If you don't know the difference, you could find yourself in a whole heap of trouble with your customers and your ISP.
If you use e-mail to promote your business, product or service, it's crucial that you clearly understand the difference between opt-in e-mail and spam (also known as "unsolicited commercial e-mail").
Spam is a huge problem: Forrester Research estimates that e-mail users get about 110 unwanted messages weekly. Brightmail has released reports that state 41 percent of all e-mail is spam, up from only 8 percent in 2001. And because many people access their e-mail primarily at work, Ferris Research estimates that spam will cost U.S. businesses $10 billion this year alone!
As a result, Internet Service Providers (ISPs) have started working closely with anti-spam organizations to filter all incoming e-mail for spam by actually blocking messages that contain particular words or phrases (like "for free," "MLM" or "XXX") and shutting out all e-mail from the domains and IP addresses of known spammers. Basically, this means if you're labeled a spammer--even if you've made an honest mistake--the majority of your e-mail and newsletters may be "filtered" and never reach your subscribers. If your e-mail is blocked by ISPs, it can take weeks--even months--to resolve the issue. In some cases, if you really mess up, you may never be able to send e-mail from your domain or IP address ever again.
So what is opt-in e-mail marketing anyway? Simply put, opt-in e-mail is e-mail sent to people who have given you permission to contact them via e-mail on a particular subject. It builds on existing relationships with customers, newsletter subscribers, affiliates and sales leads. This is why opt-in e-mail is sometimes referred to as "permission-based" e-mail marketing, and it's the most critical element to take into consideration when launching an e-mail campaign.
You see, opt-in e-mail marketing allows you to develop a relationship with your customers and establish credibility in your industry. Studies have shown that you'll need to contact most people between four and seven times to close a sale--and the low cost of e-mail allows you to effectively establish this regular contact with your clients.
If you regularly provide your customers with valuable information (like newsletters or updates) by e-mail, they'll start to recognize your name in their inboxes. So when you have promotional offers for them, they'll be open and receptive.
How is opt-in e-mail different from spam? Spam is basically unwanted e-mail that's been sent by a company or person with whom the recipient has had no prior contact. Spammers don't care about establishing relationships. They send out millions of offensive e-mails hoping to make a few one-time sales. If you've been on the Internet for any length of time, you know just how annoying (and offensive) it can be.
What do you do when you see spam messages in your own inbox? You probably delete them, right? Well, keep in mind that if you send spam promoting your product or service, almost all the recipients of your message will do the same. You won't get a good response--and you could find yourself in serious trouble, too. That's because many Internet users are so fed up with the huge volumes of spam they receive daily, they may send complaints to your ISP--who could then shut down your account!
How can you be sure you're not spamming? Consider the following before sending any message to your e-mail list:
Ñ If your message is being sent to people you have no relationship with, it's spam.
Ñ If your offer is fraudulent, or promotes fraudulent activities, it's spam.
Ñ If you're using deceptive subject lines to trick people into opening your message, it's spam.
Ñ If you're using a phony or non-existent "From" e-mail address or name, it's spam.
Ñ If you are forging the headers on your message, so that it looks like it came from somewhere or someone else, it's spam.
Ñ If you do not include an easy way for recipients to unsubscribe from your list, it's spam.
Your potential customers know the difference between spam and legitimate opt-in e-mail. In fact, according to IMT Strategies, more than 80 percent of people feel negatively towards spam, whereas 78 percent of the people surveyed in a recent DoubleClick report said they wanted to receive e-mail from their favorite online merchants.
So while responsible e-mail marketing is an extremely effective marketing tool, spam is just an all-round bad idea. It can make your ISP shut you down. And it isn't even a good way to make money. So just don't do it!
Why do you really need to know the difference between spam and opt-in e-mail? If you're accused of spamming, or if your messages get caught in spam filters, you'll suffer lost revenue, inaccurate campaign measurement and a damaged reputation. You could have your e-mail account shut down or blocked, and you could even lose your Web site.
Have you ever heard of a "blacklist," or a "black hole list"? These are the lists of known or suspected spammers maintained by spam-fighting organizations--and you'll want to keep your name off of them at all costs! Most of these lists are created based on reports from recipients of spam, and since they operate on a "guilty until proven innocent" principle, you can find yourself having to do some very serious (and very public) defense of your mailing practices to clear your name.
