If I am a customer of a particular brand, it’s no secret that their sister brands might also try to market to me. This happens all the time in postal mail advertising (think of all the seemingly random catalogs you receive during the holidays), but is a bit trickier in the email marketing realm.

I recently received a cross-branded email from Soap.com. Apparently this is a sister site to Diapers.com, a brand which I subscribe to. Soap.com/Diapers.com did a good job overall with this email. I thought I’d quickly share my thoughts on the pros and cons of their campaign, which can be used as a teaching point for other brand families considering launching new brands.

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“Like almost everyone who uses e-mail, I receive a ton of spam every day. Much of it offers to help me get out of debt or get rich quick. It would be funny if it weren’t so exciting.”
- Bill Gates on spam

Every so often it is prudent to take a refresher on fundamental email marketing topics and best practices. CAN-SPAM, officially known as the Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography And Marketing Act of 2003, is one of the most important online marketing topics. To follow are some of the basic facts, principals and rules concerning CAN-SPAM legislation. But like most legislation, this is not a simple bill. I recommend reading the entire act to learn more details.

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The question about whether double opt-in (confirmed consent) is an email best practice has been asked for the last 10 years.

In Bill McCloskey’s recent ClickZ article he takes the strong position that double opt-in consent is no longer a best practice and should be discarded. In my view, McCloskey is correct – double opt-in will not facilitate list growth.

At this point in time, individuals are largely familiar with the traditional single opt-in email sign-up process. Double opt-in requires more effort from the person who already completed the email sign-up process, which in some cases, can be a time consuming affair to begin with. For example, many registration forms (especially for sites handling sensitive personal information) now require the customer to repeat letters and numbers (CAPTCHA forms) for security reasons.

If your sign-up process is clear and straightforward, there is no need to require an individual to work even harder to join your list. Read More »