Article by Staff Writer, Posted: November 19, 2003

Permission Marketing

Permission marketing, as it relates to email marketing, is a consumer-based approach centering strongly on consumer sensitivity. It is the opposite of unsolicited contact with consumers. A permission-based approach means the company marketing itself must have either a prior business relationship with the consumer it is marketing, or have confirmed permission from that consumer. Many companies have both.

This approach is rapidly gaining acceptance on both sides of business-to-consumer mass marketing. One example on the consumer side is the embracement of the national ‘Do Not Call’ list, a federally-backed plan to reduce the amount of unsolicited telephone calls consumers receive from telemarketers. Within 24 hours of the list’s opening, thousands of consumers flooded the Federal Trade Commission with requests to halt unsolicited telephone marketing to their homes.

An example of permission marketing acceptance on the business side is the corporate reaction to the oversaturation of individual email accounts with unsolicited bulk email. Consumer ire has kindled the most aggressive anti-spam campaign by Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to date. Firms that are the core of online commerce such as Google, America Online, and Yahoo have all raised their diligence to disable suspected spammers, with more comprehensive message filters and bans on unsolicited email sending.

However, the resentment of consumers has directly inspired tough anti-spam legislation from both political parties and all levels of government. There is no shortage of elected officials willing to lend their names to the anti-spam cause, as many already have in several states.

While permission marketing evolves as the foremost approach for direct marketing, the direct marketing industry is making commitments to regulate itself before individual states, the federal government, and the international community instill anti-spam laws so strong that they affect email marketing as a whole.

Organizations such as the Direct Marketing Association, the Association for Interactive Marketing, and others are quickly establishing self-regulatory guidelines in an attempt to inspire industry change and tamp down legislation. The ongoing goal of most email service providers, email marketing companies, and application service providers, or ASPs, has always been halting the abuse of the email communications medium, and many have embraced these new guidelines.

Some analysts say permission marketing is the strata for an entire new model for the consumer-based segment of the economy. The “Permission Economy” theory refers to a “bottom-to-top” approach to engaging consumers, whereas the consumer decides when, where, how, and why they wish to view advertisements, engage content, and participate in the transaction being encouraged. In this model, it is the consumers, members, subscribers and customers who are the dominant force in determining the rules of engagement, and not the marketers.

While the Permission Economy model may still be several years away, companies using permission marketing today are seeing significantly positive response from consumers.

XM Radio, a satellite-based national radio format with over 35 commercial-free stations, has reached one million paying subscribers this year. This suggests consumers are willing to pay for services which are readily free so they can determine when, how, and with what format they can be solicited.

A national check printer, Checks in the Mail, announced to its customers in June 2002 that it would discontinue the practice of renting its customer information to other companies. After conducting a survey of new and reorder customers which cited over 80 percent saying privacy issues were important to doing business, the company stopped renting its lists and made a “Customer Privacy Guarantee” the mainstay of its marketing.

Permission email marketing is becoming the go-to approach for legitimate Internet commerce, as more consumers continue to sign up for email newsletters, coupons and even online magazines via opt-in email. To some, marketers and companies stepping up their processes of gathering permission email addresses from customers and prospects for use with their own email software represents the wave of the future of Internet marketing—if not the immediate future of online business-to-consumer interaction.