How much e-trash do you eat?

Sitting around on a conference call at the moment, discussing the value of direct (intrusive, interrupt) emails for marketing and PR purposes. To me, the difference between the SPAM and the thousands of “newsletters” I receive each week is starting to disappear with each passing email because supposedly informative newsletters I signed up for “to keep in touch” are used for nothing more than to slam me with crap I need to buy (“Today, and if I call in the next 15 minutes…”)

Now, don’t get me wrong, I am not suggesting newsletters need to be free of advertising or that advertising shouldn’t be showcased prominently – something needs to pay for the quality content I get delivered conveniently into my Inbox. However, it is pretty obvious when the only reason the newsletter exists is for you to sell shit. That’s fine too, when it comes from some cupon site or deals site, but if I signed up for your organization and gave you permission to email me to give me the news about what you are up to please have some respect and throw in a little news around your ads and promotions?

I clear out my newsletter folder every Friday, I get on the average of 700 messages a week. I am constantly feeding it one professional newsletter organization after another because I have found it that even the most reputable of companies will keep on sending you news and promotions even after you’ve signed up. Most also tie directly to the email you use to make purchases or maintain login information, so there is no escaping those. So my pile of e-trash grows.

So what is OWN to do..

I’d like to know if you read newsletters. If you do, drop me an email (vlad@vladville.com) or contact form.

Statistically speaking, we know people don’t read our newsletters. Oh, there are people that open our newsletters but they are pretty much the same people that already subscribe to our two blogs and are information junkies, or they are like me – open it just long enough to delete it.