Forum Moderators: phranque
What is actually classed as SPAM. Obviously emails like Viagra sales sent every day (5 times a day) is spam.
What if a one off email is sent to targeted potential customers eg emails sent to sports shops asking them to sign up on a directory/portal for sports shops/equipment for free.
Is this spam too?
Im asking this, as i too get fed up with the emails offering mortgages or viagra which come through every day. But ive had a few one off emails with the example above, offering to go into a free directory. Ive actually posted my business details and have had a good response from these directories. So im glad of these one off emails, as without them i would never of known about the service they offer.
whats your thoughts?
I think business to business selling has always been considered different than business to consumer selling. For example, no corporate salesperson can get by without cold calling, ANY company (Oracle, IBM, Microsoft whoever) makes their salespeople call potential clients. This could be considered much the same.
Ok, so I concede that different circumstances warrant different rules in this case and a blanket policy would be unhealthy. I'll face it... something that's spam to one person is a partnering opportunity to another.
So how do we test and differentiate? Of course, UCE'ers will have to unconditionally respect the wishes of recepients who do not want to be contacted.
But let me put forth that there would have to be some sort of central body (kinda like that DoNotCall list, but not legislated) that would establish recommendations on who can be emailed and who cannot, for whatever reason. A global opt-out list that RECOMMENDS (not legislate or decree or rule) that people on the list not be contacted by means of email unless for certain types of inquiries. (i.e. If I'm a business, I would LIKE webmasters contacting me for potential link partnerships, so I won't check/tick that off).
In short, you would be able to choose what kind of emails you DON'T want to receive. Conscientious and socially responsible companies would honour the list, backed up by some kind of review and certification program (like the better business bureau does).
You could go crazy with this and get companies integrating systems with the central system to run checks before every mailout and filter out listed addresses for certain categories.
This should, for the most part alleviate many concerns. One thing that it would change, however, is the market for email lists. i.e. people would probably only want to pay for the emails that are on the global opt-out list.
Still figuring out how this would be funded (probably mix of public/private sector donations).
No-one said it was gonna be easy to make everyone happy :)
no corporate salesperson can get by without cold calling, ANY company (Oracle, IBM, Microsoft whoever) makes their salespeople call potential clients
What they don't make them do is to record a message, then get some machine to automaticaly dial all their potential customers and play the recorded message to them before hanging up. Any salesperson who did this would quickly find themselves a ex-salesperson.
I treat an individual approach via email in quite a different way than a piece of bulk spam. Spam has, of course, made things difficult for this sort of legitimate email cold-calling by confusing the issue (although as I type I wonder if it doesn't create a problem but an opportunity: the salesperson has to think carefully about the opening sentence of the email and how it will appeal to me, rather than an average potential customer, but, by doing so,(s)he may possibly make closure more likely).
I'm with you on that one. My "bulk" emails are personal, addressed to a person not an address, and START with the disclaimer as to who we are..."This email is being sent by xxxx, a legitimate company that can be reached by calling xxxxx, etc. If you don't want to receive future mailings from us..."
I think people appreciate it (as much as they can appreciate receiving an UCE.
Part of the quality, of course, is sincere personalization. One question I was trying to answer was if webmasters contacting other webmasters in an unsolicited fashion is spam.
I think we all agree that given certain conditons, it is not spam in the conventional sense.
I send out my UCE to non webmasters.
The problem is both sides are right depending on the situation. So there needs to be a process that ensures that there is agreement to the receipt of every UCE. (kinda makes them 'solicited' instead). A global opt-out list may be the ticket, giving everyone the chance to say 'no thanks'.
I think this issue is very close to the outbound Telemarketing issue. The Do Not Call list is a step in the right direction, but it's erroneously all-encompassing.
I think we could do a better job on the internet of categorization and targeting.
I don't agree with this. Certainly either side may be right in any given situation and there are situations where both sides are right.
There are two different problems with spam. Email is being used for fraud and unsolicited porn. Everyone is against this. The heart of this problem is organized crime. Perhaps as few as 100 criminal organizations with tens of thousands of false names are involved. The bulk of their illegal earnings are passing through Visa and MasterCard bank accounts.
The banks are fighting all attempts to regulate these illegal earnings. It means big money for them. They must be held accountable along with the criminals. This illegal email traffic makes up about 50% of all email sent.
A different problem exists for the business that is using email to generate business. The anti-spam legislation is trying to curb the first problem in a way that inhibits legitimate these businesses.
In the US, free speech enjoys a Constitutional guarantee. No one needs freedom of speech when he is saying something that everyone agrees with. So whether what is being said is popular or not is immaterial. This has been upheld in our federal courts for over 200 years. Advertising in traditional mail faced the same challenges that email advertising is facing now. The right to advertise is old and honored. It is grounded in English common law.
Direct mailers have won so often that it is a settled issue in the US. The US federal courts have affirmed that you may not put a restriction on free speech in one medium that is not applied in all the other mediums. I think the anti-spammers are dead wrong trying to curb this type of legitimate mail. To date no legitimate business has been taken to task for this kind of email. Some States have laws on their books but none have dared to try to enforce them because they are unenforceable.
People outside of the US have a different history and they may be able to prosecute legitimate businesses. I note that the UK law that comes into effect in December only makes it illegal to send unsolicited email within the UK. Everyone knows that legitimate business can still legally contract to have email sent from offshore.
I think the local Pizza shop should have the right to solicit the businesses in his neighborhood. The concept that he must first get them to opt-in is ridiculous.
Solve the REAL problem. Stop the criminals and dry up their bank accounts and leave the tax-paying businesses alone is what I see we should be doing.
Solve the REAL problem. Stop the criminals and dry up their bank accounts and leave the tax-paying businesses alone is what I see we should be doing.
agreed, crime is bad. Should be stopped.
On another note,
I wasn't talking about legislation or a global 'opt-in' I'm suggesting a global 'negative option' or 'opt-out' list that companies can follow on a voluntary basis.
It wouldn't be legislated or mandatory, so no question of violation of rights.
The only problem is that it would cost money to conform to a standard and businesses are not likely to fork up the manpower when they can blast to superset of emails for less. The upshot would be that participation may add value in the eyes of the spam-hating customer.
*shrug* I'm interested in how this will evolved and what will be considered spam five years from now.