Major ISPs and online services worldwide use the blacklists the anti-spam groups to filter spam before it ever reaches their customers. So if your name appears on one of these lists, you can be sure a high percentage of your messages will never reach your subscribers--they'll be filtered by the ISPs!
If you think all this sounds a bit extreme, just think about the situation from an ISP's point of view. All those spam messages take up a ton of bandwidth, and this costs the ISPs money. Plus, as the ISPs' customers get more and more annoyed with spam, they start to complain about the problem. And the ISPs know that if they can't keep their customers happy, those customers will leave.
That's why many of the larger online services are also implementing their own anti-spam measures. The latest releases of MSN (Hotmail), Yahoo! and AOL all include some form of spam filtering or reporting. And these features are getting used a lot! In early March, AOL reported that they'd blocked more than 1 billion spam messages in one day. And AOL users use the "report spam" feature up to 5.5 million times every single day!
Various levels of government are also starting to get involved in the fight against spam. Many states now have anti-spam laws, and it's quite possible there will be a federal law in place soon. While it's still hard for individual e-mail users to use the laws to do much about spam, large online service providers have successfully sued spammers who were seen as high-jacking their bandwidth resources.
The silly thing about all this controversy is that spam is quite simply not an effective marketing tool. People aren't open to accepting offers from companies they have no relationship with. And even if a spammer does make a few sales after sending out several million e-mails, it's just not a viable long-term business strategy.
Think about it. If you send out 20 million e-mails and make 10 sales, you've probably at least mildly annoyed well over 19 million people. Does that sound like good business sense to you? Are people who are annoyed with you the first time you spam them likely to respond any better when you try to e-mail them again? No. Spam is just not a good way to establish a decent relationship with your customers.
Plus, spammers make life harder for legitimate opt-in e-mail marketers, since spam filters are getting more rigid, and e-mail users are starting to delete more messages than they actually read. More and more people are using spam filters to divert spam away from their inboxes, which results in many legitimate e-mail messages being caught in spam filters.
Are You Sending Opt-In E-Mails or Spam?
Basic Rules to Follow
1. Keep records of how and when people are added to your opt-in list. Of course, keeping good records is always good business practice, but in the case of opt-in lists, it's critical. If you're ever accused of spamming, your battle to clear your name will be much easier if you have good records to back yourself up.
2. Track requests to opt out, and remove people who opt out of your list immediately. Again, records are a good way to keep yourself safe. And remove requests always need to be taken seriously. If you can't implement remove requests every day, make sure you always deal with them before sending a mailing.
3. Post your privacy policy on your Web site and abide by it. This is just good business sense, and it will also increase your opt-in rate, since people will feel more comfortable sharing information they are confident won't be abused.
4. Investigate third-party service providers before signing any contracts for e-mail services. Remember that in the world of e-mail promotions, you're judged by the company you keep. If you're dealing with less-than-honest service providers, you could be the one who ends up in hot water.
5. Be careful with rental lists. Always ask to see the form that's used to collect e-mail addresses for a rental list, so you can be sure that people on the lists have given permission to be contacted and that they gave the list broker permission to sell or rent their address.
6. Use a real return e-mail address that has enough storage space to receive your bounce-backs and opt-outs (if you're using a free e-mail service, make sure you have plenty of room in your account before you do a mailing).
7. Provide easy instructions on how to unsubscribe from your list. If you don't do this, your message will be flagged as spam, plain and simple. Even if you instruct people to unsubscribe by clicking on a link or sending e-mail to a specific address, honor any remove requests that are sent to your return e-mail address as well.
8. No matter how tempting it may be, do not reply to any angry messages you get from people accusing you of sending them spam. Simply remove them promptly from your list, and be glad they're gone.
The easiest way to know for sure that you're not spamming is to ask yourself whether the people you'll be mailing to have given you permission to contact them. Your newsletter subscribers and customers fit this description. E-mail addresses you've purchased on a CD for $40 do not.
The second test is to make sure your message is being sent to a targeted list of people. If you sell computer software, your existing customers and subscribers will be open to offers relating to computers, software and maybe even computer accessories. But even though they know you, they will not be happy if you send them offers for discount travel or adult Web sites. They won't understand why you're sending them offers that have nothing to do with the relationship you've established with them, and your messages will be considered spam!
Don't forget to include an easy way for customers to opt out of your e-mail list. You'll probably have a few people ask to be removed from your list after each mailing, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. After all, if people have no interest in hearing from you, should you be wasting your resources on them?
