[Wolves] Spam from a Wolves firm

[Matthew Revell]

Peter Cannon wrote:

> This is a great subject one mans supposed spam is another mans 
> advertising.

I'm afraid I can't agree with you there; one man's spam is everyone's 
spam. Spam is spam.

> I currently run a database of 7000 + email addresses all of which have 
> supplied their email addresses and have the opportunity to unsubscribe.
>
> The email addresses are collected by telesales they are asked for 
> their mailing address and if we can send some info (now comes the 
> slightly dodgy bit) we don't exactly tell them we are adding them to 
> our mailing list but seeing as they give the address freely and say 
> "yes you can send some info" they have opened the door in my view.

Well, I'm not sure that I consider that to be dodgy. You ask for 
someone's email address and you tell them that you'll send them some 
information; surely it's implicit that you're going to store their 
address and, er, send them information.

> They do have the opportunity to unsubscribe and it is done manually 
> and immediately, we reveal who we are and how to contact us.

Great. I think the problem nowadays, tho', is that many spammers include 
an unsubscribe option, and people are becoming wise to the fact that 
that is more often than not used to confirm an email address is active 
(typical marketer's logic: someone doesn't want to hear from you, they 
tell you don't want to hear from you, so you talk to them even more). 
So, while you're doing the right thing, loads of spammers are mimicking 
that, which unfortunately devalues what you're doing.

> Now this generates very good business however we do from time to time 
> get accused of spamming which gets up my nose.
>
> I am no solicitor but according to the recommendations (nothing is 
> fixed yet) we do not fit the spammer definition.

Well, I wouldn't become hung up on legal definitions or recommendations, 
in this case. I think that if someone feels you're spamming them, then 
it's your duty to comply with their wishes. You've probably thought 
about this but I reckon you could look at it entirely selfishly and 
consider the strength of feeling against spam, which isn't something you 
want directed towards your business.

> Unfortunately joe public has watched Lynn Folds-Wood on catch that 
> crook tea time tv, learnt the word spam and now spews it out at every 
> opportunity to show what clever cloggs they are because they must be 
> an expert seeing as they know the terminology, bit like the guy who 
> rang me the other day saying he wanted lots of ROM's in his machine 
> (he meant RAM by the way)  you would be amazed at the amount of people 
> who phone start the conversation with "you regularly send me junk but 
> on this occasion this has caught my eye") I personally think people 
> should look at the bigger picture,
> at the moment we have the FPS ((fax preferential service) so you cant 
> fax) thew TPS ((telephone preferential service) so you cant phone) new 
> laws are due regarding email and Internet.

Well, there'll always be people who don't know the difference between 
ROM and RAM. To allude to an earlier thread, I might pick up the odd bit 
of car terminology and think that I've got it right. When I go along to 
my mechanic and misuse a term, I don't expect my mechanic to get annoyed 
with me for trying; rather, I expect him/her to do the job (s)he's paid 
for and maybe gently correct me.

Anyway, back to spam: it's a complete and utter waste of people's time 
and internet bandwidth, so it's quite right that people should be 
annoyed by it. You should be prepared for people's ire, if you want to 
do something that may look like spam. Okay, so what you're doing isn't 
spam but every business technique has its downsides: if you want to 
market by sending people email, then expect to be accused of spamming.

As for the FPS and TPS: give a medal to Oftel for having the guts to set 
them up. In many cases, they're entirely useless - cf kitchen, double 
glazing and other companies who work from ripped out pages from 
telephone directories - but at least they're giving people the 
opportunity not to have their time and fax paper wasted. I fully support 
the idea of a similar service for email but it would never work.

> If a business cannot promote itself how do they survive? The FPS 
> advised putting adds in the paper now with the greatest respect I cant 
> see the head of say ICI responding to an add in the black country bugle.


Well, come on, no one is suggesting you put an ad in The Black Country 
Bugle, particularly if the head of ICI is your target. But then, you're 
not seriously suggesting the head of any major corporation would respond 
to unsolicited fax, telephone or email marketing? Businesses have 
survived for thousands of years without email marketing. Okay, business 
may be different now but it's down to every business to survive in the 
market, according to the conditions of that market.

> So I will now wait for every one to hurl abuse at me.


Well, no abuse warranted :) It seems to me that you are not a spammer 
but that you are irritated when you're accused of spamming, even tho' 
what you do may look, to some people, like spam. I'll be brutally honest 
and say that I think that email marketing is lazy, as a primary form of 
marketing. Unless there's an established relationship, which the 
customer recognises - eg I remember that I've bought from Expedia in the 
past, so I'm happy to receive their marketing emails - I also consider 
email marketing to be intrusive. If you feel that email marketing is 
best for your business, then be prepared for one or two annoyed people. 
Even if you've done everything by the book, just take it on the chin as 
going with the territory.

Matt.