Posted by  Sid Liebenson, EVP, Director of Marketing

In my last post I raised the issue of how marketers who should be using e-mail to enhance customer relationships are, in many cases, mis-using the medium and actually annoying customers.

So let’s examine the problem more closely.  According to Forrester Research, eight out of ten broadband users delete most commercial e-mail with out reading it, and six out of ten say most e-mail offers nothing of interest.  Marketers that think their company’s e-mail messages and e-newsletters are eagerly anticipated should dream on.  Today’s inboxes are quickly filling up, and patience is wearing thin.  Nowhere is this more evident that in the workplace.

If you are like me, you get plenty of commercial e-mails and e-newsletters every day.  I subscribe to quite a lot of trade magazines and research sources.  Nearly every one sends a daily newsletter.  Several of them send various daily newsletters based on industry segment or media channel.  Once in a while I find something of relevance, but not most of the time.  And these e-newsletters are multiplying like rabbits.  I’ve finally had to say no to a few of them.  I’m willing to risk missing something that might be interesting just to avoid more time reviewing and deleting e-newsletters.  I’d rather just search for information when I need it.

Mind you, my job requires me to keep up with information relevant to our agency and our clients.  I doubt I’d be so forgiving otherwise.  And when it comes to vendor e-mail, I’m not.  And I’m not alone.

E-mail usability studies conducted by Alertbox show the inbox environment to be ruthless.  People are stressed and fast when they process new messages.  Low relevancy equals immediate deletion.  Having your low-quality messages deleted is an unfortunate fate.  But the long-term impact is even worse; your future messages may not even be opened.  Once users are trained to expect uselessness, they stop paying attention.