StatShare, a must read for all email marketing pros.
Subscribe Now!
""If it's statistics you want, always start with EmailStatCenter.com, a clearinghouse for email metrics"
- "The Email Diva", MediaPost's Email Insider"
Spam
The CAN-SPAM Act: Requirements for Commercial Emailers
Effective January 1, 2004What the Law Requires
Here's a rundown of the law's main provisions:It bans false or misleading header information. Your email's "From," "To," and routing information - including the originating domain name and email address - must be accurate and identify the person who initiated the email.
It prohibits deceptive subject lines. The subject line cannot mislead the recipient about the contents or subject matter of the message.
It requires that your email give recipients an opt-out method. You must provide a return email address or another Internet-based response mechanism that allows a recipient to ask you not to send future email messages to that email address, and you must honor the requests. You may create a "menu" of choices to allow a recipient to opt out of certain types of messages, but you must include the option to end any commercial messages from the sender.
It requires that commercial email be identified as an advertisement and include the sender's valid physical postal address. Your message must contain clear and conspicuous notice that the message is an advertisement or solicitation and that the recipient can opt out of receiving more commercial email from you. It also must include your valid physical postal address.
- Source: FTC's CAN-SPAM webpage.
FTC Revises Compliance Rules for Can Spam
The Federal Trade Commission has approved several changes to Can Spam regulations concerning compliance requirements for opting out of email lists.
New rules prohibit charging fees to opt out of email lists, or requiring individuals to provide any more information other than their email address and opt out preferences.
The changes also specify that individuals seeking to opt out of lists must be able to accomplish this task by simply sending a reply email message or by visiting a single Web page.
Another revision now allows email senders to use postal addresses and P.O. boxes as return addresses.
- Source: Direct Magazine
21% of all respondents said they use the "report spam" button to unsubscribe even though the email is not technically spam. - MarketingSherpa "Email Marketing Benchmark Guide 2008" (2008)
39% of all respondents said they used the "report spam" button often or very often. - MarketingSherpa "Email Marketing Benchmark Guide 2008" (2008)
B2B subscribers are twice as likely to consider email "spam" if it comes "too frequently." - MarketingSherpa (2007)
53% of consumers say email is irrelevant - David Daniels, Vice Presidnet, JupiterResearch (Dec. 2007)
40% of consumers say email comes too often - David Daniels, Vice Presidnet, JupiterResearch (Dec. 2007)
26% of consumer unsubscribe using spam button - David Daniels, Vice Presidnet, JupiterResearch (Dec. 2007)
7% of the companies surveyed continued to send messages after 10 days (from which they opted out of their email program), which is a violation of the federal Can-Spam Act. - Silverpop (2007)
30% of the companies surveyed continued to send messages for several days to people after they opted out of their programs. - Silverpop (2007)
Inbox providers, such as Yahoo, AOL and Gmail, all use the percentage of people who hit the "report spam" button for a particular sender as the No. 1 gage in considering whether to deliver incoming email to users' inboxes or not. - Direct Magazine (2007)
By all accounts, any sender who gets a complaint rate higher than 0.5% will have serious delivery issues at these ISPs. - Direct Magazine (2007)
53% say they received less spam than they did last year -- the third consecutive year in which most respondents reported a reduction. - Epsilon (2007)
30% say they use spam complaint mechanisms, while two-thirds of them equate reporting spam with unsubscribing from marketers' email programs. - Epsilon (2007)
20 percent of respondents admit to using the "report spam" button to unsubscribe. - Email Sender and Provider Coalition (2007)
More than 8 out of 10 email users have used the "report spam" button in their email clients' interfaces. - Email Sender and Provider Coalition (2007)
Nine out of 10 email users want a universal "unsubscribe" button in their email clients' interfaces, one that would send an unsubscribe request from the receiving email server to the sender's database. - Email Sender and Provider Coalition (2007)
The Spam epidemic is costing U.S. businesses $712 for each employee in lost worker productivity. - Nucleus Research (2007)
Two out of every three email messages received by today's business users are spam. - Nucleus Research (2007)
Users are spending 16 seconds identifying and deleting each spam email, which translates into an annual cost of $70 billion to all U.S. businesses. - Nucleus Research (2007)
At least 90 percent of email reaching corporate servers is spam. - Nucleus Research (2007)
The average user receives 21 spam messages to their inbox each day. - Nucleus Research (2007)
81% of email marketers are unaware of CAN-Spam Act - WebSurveyor Corp (2006)
40% of all email considered Spam - TopTenReviews.com (2006)
A BrightWave Marketing study of spam emails received over 1 week period in 2006 revealed.
- 32% did not appear to make sense at all
- 71% had a clear call-to-action
- 77% featured links
- 43% had an unsubscribe link or contact information
- 30% had a misleading Subject line while 80 percent had a misleading From line
- 3% asked for money or assistance with completing a financial transaction
- Zero phishing scams
- The leading industries (when able to be determined) represented by the spammers were:
- Pharmaceutical -- (Hoodia for Your Health!) -- 17 percent
- Mortgage -- (Special Refi Rate!) -- eight percent
- Education -- (Get Your Degree Today!) -- eight percent
- Job Opportunities -- (Double Your Income-- Work From Home!) -- six percent
- Stock Market -- (Hot Tips!) -- five percent
12.4 billion - Daily Spam emails sent - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
6 - Daily Spam received per person - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
2,200 - Annual Spam received per person - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
$255 million - Spam cost to all non-corp Internet users - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
16% - Email address changes due to Spam - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
2.1 million - Annual Spam in 1,000 employee company - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
Spam messages promoting pornography are 280 times as effective in getting recipients to click on them as messages advertising pharmacy drugs, which are the next most effective type of spam. - Secure Computing (July 2006)
Porn-related emails get a 5.6 percent clickthrough rate while messages advertising pharmacy drugs get less than a one percent clickthrough rate. - Secure Computing (July 2006)
28% - Users who reply to Spam email - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
8% - Users who purchased from Spam email - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
15-20% - Corporate email that is considered Spam - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
4-5 seconds - Wasted corporate time per Spam email - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
31 billion - Daily emails sent - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
56 - Daily emails sent per email address - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
174 - Daily emails sent per person - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
34 - Daily emails sent per coporate user - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
10 - Daily emails received per person - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
3.1 - average Email addresses per person - TopTenReviews.com (2005)
