Do You Get Too Many Outdoor Marketing Emails?
No one wants to be bombarded by emails from the same company all week long or even a few times a week. It leaves a very negative impression.
I learned that when I worked for an email newsletter provider that was a precursor to MailChimp and Constant Contact, which are the email engines that blast out newsletters for millions of businesses. I managed multiple groups including software development, product management, data center operations, client services, and email deliverability.
Our clients paid us to assemble newsletters for them, get them past spam filters, and into the inboxes of their email subscribers. But our success was determined by how many recipients opened the email, what they read, and the offers in the newsletter which they purchased.
What we found across 10’s of thousands of customers is that you’ll get the best business results if you send out a newsletter once a week on a regular schedule. If you do that, recipients will remain subscribers, they’ll look forward to getting your newsletter, and they’ll act on its contents. Over-communicate and they’ll unsubscribe and cut you off.
I’m writing about this because I, and I suspect you, have spent the past 6 weeks being bombarded by near daily emails from outdoor retailers, gear manufacturers, and the outdoor media. It’s been relentless and left me with a very negative impression about some companies.
But regular SectionHiker newsletter subscribers know that I only send out one newsletter each week. That’s how I’ve rolled since I started sending out a weekly newsletter 10 years ago. The contents of that email include hyperlinks to the articles (usually 5-6) I published on the website during the preceeding week.
You have to understand my perspective. I like having regular readers because I enjoy the comments they leave on the website, they teach me things I didn’t know, and I enjoy the relationships I form with them.
So if you want a hiking and backpacking newsletter you can look forward to each week, subscribe to the weekly SectionHiker newsletter.
I thought I’d get that off my chest.
Long time SH newsletter subscriber. Love your weekly emails.
Couldn’t agree with you more about getting to many emails. Biggest culprits include hyperlite mountain gear, garage grown gear, six moon designs, treeline review,, black diamond. Unsubscribed from them all and will not do business with them again.
But what really ticks me off is getting emails from backcountry.com and amazon about items I looked at but decided not to buy. Big brother is watching you! Super creepy.
and add Outdoor Research to that list also!
I think you’re right about the lack of performance measurement. I’m shocked that they’re not measuring subscriber retention. Lazy marketing. Says a lot about the value they place on customer loyalty.
I would like to get something off my chest to regarding e-mail newsletters. Even though I deliberately subscribe to a Newsletter by checking the box, I still get an annoying popup box asking me to subscribe to the newsletter. Grrr.
That’s ultimately a privacy issue. They can’t know who you are unless you log in and these days that means handing over your phone number so they can “verify” you, when in reality they just data mine your number to learn everything there is about you.
The most annoying aspect, which has been particularly egregious from Backcountry, REI, and some knife retailers, is the constant bombardment of closeout or holiday sales. Are they really sales if they’ve been ongoing for months? Who are they tricking at this point? It’s like they’ve all decided the local car and furniture marketing commercials are the best approach.
Solve: make a Gmail rule that moves them all into an a category tag “outdoor companies”, check it once a week.
This season has been awful. Even though I NEVER, EVER, check the box that says “Please send me portions and marketing updates”, they spam me anyway. Who checks that box ? Worse is when you click on “unsubscribe ”, and they ignore it. Sometimes they say won’t take effect for a few weeks, really, what kind of technology are they using, paper and pencil ? Cabelas in particular is offensive, I get 2-3 promotions a day from them, after checking unsubscribe many times. Yes this touched a nerve. They seem to forget I am the customer, and most outdoor stuff is a commodity you can find at many retailers…
“Sometimes they say won’t take effect for a few weeks, really, what kind of technology are they using, paper and pencil ”
Good question! :-)
Unfortunately, my credit card statement proves that they work!