Digital Marketing in Canada

About Digital Marketing

Most digital marketing agencies sell you reports, slides full of impressions, reach, and engagement metrics that don't pay rent. We sell measurable revenue and qualified leads. Our digital marketing work spans SEO, Google Ads, Meta Ads, email automation, content marketing, and the analytics setup that ties every channel back to actual money. Every retainer reports against your North Star metric, revenue, leads, signups, not vanity numbers.

What the engagement includes

• SEO, technical, content, and local
• Google Search and Performance Max Ads management
• Meta (Facebook + Instagram) Ads management
• LinkedIn Ads for B2B
• Email marketing automation (Klaviyo, HubSpot, Mailchimp)
• Content strategy and long-form blog writing
• Landing page design and CRO (conversion rate optimization)
• Google Tag Manager + GA4 + Meta Pixel + server-side tracking

Consent that expires, green claims, and audiences Canadian law keeps off limits

For an email or SMS campaign reaching Canadian recipients, the part of CASL that shapes the system is consent that runs out. Implied consent from an existing business relationship lasts two years from a purchase or the end of a contract and six months from an inquiry or application, so a customer who bought once in 2024 and not since drops out of mailable status on a date the platform can calculate, and the campaign has to win express consent before then or stop. A request for express consent has to set out clearly and simply what it is for and who is asking. A business address published conspicuously, without a statement refusing unsolicited messages, can be written to, but only about something relevant to the person's role. Every message identifies the sender and anyone it is sent on behalf of, with contact details that stay valid for at least 60 days, and carries an unsubscribe that has to take effect within 10 business days without the recipient doing anything further. Section 13 puts the burden of proving consent on whoever claims to have it, so the record shows the form wording, the date and the source for each address rather than a single yes flag. The Act applies whenever a computer system in Canada is used to send or access the message, which covers a campaign sent from India to an inbox in Toronto, and section 9 separately prohibits aiding, inducing or procuring a breach, the provision that reaches an agency or a list vendor as well as the brand. The maximum penalty is $10 million per violation for a business. So consent type and date sit on each record, expiry is computed rather than remembered, and an imported list is held back until its consent can be shown. How CASL applies to your own list is for your own counsel.

Ad copy in Canada is tested against the Competition Act, and two of its provisions reach straight into campaign creative. The first covers environmental claims. Since 20 June 2024 a claim that a product protects or restores the environment or mitigates the causes or effects of climate change has had to rest on an adequate and proper test, with the proof on the advertiser, and a claim about the environmental benefits of a business or business activity has needed adequate and proper substantiation. That second rule was amended from 26 March 2026. The requirement that the substantiation follow an internationally recognized methodology was removed, and private parties can no longer bring a case under it, while the product claim test stands and private applicants can still seek leave from the Competition Tribunal over other deceptive marketing. So a carbon neutral headline, a recyclable badge in a shopping ad or a sustainability landing page goes live with the test or evidence already on file, not assembled after a complaint arrives. The second is the ordinary price. Showing a regular price beside a sale price is reviewable conduct unless the advertiser sold a substantial volume at the higher price within a reasonable period, or offered it at that price in good faith for a substantial period, before or after the claim. Strike-through prices in product feeds and promotional banners therefore come from the price history the store actually holds rather than a list price someone typed into a spreadsheet. A court can order a corporation to pay up to $10 million for a first order and $15 million for later ones, or three times the benefit, or 3 per cent of annual worldwide gross revenues where the benefit cannot be worked out. How your own claims stand up is for your own counsel.

Two Canadian rules decide whether some audiences can be advertised to at all. Section 248 of Quebec's Consumer Protection Act prohibits commercial advertising directed at people under thirteen, and section 249 decides whether an ad is directed at them from its context: the nature and intended purpose of what is advertised, the way the message is presented, and the time and place it appears. The Office de la protection du consommateur's guide applies this to every medium, the web and mobile phones included, and treats a section of a website as a medium in its own right, so a toy, game or snack brand selling in Quebec cannot reach children through pre-roll on children's videos, a creator whose audience is mostly children or a games page on its own site, whatever a platform's age settings would allow. The targeting, the creative and the placement all have to point at parents. Cannabis is stricter across the whole country. Section 17 of the Cannabis Act prohibits promotion unless the Act authorizes it, including promotion that communicates price or distribution, uses a testimonial or endorsement however communicated, depicts a person, character or animal, or ties the brand to a way of life. A licensed seller may use informational or brand-preference promotion in a communication addressed by name to an adult, or online where reasonable steps have been taken to keep young persons from accessing it. That rules out creator campaigns and lifestyle creative, sends paid traffic to an age-gated page rather than to a product and its price, and limits the email list to named adults who also consented under CASL. Provinces set their own minimum age and retail rules on top of this. Whether a campaign fits one of the exceptions is for your own counsel.

How we work with Canadian clients

Two things shape Canadian projects more than anything technical. The first is language: if you serve Quebec, French is a legal requirement rather than a nice addition, and the rules tightened considerably under Bill 96. The French version has to be available on equal terms with the English one, which is a design constraint from the first wireframe rather than a translation task at the end.

The second is anti-spam law. CASL is stricter than most teams expect, and the penalties are real. Consent has to be express or clearly implied, records of it have to be kept, and every commercial message needs a working unsubscribe and accurate sender identification. We build those into the product rather than leaving them to whoever configures the mailing tool later, because that is where the exposure usually sits.

Indicative pricing in CAD

Converted from our published Indian rates and rounded. Exchange rates move, so the figure on your quote is calculated on the day it is issued.

Questions Canadian clients ask

Digital Marketing: common questions

Other markets we work in