Tuesday, July 03, 2012

AM Inbox: Permission to re-permission?

The Retail Email Blog monitors the email marketing campaigns of more than 100 top online retailers. Here are highlights from my inbox this morning:

Chadwicks — An Exclusive Invitation + 20% Off
Chadwicks is trying to lure back old subscribers, but the circumstances have me scratching my head a little. In general, if someone unsubscribes, they you really shouldn’t be emailing them to try to win them back—although you can use other channels such as direct mail to try to regain email permission. However, in my case, I never opted out. Without warning late last year, they suddenly stopped sending me emails, which I had been receiving every other day, so they hadn’t down-throttled me before dropping me. So technically they still have permission to email me, but it’s odd that they’re trying to win me back when they dropped me. It’s unclear if this is an effort to re-permission subscribers who were accidently dropped because of a technical snafu or poorly executed inactivity program, but I would urge marketers not to use email to re-permission subscribers who opt-out. Unsubscribing means you no longer have permission to email them.

July 2012 Chadwicks email

SUBJECTIVITY SCANNER: Select noteworthy subject lines
Musician’s Friend, 7/2 — Save On American-Made and Retro-Inspired Gear
Northern Tool, 7/2 — 4th Of July Sale - Save On Products Made In The USA
Cooking.com, 7/2 — Fourth of July Dessert Recipes: From Cherry Pie to Classic Chocolate
Norm Thompson, 7/2 — Ssss-Bang-Boom! Savings to Celebrate!
J. Jill, 7/2 — Star-spangled savings! Up to 75% off + free shipping.
Blue Nile, 7/2 — Plan Your Summer Proposal with the Perfect Ring
Brookstone, 7/2 — POOL CLOSEOUT... deck out your pool and save
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