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The Evolution of the Canadian E-mail List Market
By Don Lange
Direct Marketing News
January 2002 — The e-mail list rental business is growing in Canada and with that growth has come the inevitable evolution from trying to find e-mail lists to trying find ones that respond.Until recently, most of the lists that have been available in Canada have been a multi-compilation of several different interest categories all lumped together in a database under some catchy names (the "Affirmative Partner Interest Category Raise Your Hand if You're Interested in Finance/Pets/Whatever Co-Op").
Most list professionals know that lists that are created for the sole purpose to be lists generally are the poorest responding. The best responding lists are those that have demonstrated some true affinity to a subject, interest, philosophy or category. These lists are generally by-products of a business more closely associated with traditional mailing lists- magazine subscribers, catalogue buyers, in-depth consumer product surveys, industry associations, etc. The owners of these lists have an almost maternal relationship with the people on their lists because for the most part the labour to produce these names was long, hard and expensive.
Invariably when more traditional list owners make their lists available for rental purposes a maternal instinct kicks in. It's almost like sending your kids go away to university. On the one hand it sounds great to have a room to convert to a den. On the other hand, only parents feel that special protectiveness with their own children so maybe it would be better if they just stayed at home.
Nonetheless, more and more traditional list owners are making their e-mail lists available and are beginning to look long and hard at the "details" of what this might mean with respect to privacy, revenue, and basic management requirements in light of some of the mixed messages that have been delivered to the marketplace.
Privacy
The Opt-In/Double Opt-In/Opt-Out DebateIf you ask most individuals in the e-mail business they will tell you that before you can ever communicate with a customer or prospect by e-mail you should receive either an "opt-in" approval or even a "double opt-in" approval.
This sounds like the people putting together these lists are highly conscientious. However, the truth of the matter is most opt/double opt-in lists are disguising a very fragile bond between the people on the list and the people who have put it together.
Whether to Opt-in or Opt-out continues to raise debate. Opting in a customer simply means that that they have to perform some sort of action in and around their sign-up information that indicates that they are ready and willing to receive communication by e-mail. Usually this means that they get to "check" a box or boxes with the different options. If their names are going to be rented to third party advertisers then this fact is specifically cited in and around some dressed up sentence along the lines "please check here if you want to receive offers from 3rd parties".
The so-called double opt-in was actually first invented to double-check if the e-mail address was valid. The thinking was if you told someone that they would receive an e-mail validating their request and then they didn't, they would take the time to re-enter their information more carefully. It was simply expedient to tell the world that double opt-in was to really ensure that one's privacy was being double-checked. This was such a good story that some companies who double opt-in now really are doing it for privacy reasons.
Providing customers with an "opt-out" more closely follows the direct mail model. In most cases, it is essentially the same as an opt-in except the check box providing consent is already checked. In some cases the user has to follow a more arduous procedure such as finding the privacy page and e-mailing requests from there. But, again for the most part, most list owners like to keep the opt-out in people's faces and will often send a "scout" e-mail telling people on their list about their intentions.
Using a straight up comparison the opt-in is definitely the better way to go. However if you do decide to go with an opt-out, the message should be very clear and prominent - the scout e-mail is best but will cost the charge for the e-mail broadcast.
The Customer Perception
Here's a typical scenario. I surf a site about 6 months ago and end up leaving my e-mail address because I want to be kept up-to-date on some subject or another. Now 6 months later I receive an e-mail that has a lead message that reads "When you visited us on DealDog.com you gave us permission to send you items of interest." What usually follows is a life insurance offer or some other offer that has no affinity to either me or the site where I left my e-mail address (and probably double-opted-in). Is this privacy compliant? It sure is, all the privacy advocates would be thrilled about the double opt-in. Will it respond? Probably not.Revenue
This is always a tough conversation to have with list owners. The hard truth is unless you have a list of extremely vertically targeted individuals in which there are lots of companies seeking to market to (don't count your competitors, you'll decline their orders) your list is not worth a million dollars. Truth be told, your list is probably not worth what the going rate is for e-mail lists - which is about $250/M to $350/M.I can think of few lists that would command huge dollars per thousand except perhaps for professionals such as physicians
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