Is Bulk Email Internet Marketing Still Spam?

Search for ‘bulk email internet marketing’ in Wikipedia and you’ll be redirected to an article on email spam. Unfortunately, bulk email and spam are interchangeable terms these days, owing to methods which have annoyed and infuriated internet users for many years. However, new tools and techniques allow marketers to email en masse without fear of receiving accusations of spam, in return. 

A brief definition of spam

Let’s start off by defining spam, how it’s different from newsletter marketing and not always the same as bulk or mass mailing.

Spam is junk and always unsolicited (the magic word here). We define spam as unsolicited bulk email (UBE), commonly when the same message is sent to many hundreds or thousands of recipients without their permission. We liken this email to spam, a fairly disgusting luncheon meat known as being ever present, and hard to avoid, as depicted in a famous Monty Python sketch. 

Separating spam from mass emailing 

There’s nothing wrong with emailing a lot of people all at once, as long as they expect it. But if they don’t, you could be treading in hot legal water. This is why opt-in permission subscription is so important, where a person wishing to subscribe to communications not only provides their email address willingly, but also click ‘yes’ to a confirmation email (double opt-in).

Different countries define spam and the seeking of permission differently. For example, in Australia controls are tighter – people must give their express ‘opt-in’ permission for certain mailings. In Switzerland the lines are a little fuzzier – it’s possible to send a newsletter to someone who provided their email address for something else.

Surprisingly, in the US, spam is actually legal according to CAM-SPAM legislation, as long as it has a truthful subject line, no forged information and other stipulations.

In Europe, the rules concerning spam are contained within the Directive on Privacy and Electronic Communications click here for bed time reading, the same set of laws that govern cookies and the treatment of traffic data. 

Is newsletter marketing spam? How can we avoid spamming people?

Again, not if you seek the correct level of permission. MailChimp offers excellent opt-in subscription features by default, giving you an iron clad defence against spam accusations. However, if you’re doing things right, you shouldn’t need to defend yourself. 

To avoid spamming people when bulk email internet marketing, follow these tips:

• Don’t buy your subscribers – it is possible to buy lists of email addresses, but this really defeats the point of modern online marketing, especially Inbound Marketing where we seek to provide value, build reputation and have followers spread our communications for us.

• Use a reputable email system – MailChimp is pretty hot on preventing spam, and will ask you each time you subscribe anyone manually whether or not you have permission to do so. We’ve known it to lock accounts when too many emails are added all at once, in too short a time. These features are designed to protect everyone from both sending inadvertently and receiving spam. If you do things correctly, you shouldn’t have to worry about being frozen out.

• Use double opt-in permission marketing – as mentioned above, this is an inherent feature of the more reputable email systems, and requires that the wannabe subscriber confirm their subscription by replying to an email.

• Be clear about what people are signing up to – if you have lead capture forms on your landing pages, clearly state that you may use contact details for other communications. Also make it clear that you’ll treat email addresses as confidential and not sell them off to third parties.

My mass emails are legitimate, but are being blocked. Why?

Many email clients sit behind effective spam filters, perhaps a little too effective. There are certain words, for example, that if found in your email subject line will result in it being sent to the junk folder. 

You can find a list of 100 such trigger words and phrases here on the Mannix Marketing blog, or you can read a MailChimp article on avoiding spam filters. MailChimp has a subject line tester that’s kept up-to-date and will inform you of any potential filtering problems, such as: 

• Using too many exclamation marks!!!!!!!
• WRITING EVERYTHING IN CAPS
• Bright red or green fonts
• Including the word ‘test’
• Sending to multiple people in the same company (i.e. with the same email domain) all at once

Is lead nurturing spam?

Lead nurturing – automated follow-up emails, triggered when someone signs-up for an offer or downloads something behind a form – is not spam, if you tell people to expect it and personalise as much as possible.

There will always be some people who receive such emails and think of complaining, which is why it is so important to refine your communications and target people with highly relevant information.

If someone downloaded an ebook on social media, your follow-up lead nurturing emails must refer to that and provide something useful – interesting blog articles, an ebook that accompanies the original, and so on. 

To wrap things up and answer our original question, bulk email is more than just spam, if you define it correctly, seek permission and provide value. To find out how you can incorporate mass email marketing into your next campaign, get in touch with Versio2 and we’ll be happy to tell you about the tools we use, including the HubSpot Inbound Marketing platform.