Email spam costs companies $712 annually for each employee in lost time. Fortunately readers are receiving less spam for the third year in a row thanks to a variety of factors including the CAN-SPAM Act and the efforts of ISP’s to block and report spam messages.
What is the CAN-SPAM Act?
On January 1, 2004 The Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act, or The CAN-SPAM Act, became effective giving the Federal Trade Commission power to establish guidelines for email marketing and to punish those who broke those guidelines.
The CAN-SPAM Act established the following guidelines for emails.
• False or misleading header information is banned. The “From,” “To,” and routing information must be accurate and identify the person who sent the email.
• Deceptive subject lines are prohibited. The subject line of an email cannot mislead the recipient as to what the content of the email contains
• Every email must contain an opt-out method. Each email must have some sort of email address or function that allows readers to opt out of future emails. This can be done through a menu opting out of certain kinds of emails, but the sender must honor the request to be removed. The opt-out function must remain live for 30 days after an email was sent, and the law allows only 10 days to stop emails being sent to unsubscribed email addresses. You cannot have others send to that address or sell or transfer the unsubscribed email address unless you are transferring it so another entity can legally comply.
• Commercial email must be identified as an advertisement and must include the sender’s valid physical postal address. There must be an obvious notice that the message is for advertising purposes and the receiver can opt out as desired. It must also contain a valid physical address.
Effects of Spam
Spam can destroy not only your reputation, but your business as well. If you are reported as sending spam, you can find your email addresses blocked, your websites shut down and you might even discover a notice about legal fines or a court hearing. Even if you find a way to get away with spam or something very close to it, it is not worth it.
Effective Email Marketing
True email marketing is based on relationships and trust. The value of email marketing comes not through a quick sale generated by spam, but by the ongoing relationship and business from a respected consumer. Your email campaigns should be positive, honest, and designed to grow your business and reputation, not to deceive customers or label yourself and your business as unprofessional and illegal.
Here are the steps to take for an effective email marketing campaign:
- Choose a quality email marketing solution. Here’s a free guide to choose the right email marketing solution for your needs.
- Start building your email list. Avoid buying a junk email list, build it from scratch.
- Prepare a nice newsletter with branding in mind, be consistent. Keep the mainframe of the newsletter template same for each campaign.
- Do not only send promotional offers, coupons, etc. Always include something useful. A tip, some nice content, some news, etc.
- Put yourself in the recipient’s position. Would you keep reading your newsletter? Make it interesting, not boring.
- Build the trust, and relationship first, think about making profit from your email list later.
When you have a nice email list which was built overtime with trust and relationship, the profits will start pouring. So, be patient and start working on your email campaign, and remember to stay away from email spam.
Ahmet Kirtok is a NYC based business owner, and online marketing expert. He writes product and web services reviews, you can also visit his personal site http://www.kirtok.com
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Ahmet_Kirtok
Posted in Internet and Businesses Online |