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Spam Doesn't Work?
An anonymous reader writes "Businesses who believe the hype that spam works should read this article. It seems that the more recipients that you spam, the less likely they are to respond (startlingly obvious, but this seems to prove it)." Somehow I doubt this. If Spam didn't work, why do I get a hundred
pieces of it every morning? Someone is buying.
The study was about asking informational questions, not about hawking products to the masses. The "bystander effect" doesn't apply here.
the more recipients that you spam, the less likely they are to respond (startlingly obvious
How is this obvious at all, or even correct? The people you spam have no knowledge of how many others get spammed by the same person/company. Although your odds of getting a bite have to be ridiculously low, they most certainly have to go up with every mailbox you hit. Basic statistics!
Mark
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
That "experiment" was rather useless, first they used a woman as the From person, the lonely computer geeks immediatly saw "fresh meat" printed all accross the email, so they wanted to be helpful but also help themselves. Next, the email required the person to actually respond. How many of us have actually recevied spam that wants to "talk" with us? Other than ofcourse the African millionare that wants to use your bank account to extract money out of the contry.
In conclusion this article proves nothing, and the fact that spam is on the rise proves 1 of 2 things. Merchants investing on spam are idiots or people buying products that see adverstise on spam are idiots.
Useless sig.
The paper does not show that spam does not work. It just proves that when sending spammail you should only put 1 person into the to section. And the fact that the virtual girl got responses from such a high percentage of recipients might be a hint that spammers should always use female names in reply to addresses.
Googlefight "Slashdot Troll" against "BSD is dying" 303:229. BSD thus cant die.
Any type of computer based advertising has a high annoyance factor. Most of us grew up with ad-less computers, so why should we submit to it now? In contrast, most TV has always been a advertising vehicle, so we don't mind as much when we get hit with TV ads.
Free Mac Mini Yeah, it's
1. The research only says that people are less like to respond if the to field contains multiple names. A lot of spam is targetted at only one person.
2. The research only says that people are less like to respond if the to field contains multiple names. It does not say that they are less likely to read it.
3. If you're targetting 30 people a go, and only 3 respond, then your'e still getting a better response than if one person was targetted and that person responded.
The irony with spam I think is that the less Spam in the system, the more effective it is. So - if people manage to block 90% of spam, then the 10% that gets through works better, and the spammers can afford to try a little harder to get that spam through.
Like a sort of a feedback loop sort of thing.
Training monkeys for world domination since 1439
If you haven't read the article yet, it's not about commercial spam at all, but the psychological effects of getting an email asking a question from someone you know, with more names in the cc: field resulting in more of a "someone else will answer it" effect.
It really has nothing to do with commercial spam, and the original post here did nothing to make that distinction.
Spammers should be shot.
The people who buy stuff from companies that spam should also be shot. This behaviour encourages spammers. If you're going to buy something from a spammer, at least go to the website manually, not by clicking that link in the e-mail. But most of the world is stupid, and does not know this.
I use a unique name for everything I need to hand an email address to.. ie.. microsoft@mydomain.com would be the email address i give to microsoft.. that way.. not only will i kill the address if it starts getting spammed, I know who sold me up the river.
Don't Tread on Me
ahem, better change your forged e-mail address than :)
Besides jokes, best way to fight with spam is fight it, via free services like spamcop.net.
You of course can send your own spam reports but believe spammers use advanced tricks over and over, even hex IP's included!
well, if they add that little bit of logic, i have their valid e-mail address. if i have that, then I can retaliate.
dmarien
My problem is that, while it will keep the spam out of my mailbox, the TMDA method still consumes resources on my server. Doubly so now, too because each incoming "unknown" mail will generate an outgoing message. If I can deny the message before the session even reaches the DATA phase (i.e. by using RBL's and checking the header), then I don't have to deal with the spam at all.
"Tell me doctor, with all of your defenses, are there any provisions for an attack by killer bees?"
The study in the article did just that. Some of the people received an email that looked like it was just to them, others saw many names in the to: field. They found that people who thought they were singled out were more likely to be helpful.
The relevant psychological phenomena are called bystander apathy and diffusion of responsibility. In each, the more people in a group, the less likely each individual is to help/work.
This is nothing particularly new, it just says that people behave consistently in person or when contacted by email. It has nothing to do with commercial SPAM, only with requests for information/help to others.
"If Spam didn't work, why do I get a hundred pieces of it every morning? Someone is buying."
That's simple, alot of small business owners are stupid and they buy lists. that's who's buying
The only way to get the point across to the execs will come too late, when your co-lo provider shuts you down and your Web site's off the air because of the spam complaints or when your legitimate e-mails to legitimate customers and business contacts start to bounce because you've been flagged as a spammer. What nobody's figured out is how to get this cost across to the execs in a dollars-and-cents way they understand.
You get spam because some guillible guy in marketing buys the ability to spam from an "Intenet Marketting Guru". The poor marketing guy is convinced that even a 0.1% is likely and will be profitable.
It's not us who gets suckered into buying the crappy product that doesn't work, it's them.
Don't any of you chuckleheads ever bother to read the actual article? It is NOT about spam (UCE). It is about asking for information from multiple people. Since spam often uses BCC, the article isn't even relevant. As to why the so-called "Cmdr Taco" wouldn't realise this, we can only assume that HE hasn't read the article either. Maybe HE should change his name to "Cmdr Chucklehead." +5 (longer than most other +5s)
Hic iacet Arthurus, rex quondam rexque futurus.
How you got modded up to 2 Is beyond me. The REASON that it isn't appropriate is because I do NOT need to have a naked woman on my screen when I'm trying to teach my grandmother how to conect to her e-mail NOR do I need that displayed when children are around.
If you think that such pictures are sutable for display whenever and wherever it pops up regardless of who's in the room, then I'm not the one with "pretty much warped values" now am I?
-- Wiccan Army, 13th Airborne Division "We will not fly silently into the night"
> hundred pieces of it every morning? > Someone is buying.
Wrong. The fact that people send huge volumes of spam does not mean anyone is buying. Indeed, most spam comes from people who have been duped by list-sellers and email-sending-service sellers, into believing the same logical mistake.
Dozens of dot-com companies spent tens of millions of dollars on TV and radio advertising. They wouldn't do that unless it worked, right? But if that's true, why did they all go bankrupt, and why did so some report that they spent more money on advertising than they received in gross sales?
For a clever spammer, it costs almost nothing to send spam, so the mere prospect of a single sale is enough to justify sending millions of spams. For a stupid spammer who believes what the remailer or list-seller says, spamming is a bad business decision, just as many folks who advertise in the newspaper or yellow pages would probably not do so if they tracked the results and compared the cost.
The culprits for spam are ignorance and greed, not actual profit.
-- http://www.MarkWelch.com/ Pleasanton California
This study has absolutely nothing to do with spam. Advertising is a medium that is supposed to be directed at a wide audience. The study is about diffusion of responsibility.
Jesus.
Gee... I'd hate to see the CC: field for that test message...
Your Servant, B. Baggins
The appropriate questions would be...
So, who ISN'T selling you up the river?
-Jim
Don't Tread on Me
Beware, your calculations are bogus, and I am afraid that you'll get a reply every minute...