examine their data and how they manage it. For a company’s business model to be GDPR-compliant, it has to do many things. As you design your business model, implement these steps.
Data Mapping
Make a map of where all the personal information in your business comes from, and write down what you do with it. Find out where the data is, who can access it, and if the information is at risk in any way. This is important not only because of GDPR but also because it will help improve Customer Relationship Management.
Data Prioritisation And Routine Scrubbing
Remove any data your company is not using to avoid keeping more data than you need. To do so, decipher what information is essential to maintain and any information your company has collected that isn’t beneficial to its operations. GDPR encourages people to treat personal information with more care.
Consider these points throughout your data-scrubbing process:
- What your motivation is behind collecting the different kinds of personal information
- Whether the possible revenue you’ll earn if you delete the data versus encrypting it is greater
- What unessential data you do not need to save
- Whether or not the volume of data you collect is useful
Implement Cybersecurity Measures
Cybersecurity is a necessity. Formulate and implement security measures across your data collection and storage model to limit and prevent data breaches. In the event there is a data breach, you must act quickly when notifying the relevant authorities and the person whose data was potentially exposed.
Remember to do your due diligence by checking in with your data suppliers as well. Even if you hire someone else to collect the data (for example, Microsoft Forms), you’re still responsible for the data and ensuring their cybersecurity measures are in place.
Take A Look At Your Paperwork
You’re now required to implement a double-opt-in consent process. The GDPR now makes it mandatory for persons to give explicit permission for their data to be collected and used. This means pre-checked boxes and “implied consent” is no longer acceptable. All disclosures and privacy statements then need to be thoroughly examined so you can make changes where necessary.
Create And Implement A Robust Personal Data Handling Process
Based on the eight fundamental rights outlined by the GDPR, create policies and processes for each of these instances:
- In the event of a data breach, how will this be communicated to the persons affected
- What method will you employ to obtain consent from individuals legally
- How does a person go about getting their information erased
- How will you make sure to remove all data from all channels
- How will you go about data transference if a person wants to move their information
- How will you verify that the individual who asked for the removal of their information is who they claim to be
Become GDPR Compliant For Your Business’s Growth
The European Union has enacted the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). The new rules don’t need to be a marketing death sentence for smaller firms. Following these guidelines may reduce the likelihood of incurring a penalty for a compliance lapse in your organisation. While there are some pitfalls to the GDPR, your business model can see positive changes to marketing strategies and the overall efficiency of its data operations.
Avoid fines by developing procedures and policies to address the eight fundamental rights specified in the GDPR. You should also do your due diligence to ensure compliance and always inform individuals if you experience a data breach.
Optimising IT can help you manoeuvre the arduous task of implementing GDPR compliance measures. Let us show you how.
