• by Masha Geller , May 29, 2002

Yesterday, I issued a call to marketers to take a stand against SPAM. As it often happens with touchy issues like these, the reader feedback was off the charts. Most people agreed that spam is a terrible threat to the email advertising industry and marketers have to wage a war against it and soon. One email, however, presented an interesting counterpoint to that view and while I’m not entirely sure I agree with any of it, I thought it might be worth presenting to you, if only for the fun of playing devil’s advocate.

For starters, the writer, who is an Account Manager for TMP Worldwide's Directional Marketing Interactive, proposed that we start differentiating unsolicited commercial email (UCE) and SPAM. “SPAM is relentless and often illegal -- unsubscribe features that don't work, hijacking of outbound servers, and the use of invalid reply-to addresses,” he explained. On the other hand, “UCE is from legitimate commercial enterprises that may have gotten a person's info from 3rd parties or even from the person himself and decided to market to him without permission. So be it. The fact is that we in the capitalist world have always had a love-hate relationship with advertising and marketing. On the one hand it’s intrusive and annoying. On the other, it subsidizes costs and makes life more affordable. The Internet is no exception.”

The overall point of the email was this: Why do online marketers have to be different from telemarketers and direct marketers who don't abide permission-based marketing rules and "spam" consumers relentlessly? Moreover, why are direct and telemarketers still around if everyone hates their tactics? Obviously, the answer is that such tactics work. Consumers respond to them.”

The email went on to explain: “For some reason, we in the interactive space feel that simply because we can put a "Dear Scott" at the top of an email, we have the capacity to build "real" relationships with consumers,” he wrote. “Most people put up with advertising. They do not embrace it. They do not view themselves as having a relationship with a company. They are simply looking for quality, low prices and customer service. Such an offer can be presented if the person did not give permission in the first place to be contacted.”

Not a new idea by any stretch, but worth thinking about nevertheless. What’s your opinion?