Small businesses turning to spam
I’ve noticed a disturbing trend in the last few weeks and months. As the economy continues its downward spiral, more and more small businesses are turning to email marketing through harvested lists. I’m not talking about shady unknowns hocking “enlargement” remedies to lists of millions of addresses being sent through open botnets of open relays. These are small, local “mom and pop” type businesses harvesting more targeted lists of a few thousand emails. While their desperation may be understandable, this tactic dances a fine line and often crosses over into the realm of being blatantly illegal. Their actions can even be more annoying than bulk spammers since their messages are less likely to be picked up by anti-spam filters. This means more clutter and crap in your inbox.
For years, I have run an opt-in email list for my small side business. I’ve been careful to only include people who subscribe and immediately (automatically) remove unsubscribe requests. This has become one of the most valuable assets to my business. So much so that I’ve found myself more than once in the awkward spot of having to turn down requests from people wanting to send their information to it. It’s this kind of value that small businesses in tight times are looking to take advantage of. Unfortunately, many have not spent the time to build a solid opt-in list in the good economic times. Now they are turning to email harvesting as a quick solution.
Unfortunately, many small businesses do not know the legalities behind their actions. At least this is what I want to think. It’s rather disturbing to think that there are small “mom and pop” shops that know the legalities and simply don’t care. However, I’m sure that this is a case for at least a few. Regardless, the fact is, harvesting email address is at best unethical and at worst illegal. I am not a lawyer, but the CAN-SPAM act of 2003 places many restriction on how email addresses can be obtained. The best advice I can give to small businesses is to play safe by only adding people to your email list that have requested to sign up (opt-in). You don’t have to view this as a hurdle to your potential marketing campaign. Offer lots of ways people can subscribe and give them incentives to opt-in. In time, you’ll have a solid and legit marketing base.
The reality of the situation is, many small businesses are not doing this. They are openly creating lists of any email addresses they can find or get access to. My inbox is stating to fill with small business spam. Many I know have harvested my address since they are in relation to some keyword I have on one of my web sites. Many are even using legitimate email services such as Constant Contact or Topica to send their “newsletters” from. This is a clear violation of these companies terms of service.
So why is this allowed to happen? Small businesses are often just to small time for government agencies to go after under the CAN-SPAM act. There are bigger fish to fry and the large majority of small time spammers go undetected. In a sense, this is not a bad thing. If the government was too aggressive, then it would put undue pressure on people running legitimate lists who many not have legal access to ensure they are 100% in the clear. However, since many of these small time spammers use email list services, there are courses of action to take. Many of these email services will gladly shut down harvest lists under their terms of service if only people bring this to their attention.
So what can you do as someone getting annoyed by an inbox full of junk? Here are a few tips:
1. Avoid getting your email harvested in the first place. Most legitimate email lists will clearly advertise themselves as such. This way you know what you are subscribing to and you are indicating you want updates from them. Watch out for forms that ask for your email address and you don’t know why they need it. If you don’t want updates from them, and they don’t need to communicate with you by email, then don’t give out your address. Web sites often use email addresses as identifiers for accounts and posting. This is normal and most will not display your address. However, look around the site and see if any of their other users have exposed email address. If so, you may want to reconsider entering it.
2. Watch our for social networks. Sites like Facebook will often expose your email address to people in your friends network. Many small businesses will friend you to gain access to it. Be sure you know the people you are becoming friends with or at least only friend people who you want updates (possibly email updates) from.
3. Once you get spam from small businesses, check to make sure you didn’t subscribe to their email list and forget. Remember, this could be a “mom and pop” shop. You don’t want to hurt their legitimate marketing line because you forgot you actually did subscribe to it. If you are unsure, then look for an unsubscribe link. All legit email lists should have it. If you want off the list, then use it.
4. If you know you didn’t subscribe to the list, then report them. Don’t reply to the email. This only tells the person on the other end that you are a valid email address and you may end up with more spam. Instead, look to see if there is an unsubscribe link. If there is not, then click the “report spam” button in your email program. If you are with a large email provider, this will help filter messages like this in the future. If there is unsubscribe information, chances are the email was sent through a service. Sometimes the service is clearly listed at the bottom of the email. Other times, you might have to hover over the unsubscribe link to get the web site of the email originator. Go to the service’s web site and find/search for an abuse address. Most all legit email marketing services will have one. Forward the email to the abuse contact and indicate to them that you did not subscribe to the email and you believe your email has been harvested. This will allow the service to investigate and possibly remove the offender if they violated their terms of service.
It takes time to build legitimate email marketing campaigns. In these difficult times, many are looking for shortcuts at the expense of you and I. While it seems minor that we get a few unsolicited email from small time businesses, imagine if all the little shops you pass on the way to work could communicate to your email inbox. It would start to become hard to find that email from your dear Aunt Sally inviting you over for some of her homemade apple pie. It’s time to send a message to small businesses that there are acceptable and unacceptable ways of running their advertising.
