A recent poll conducted by Harris Interactive, and commissioned by Digital Impact, Inc found that 86% of the respondents have requested to receive legitimate e-mail marketing messages, and 71% have made purchases based on e-mail marketing. Also, 59% define e-mail marketing as information on products or services that they have requested to receive. Additionally, 79% of the respondents have a neutral-to-positive impression of legitimate e-mail marketing.

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So Many E-Stores, So Little Time…

The biggest obstacle e-commerce faces in gaining new customers appears to be the ingrained shopping habits of many consumers who have bought anything online. Giga Information Group data shows nearly half of US homes still do not have access to the Internet, and people in a third of those homes say they don't see a need for it. Meanwhile, those who do shop online frequently tend to shop at only a small number of online stores. (As reported in Corante.com)

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Those of you who know me from the early 90’s remember me at the "Queen of Fax." Well those days are long gone. E-mail has certainly become the power channel of today’s marketplace. But it’s surprising how few people know how illegal unsolicited fax really is.

I’m happy to pass along info on guidelines The Direct Marketing Association recently released for complying with the federal Telephone Consumer Protection Act rules on broadcast fax advertising.

The TCPA, which is implemented by the Federal Communications Commission, bans unsolicited commercial faxes, both for consumer and business-to-business marketing. The DMA's fact sheet, titled "A Matter of Fax: What Direct Marketers Need to Know About Sending Faxes," explains the TCPA fax rules in a question-and-answer format.

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In an age of the three D’s – Disengagement, Distraction and Distrust, marketing productivity has become the number one challenge J. Walker Smith, president Yankelovich Inc., told ListVision attendees during his keynote luncheon speech in New York last month.

Marketers need a better understanding of consumer attitudes and "the socialization of marketing resistance." "Right now we’re not resonating with consumers on an emotional level," Smith said, "and consumers have changed in profound ways."

American shoppers, Smith says, no longer have material accumulation as their goal as they once did in 1990’s. If anything they feel the "claustrophobia of abundance." Today, Smith’s research shows consumers are searching for intangibles like community, family, integrity and security. "People have all the stuff they need, they don't want anymore stuff," Smith said.

A study conducted by Yankelovich in partnership with DIRECT Magazine found that 85% of consumer respondents said they get too much unsolicited mail. Yet direct mail works, Smith pointed out, because 54% responded to a DM offer in the last six months and 40% made a purchase. "People may hate direct marketing, but they still use it in large numbers."

In the study, purchasers described themselves as smart, confident, creative, well-educated and talented. The biggest difference between purchasers and non-purchasers was an attitude of optimism. Those with optimism were 30% more likely to purchase through direct marketing in the last six months.

Smith emphasized that the way to stand out against the blur of messages is to target yours to those people with the appropriate attitudes, not just the right demographics.

Yankelovich has introduced a suite of lists called Lists with Attitude. The files include 3.5 million adventure seekers, 11.2 million control seekers and 10 million trend setters

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