By now, I thought it was universally accepted that anyone who sends bulk commercial email is better off using a fully configured email-marketing platform instead of blasting from Outlook.
However, I keep running into the same old excuses from people who must be in serious denial about their email marketing efficiency and results.
Yes, you physically can send email from your Outlook or other individual email client. That doesn't mean you should do it.
The few dollars you save by sending bulk email through a desktop client or a home-grown solution that was current when Bill Clinton was still president is more than offset by the opportunity cost of lost potential business and customer ill will.
These are my four favorite excuses:
1. Email marketing really means spam.
Oh, and sending the same commercial message to everyone in your Outlook contact list is fine, even your kid's soccer coach, who has no interest at all in your travel agency's last-minute deals?
Maybe you don't think of your messages as email marketing in the conventional sense. But, just because you're not a Fortune 500 company, that doesn't make your sales-solicitation email or fund-raising request any less commercial.
After all, CAN-SPAM doesn't exempt small businesses or nonprofits from following the regulations for commercial email.
Let's also consider the modern-day version of spam. It isn't just unsolicited email sent by shadowy figures using forged IP addresses. People now define spam as any email they don't want, even opt-in email.
So, even though you might have explicit permission to email everyone in your contact list, they aren't all going be interested in everything you email. Can you segment your list to send only relevant email? Probably not, unless you spend hours combing your list. So, you're the spammer now.
2. Sending messages through an email platform is really impersonal. I want my customers to think I'm emailing each one personally.
Mmmmm, yeah. Let's go back to your soccer coach. If your email doesn't refer to the practice schedule or picture night, he's probably not interested in your travel deals.
Now, let's look more closely at that message. How are you sending it? With 150 names in the To: or CC: field? Oh, yes, very personal.
People really hate that -- not just seeing their own email address broadcast to a bunch of strangers but also having to scroll down through six or eight inches of code to see what you want. And then you offend them because the message is you inviting them to yet another kitchenware party or listing your latest ink and toner deals.
Don't think you're off the hook because you figured out how to use the BCC: field (the one under the CC: field in the address form of an email message). Sure, that shows only one address in the To: field when your recipient opens it up, and it sort of looks personalized. But, ISPs are still likely to block or junk-folder any email with 50 or more addresses in any of the fields as possible spam.
We really have two issues here:
- You're still sending commercial messages to people who didn't ask to get them from you, no matter how much they might love you in real life.
- You're using an email client that was never designed to handle bulk email. It doesn't send email at the same capacity, and it doesn't automate a lot of the email drudge work, like adding or removing addresses or processing bounced emails.
3. My IT guy will get mad at me if I stop using the home-brewed system he wrote when he was learning Perl scripting back in 1999.
Too bad. He's not the one using it. It's your email program, your budget, your department, and your neck if you don't get the kind of results that the people in the corner office or executive suite expect from you.
In fact, I will bet he spends a lot more time fixing problems with that antiquated email platform than he admits. Buy him a box of doughnuts and tell him you're going to lessen his workload. I promise, he'll get over it fast.
Plus, the email world has evolved since 1999. Email clients and platforms have changed along with it. Customer expectations are higher now, and much more is expected of you as a sender. If you're still emailing like it's 1999, you might even be doing yourself more harm than good.
4. I run a small business and I don't send enough email to justify the expense.
Surprise! Small to medium businesses are the fastest-growing segment of email platform users.
While you're loading text messages listing your real-estate agency's weekend open houses into your Outlook client, your competition up the road or even in the next office is pulling data from his website into a professionally designed template, optimized to reduce spam triggers and to render correctly no matter how his recipients view the message.
Who's got the competitive edge?
For all you know, your own industry niche can even help you upgrade to a professional platform for email marketing. If you're a multi-level marketer or franchise holding, it's worth checking out.
Home-party marketers like Pampered Chef and Creative Memories give their affiliates access to proprietary email-marketing clients with all the features and capabilities of the big email service providers. They don't want to deal with the hassles of self-administered email, and neither should you.
But maybe you think you have an ironclad excuse for continuing to blast out email from your desktop client. Bring it on! I'll bet you that box of doughnuts that ponying up for an email-marketing platform is still the better solution.
Wendy Roth is the senior manager of training services for Lyris Technologies.
