This morning I received an email after I sent out an invitation for a webcast to all the addresses I painstakingly collected over the last years (really, we don’t buy addresses).
Him: „Where did you get my email address.“
Me: „From your website.“
Him: „Please remove the email address!“
… I was very close to answer: „Sure, send me the password for your web server.“
… or: „Sure, because now I have your personal email address!“
Or this afternoon I filled out one of these contact sheets. This is the header of the confirmation email, which contained all the information I provided:
„Thank you for your request. A message with the information you provided will be sent to the email you provided.“
Now, they sent me an email to the address I provided with the information’s I provided, to tell me, that they are going to send me an email to the email address I provided, with all the information I provided.
That’s a terminal case of routine-blindness.
PS: If somebody is interested in the Collax Webcast, go here.
I think what he meant was „Please remove the email address from your list“.
If the recipient is in the US, you need to be CAN-SPAM compliant. That means have a working removal process (e.g. a link to click) as well as name and physical address of the party sending the email (i.e. you/your
company).
I was very active in the anti-spam area some years ago, and most anti-spammers consider manual email harvesting as bad as if you use bots. Email harvesting is actually not allowed in some jurisdiction, I think Europe is one of those.
Remember, as the mantra goes: „spam is not about content, it is about consent“. Spam is the popular name for UCE (Unsolicited Commercial Email) and UBE (Unsolicited Bulk Email).
Simple test:
* Is it sent withouth them requesting it to be sent?
* Is it of commercial nature?
* Is it bulk, i.e. identical or almost identical content to multiple reciepients?
If your answer is „yes“ to at least two of the questions above, it is spam.
If they sign up for information, make sure you use confirmed opt-in. And make sure you save the confirmations.
http://www.spamhaus.org/faq/answers.lasso?section=Marketing FAQs#15
****I think what he meant was “Please remove the email address from your list”.****
Really? Just for the record: I KNOW THAT. THAT WAS THE FUNNY PART!
As anybody else, we get addresses through the many personal contacts we have. Once in a while, people change in companies, email addresses change and things like that just happen also to addresses you contacted before. OK?
And BTW, we are CAN-SPAM compliant. Happy now? And Europe is not a country. It’s a continent.
In the first case you just spammed the person. The fact that an emailaddress is listed on a website does not make it right to send it unsolicited commercial invitations. If you harvested it manualy or with a bot is not relevant IMHO.
Just my 2 eurocents.
I give up. Since you all know better what happend, no matter if you miss the other 90% knowledge about the situation, I leave it at that.
I am a bad boy. Happy now?