email Jumps the Shark

I am absolutely amazed at the rapid expansion of junk mail being sent. And what is more concerning is it seems to be increasing. And that increase is actually a self fulfilling prophecy that we marketers have created. We send more and more email to make up for the decrease in response rates. Thus, we just keep expanding the target list to meet past results. And I would imagine we “loosen up” that tight list criteria we started out with. 

However, I believe we’re at the “jump the shark” moment as it relates to email as an effective tactic for  lead generation. Many of you might have thought that moment came years ago and perhaps it did.   Check out these statistics compiled by SpamLaws

• 14.5 billion messages globally per day are spam. That’s 45%... so nearly half of all email is junk
• Advertising spam makes up 36% of junk email
• And if you thought that was bad… estimates of 58 billion junk emails sent per daywill be the norm in the next four years. That landslide of junk email is estimated to cost businesses $198 billion per year

And guess what – we’re the culprits. Yep, go to the mirror and look at that face and realize you are guilty as charged.

So what kind of things should Marketers do over the next 4 years?

• Stop looking at your % of unsubscribes you get per campaign. It is a false indicator. Junk filters distort the number.
• Use direct mail – no one sends great mail anymore (if any mail at all) and if done properly you’ll cut through the clutter.
• Give your content away via social networks and communities – and let customers “find” the content in the appropriate areas.
• Tighten your list criteria back up
• Drive customers to your website to get content or interact with your brand
• Use more mass advertising and search to drive more top of the funnel leads
• Use associations and partners to help spread your message
• 3rd party PR – get out in front of the press, be an expert that companies look too
• Use social channels to promote valuable content back to your web site
• Focus on those who actually want to receive your emails
• Hold customer events or tradeshows to promote the brand and feed the sales funnel
• Just reduce the amount of email you send – sounds simple enough, but when you need to push sales quickly everyone seems to pull email out of the marketing tool kit first
• Get creative – start being marketers again!

These are just a few ideas I’m sure you have more. Look we need to get off of email crack. Remember, the road to recovery is to admit you have a problem.

Scott