You Tell ‘Em, Martin
In response to seeing this in an email he received…
“If you get easily offended, STOP reading now and scroll down to the unsubscribe link at the bottom cause you are wasting space on my list reserved for someone who is serious.”
… Martin Avis commented…
“Okay, I will. Because you are wasting serious space in my inbox.”
You tell ‘em, Martin. 
What amused me, beyond Martin’s comment, was how the marketer sending the email could possibly consider that any subscriber was “wasting space on my list”. Huh? How does that work? Some of the biggest super affiliates have lists that are hundreds of thousands of email addresses. The last time I checked, there wasn’t a fee based on list size… or if there is, it’s much diminished from the early days of Internet marketing when we seemed to pay more for every 1,000 email addresses.
Oh well, I guess the marketer couldn’t be bothered to use “because” instead of “cause”, was arrogant and offensive to their own list and so probably isn’t likely to see the incongruency in accusing people of “wasting” space on their list.
I think, when this “get off my list if you don’t like it” tactic is used, it’s so that the marketer can subsequently pursue a more aggressive marketing line and consider it to be alright. Presumably, “if the people receiving the emails had wanted to unsubscribe, they already would have” justifies the increased marketing aggression to people who remain on the list and are therefore “serious” about taking action. I don’t agree with it, I’m just trying to understand it. It sounds like psychological blackmail to me.
What do you think?
May 12th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
Nice spot Neil, and good call Martin!
As you know I’m currently in the process of methodically unsubscribing from a number of lists that I feel on reflection take more than they give in the attention / WIIFM equation.
When I get a “I’m stepping it up so hold on tight or p*** off” email like the one you’ve just described I’m always tempted to hang around just to see what’s coming up, but Martin is very right - if a marketer doesn’t respect your inbox - and hence you - they don’t deserve to have any place in it.
May 13th, 2008 at 1:01 am
hi,
Yes I have done the same thing, I get so much junk mail. And the marketers that have just pitched as in selling stuff all the time are off my list.
Some marketers that are a little shady or promote things or other marketers of similar nature are off my list too. only ones giving good info will stay.
I will keep neil shearing on my list.
steve
May 13th, 2008 at 8:23 am
thanks Steve.
Neil.
May 14th, 2008 at 2:13 am
OK, so I’m not “Neily”, I’m just returning Neil’s wicked sense of humor on a recent list that I twisted his arm to sign up to, but back to the point of the reply…
The marketer was obviously just trying to pull a “get them interested” ploy, and Martin has seen it all before, he’s been doing this longer than me, and probably as long as you, Neil, so he “called the bluff”..
“copywriting” should, imho, be saved for sales latters/pages.
I can do “copy”, I’m not great at it, but I can do it, but I don’t do it when I’m sending a mailing to my list/subscribers.
They’re already on my newsletter list because of some salespage or “squeezepaqe” “copy”, so they don’t need any more, they signed up to get my honest opinion, I hope, so that’s what I give, no BS copyrighting, just what I think.
Guess who I learnt that one from…
thanks “Neily”.
@MattGarrett
p.s. don’t follow me on twitter, you’ll know how much time I spend…….