RetailEmail.Blogspot monitors the email marketing campaigns of more than 100 top online retailers. Here are highlights from our inbox this morning:
CompUSA, 1/25 — All-New CompUSA...$10 Off until 1/30
After sending their last email on Dec. 30, CompUSA returns with this email, which quietly announces that “CompUSA is now a Systemax Company” and trumpets an all-new CompUSA.com. The most interesting thing about this email is the prominent “UNSUBSCRIBE” link at the top of the email, which replaced the “Having trouble viewing this?” link that they typically ran. This is the first time that I’ve seen a retailer do that, despite recommendations from some email experts to do so.
In my just-released Retail Email Unsubscribe Benchmark Study, I advise marketers to also include an opt-out link at the bottoms of their emails if they decide to include one at the top, the reason being that retailers have trained their subscribers to look at the bottom of their emails for opt-out instructions. CompUSA wisely does just that, including a prominent opt-out notice at the bottom of their email as well.
The emphasis on giving subscribers the clear option of unsubscribing stems from three factors: (1) the change in ownership, (2) a change in sender address (from CompUSA_email@elist.compusa.com to enews@compusa.com), and (3) the many weeks that passed without subscribers receiving any emails from CompUSA. All these factors could lead to higher spam complaints from this email. The prominent opt-out instructions should help alleviate that risk. I’ll be curious to see how CompUSA’s emails change over the coming weeks—particularly if they borrow tactics from Systemax sibling TigerDirect.
Road Runner Sports, 1/25 — Just because we love you ... Valentine's Special Offer!
In my Oopsy Hall of Fame: 2007 Inductees post I only mentioned in passing what is probably one of the most prominent errors—broken links. In this email, clicking both the primary calls-to-action generated “HTTP Status 404 – Could not find the requested link” errors. That surely frustrated some subscribers and cost Road Runner Sports some sales.
Chadwick’s, 1/25 — Take 50% OFF to thank you for your patience!
In what is becoming almost a monthly occurrence, Chadwick’s apologies to subscriber for their site being down (see Nov. 5 AM Inbox and Oct. 1 AM Inbox). Not to be flip, but it’s probably time to find better technology partners or a new CIO.
SUBJECTIVITY SCANNER:
Bluefly, 1/26 — FREE People StyleWatch Newsletter: Get the Latest Looks & Best Deals
Sephora, 1/25 — 37 skin problems, solved!
Sam’s Club, 1/27 — Gifts from the Heart at Sam's Club
Kmart, 1/25 — Up to 70% off Valentine's Day Gifts
Spiegel, 1/25 — Clearance: Valentine’s Day Gifts For You, All Under $35!
Office Depot, 1/25 — TV Blowout! Save up to $350 Instantly.
Ralph Lauren, 1/26 — Spring Trunk Show: Reserve Your Favorite Looks
Bloomingdale’s, 1/27 — Extra 40% Off + Flower Prints For Spring
Ann Taylor, 1/25 — Buy One Get One 50% OFF: New Spring Tops!
Alloy, 1/25 — NEW spring trends + free shipping
Sears, 1/25 — Saturday: 3 Hour Specials + Get up to 70% OFF
Spiegel, 1/27 — Introducing Treat Yourself Sunday! See Today’s Sale…
RadioShack, 1/25 — Free Online Courses - RadioShack Learning Center
J. Jill, 1/25 — Find out what makes studio denim our new favorite. Plus, get $25 off.
Circuit City, 1/27 — Deal of the Day--back by popular demand!
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4 comments:
Chad -
I am all for putting a "somewhat" prominent unsubscribe button/link at the top of the message. I'm a big believer that if a subscriber wants to be removed, they are not going to search for the unsub link; instead, they'll opt to "Mark as Spam/Junk."
This is always a tough conversation to have with my clients as they say..."Why would we make it easy for people to leave? There is a cost to add them." My reply - the cost of "mark as spam" is much higher than the lost opportunity cost.
What do you think?
dj at bronto
DJ, if people want to leave, they're going to leave, whether you make it easy for them or not. I think you're exactly right about the cost of getting spam compliants vs. losing people through an unsub.
I've tried unsubscribing from the CompUSA email for three weeks now, and each time it says that I will receive and email when my status has changed.
I'm really annoyed with this, and calling them will not do anything directly. They will ask you to email a specific email address to be removed. I asked the customer rep, 'So what you are saying is the unsubscribe form doesn't work?' She refused to answer one way or another.
To make things worse, I use unique email addresses (via a domain email catch all) and can clearly see when a website passes email addresses to spammers. In all the years I've done this, the only time I had this happen was with TigerDirect. I made a purchase with them, 5 days later, this email address which never existed in all of mankind suddenly starts receiving SpamAssassin 20+ rated spam.
I called TigerDirect, spoke with someone that denied that the sell email addresses and went on trying to educate me that 'everyone and their grandmothers know that just having an email address means you will get spam.' He then got angry and tried tracing my phone number (which was the wrong number) and began insisting I was someone else - in fact gave out the name , phone number, and address of this other customer. Nice privacy policy!
I only told him the day that I made the purchase. The odd thing was after I mentioned lawsuits and said that he'd be hearing back from me, the spam stopped to this unique email address. It was quite telling. For a year now, no email has been received at that address, when between the time of order and my call, I was getting a number of spam emails a day.
Why does this concern CompUSA? Because SystemMax owns both CompUSA and TigerDirect.
I would love a class action lawsuit to happen. Think of the number of customers and the settlement would be enough to show these companies that they can not abuse their customers in this way.
Catchall,
I'm not sure what's going on in your case, but I've had a very different experience with TigerDirect, as well as pre-acquisition CompUSA. While working on my just-released Retail Email Unsubscribe Benchmark Study, my unsubscribe requests to both TigerDirect and CompUSA were honored immediately. It's possible that there are integration/migration issues resulting from the acquisition that are causing the problems you're experiencing--which is no excuse, of course.
Regarding spam, I use non-circulated email addresses to do all of my campaign tracking and I receive no malicious spam. That's not to say that I don't receive spam. I certainly do, and have written about these breeches of permission several times (including this reportlet: http://retailemail.blogspot.com/2007/08/reportlet-division-of-permission.html). But that spam has always come from the sister brands and partners of the retailers that I track, not from malicious spammers.
Considering that you've tried to opt out and have even called them, I'd say just mark their email as spam and be done with them. That's your right. It's your inbox. If they can't get their systems to function properly, it's not something you have to suffer.
Good luck.
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