Opt-in vs. opt-out

Jeanne has a great post up at ClickZ comparing the performance of mail to an opt-in list to performance of mail to an opt-out list.
The article looks at opens, clicks and click through rates over 7 quarters (Q1 – Q4 2010; Q1 – Q3 2011) covering 330 million emails. I strongly suggest anyone interested go read the whole article.
The short version, though, is that the opt-in lists had more opens and more clicks than the opt-out lists. In some quarters it was double the number of opens and clicks.
This data is a strong indication that opt-in lists perform much better than even the best opt-out lists.

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Confusing opt-in and opt-out

Harvard Business Review posted a blog earlier this week suggesting that all businesses should treat email marketing as an opt-out process. Unfortunately, the post seemed to me to conflate and confuse a number of things.
She mixes in potential customers providing business cards to an exhibitor at a trade show with current customers that are using a product. She promotes businesses using opt-out as a default communication practice, but then talks about giving customers preference centers to manage the contact.
Overall, it was a very confusing article.
For instance the author says:

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Email Change of Address

How many readers have ever submitted an email change of address form? How many readers even know where to go to submit an email change of address form?
And I’m not talking about going to a particular retailer and saying “change my email address” I’m talking about using one of the companies that offer email change of address as a service. Where do they get their names and email addresses? I sure don’t know.
How many readers have actually purchased an email change of address service for one of your mailing lists? Do you know where the addresses came from?
I’m wondering how many people buy email change of address services, but have zero clue how to sign up for them. I mean, I know, you can go to FreshAddress or Experian and get ECOA services. But I don’t know how to tell either of them that I want to be included in their ECOA services.
So how do consumers get to be on a change of address list? And how opt-in is their participation?
One reason I ask is that a number of my clients have stumbled into serious delivery problems recently. Investigation generally points back to the ECOA service they used. So I’m wondering how actively and knowingly consumers are using ECOA services.
 

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What Mark Said

Mark Brownlow skewers the arguments from opt-out proponents. A definite must read.

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