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How To Convince My Boss Not To Spam?

Posted by kdawson on from the engendering-ill-will dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The small travel agent that I work for recently received an email from one of our competitors with several thousand of their potential customers in the 'To:' and 'Cc:' fields. My boss now wants to use these addresses to send unsolicited advertisements. I would like to convince him not to do this, as I believe that this practice is morally wrong and legally dubious. However, morals don't go very far in the business world, so I'm asking Slashdot: what business-oriented arguments can I use to dissuade my boss from spamming?"

8 of 475 comments (clear)

  1. my $0.02 by tomalpha · · Score: 5, Informative

    I reckon you've got a few options:

    1. point him towards your country's relevant legislation: UK (and in non-legalese) or US
    2. explain why spam is so annoying because it's intrusive and it makes it harder to read wanted messages in your inbox
    3. explain that spamming 1000 people may get him 1 extra sale, but it will piss off the other 999 to the extent that some of them will go out of their way to avoid trading with you

    Ok, so you're dealing with a sales-focussed person here, the only one likely to carry any weight is going to be last one and even then, you may be onto a losing streak. Assuming this person controls your pay packet, you're either going to have to put up a token resistance and then keep your mouth shut; or perhaps if you have the option, consider whether you want to be working for someone like that...

    1. Re:my $0.02 by Saint+Fnordius · · Score: 5, Informative
      That might look like fun, but in reality it has two things going against it:
      1. It's work setting it up. Who wants to spend time making it so that it isn't an obvious spoof?
      2. Spoofing your competitor is a really bad idea, legally. We are talking opening yourself up to lawsuits here that could drive you bankrupt, never mind criminal law.

      I realise you probably were trying to be humorous, but you never know who might get the wrong idea reading these threads. Best to state the obvious anyway...
    2. Re:my $0.02 by simontek2 · · Score: 4, Informative

      I work in a datacenter, its amazing how difficult it is to get off those lists. Love the people that call and say they want to send millions of emails and go "No we are not spammers, we are email marketing", and then want their IP's to change frequently. umm no.

      --
      SimonTek
  2. Spamhaus by j_sp_r · · Score: 5, Informative

    Explain that sending spam might put your email server on the Spamhaus blacklist, OR pissing of your provider, so you cannot send email again to existing clients.

  3. Re:You can't. Spamming them will make the company by drmerope · · Score: 5, Informative

    And is the right choice, if done smoothly. Don't mass email. Investigate each contact send a personalized note targeted at them and their business.

    Use the information, just don't abuse it. Spam is quick and dirty, but a poor substitute for the elbow grease of real salesmanship.

  4. Problems with "advertising" by 91degrees · · Score: 5, Informative

    The response rate to this sort of advertising is extremely low. He'll be lucky to get a single response, thus making it not worth the time to compose an email.

    Most people react badly to unsolicited emailed advertisements. It is likely that some of these people are already customers or potential customers. This will dissuade them from choosing your company in the future.

    If any customers are in the EU, you may have a data protection liability. Even if you don't, at least some people will respond requesting to be removed from the mailing list, which is something that will have to be dealt with.

    It's very likely to be against the terms and conditions of your ISP.

    It is possible that you will be blacklisted by the recipients ISPs (unlikely if he does this once)

    There may be some legal ramifications for taking advantage of an obvious mistake by the other company. Even just a baseless legal threat would take time and money to deal with.

  5. Point him at Seth Godin's books by cliffski · · Score: 5, Informative

    point him at this:

    http://www.sethgodin.com/permission/

    Seth Godin is the marketing guru who advised google on how to succeed in business. he knows his stuff, and he is MASSIVELY anti spam.
    Tell your boss he needs to read the guys book before he does something that could wreck his business.

    --
    DRM-free indie games for the PC and Mac: Positech Games
    1. Re:Point him at Seth Godin's books by tambo · · Score: 4, Informative

      Tell your boss he needs to read the guys book before he does something that could wreck his business.

      Dude, PHBs don't read anything that isn't in cartoon form. I think that's even a prerequisite qualification of applying for a management job. The application forms are usually submitted in crayon, too.

      - David Stein

      / reads too much dilbert
      // among other things that aren't actually comics
      /// like, well, fark.com
      //// (obviously)

      --
      Computer over. Virus = very yes.