Jeanne Jennings, August 12, 2004

What do ESPN and a local colleague of mine have in common? They are both annoying their e-mail recipients by assuming they know what types of information will be of interest to them, rather than letting readers self-select.

A 'sender beware' tale from the trenches with lessons for any organization with a house e-mail list.

Maria Mandel, DM News, August 6, 2004

This right-on article harks back to the main premise of Seth Godin's book Permission Marketing: That the Internet and e-mail are different animals than print, radio and television and that marketers need to understand that and adjust accordingly to be successful. A good refresher for anyone working in this space.

EmailSherpa, July 29, 2004

You know what an open rate is, but how about a Bayesian filter, Joe job or PGP? This is a good reference for those new to e-mail.

Mark Thompson, USC Annenberg Online Journalism Review, August 5, 2004

This article does a good job of providing an update on CAN-SP*M regulations as they've been fleshed out to date. It also talks about the attempts by some (in this case, publishers), to escape having to comply with the law.

As it is, the legislation hasn't decrease spam (see the article below). Creating exempt groups will just give unscrupulous mailers another loophole to exploit. I still prefer opt-in, whether the message is commercial, editorial or some mix of the two.

Gregg Keizer, TechWeb News, August 5, 2004

Percentage of e-mail that is commercial and unsolicited (UCE): 84%
Percentage of UCE messages which are CAN-SPAM compliant: 0.54%
While I agree that CAN-SPAM has been pretty ineffective at stopping spam, it has done one thing -- make it easier to identify the potentially good guys (those complying who you can find if you need to) as opposed to the bad guys (who don't bother).

Good, quick-read article to keep up with industry goings-on.

New benchmark data on SEO and paid search ads for you to base your budget on (and compare results to)...

Do you know if your search marketing clicks and conversions are as good as they should be? Or, if you're budgeting the right amount of money on optimization and/or paid search ads?

Now you'll find fast, reliable numbers in MarketingSherpa's Search Marketing Metrics Guide, including self-reported data from 3,007 marketers.

Silverpop. February 2004

This is the best overviews on deliverability that I've seen. It covers all the different ways your e-mail can get detoured from it's intended destination. It's a 7 page PDF; you need to provide some basic information to get it, but it's worth it.

Note: Once you register on the site and request the report they'll send you an e-mail with a link to the PDF. This e-mail went to my junk mail folder (classic, no?) so if you don't get it right away (it's an autoresponder), you might want to check your junk folder.

If you're looking for an ASP or full service e-mail solution, web analytics tool, SEM vendor or just want to get a peak at the creative campaign winners, here's your chance! ClickZ winners are nominated and voted on by industy people just like you and me. Check out the best of the best for 2004.