Direct marketing is advertising sent directly to customers without intermediaries. Direct email marketing is cheaper and more targeted than telemarketing and direct mail, but has guidelines and penalties. The CAN-SPAM Act requires accurate information, opt-out options, and prohibits email harvesting. Experts recommend opting-in and not buying or selling email lists.
Direct marketing refers to advertising that travels directly from a business to its customers without intermediaries. This type of marketing has several advantages: first, it can be more specifically targeted than, say, buying advertising that the firm’s customers may or may not engage with; second, it can be monitored to see how effective it is. Flyers and catalogs sent by snail mail are more traditional types of direct marketing. Direct email marketing is a newer approach where promotional materials are sent via email.
Direct email marketing has some advantages over telemarketing and direct mail. First of all, it costs less than both. This means businesses can send out more marketing messages and tailor them to different segments of their audience. Secondly, it is not subject to global cuts, the way telemarketers of any kind can be stopped by subscribing to the national do not call list.
However, email direct marketing has guidelines, rules and penalties that are not in effect for mailings sent via the United States Postal Service. It is important that anyone planning to start a direct email marketing campaign is familiar with both the law and currently accepted best practices. The former will help prevent the company from being labeled a spammer. The second will help keep the company in the good graces of its customers.
In 2003, the CAN-SPAM Act (Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act) was passed. It included some requirements for commercial email senders, a definition of commercial spam, and an explanation of penalties for spam. According to CAN-SPAM, a direct marketing email can be commercial spam if it has four characteristics: it must be sent in bulk, contain nearly identical if not identical messages, be unsolicited by the user, and be a – emails of a commercial nature. Email with these characteristics is known as unsolicited commercial email or UCE.
CAN-SPAM requires the use of accurate subject and header information, the presence of opt-out options, and the inclusion of the sender’s physical mailing address, along with a clear statement that the message is commercial in nature. Furthermore, you are prohibited from harvesting emails by harvesting them from websites, using scripts or other means to automatically register accounts, creating recipient email addresses by permutation, or using a computer or network to forward emails without the owner’s permission . Experts go further. They say CAN-SPAM is just the bare minimum and honest, honest merchants should opt-in, rather than opt-out; do not buy or sell email lists; and be clear about the opt-in and what the results of the opt-in will be.
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