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Barack Obama vs Mitt Romney
@LorenMcDonald over at SilverPop has an interesting comparison of the email marketing habits of the two presidential campaigns:
@LorenMcDonald over at SilverPop has an interesting comparison of the email marketing habits of the two presidential campaigns:
Kojo Nnamdi did a bit on this yesterday http://thekojonnamdishow.org/shows/2012-07-24/campaign-2012-hits-your-inbox featuring, among others, one of the ProPublica reporters involved with their campaign email project, which is here: http://www.propublica.org/article/explore-hundreds-of-campaign-emails-in-the-message-machine
I meant to mention that, but it slipped my mind until I saw your post.
At the risk of obnoxious self-promotion, I blogged about both of these campaigns recently….
A Tale of Two Presidential Campaigns: http://mainsleaze.spambouncer.org/?p=2092
I didn’t blog about the general tone of their emails, but could have — in addition to the spam, I’ve got legitimately subscribed email addresses on both. Silverpop noticed the differences between them: I noticed the similarities. Both spend too much time sniping at the other or at “the Democrats/Republicans” rather than talking about their own records or proposed solutions to big problems facing the U.S. Neither does much of a job of making me feel like an individual rather than a full wallet. :/
Frankly, I think that the problem in both cases isn’t their email strategy, but something more fundamental. It’s difficult to show respect for the public when you have no respect for the public.
Of course political messages are exempt from CAN-SPAM. So? All that means is that the U.S. federal government cannot prosecute those who send them. It doesn’t turn spam (unsolicited bulk email) into legitimate (solicited) bulk email.
Being legal under CAN-SPAM also doesn’t stop companies, ISPs, and blacklists from listing IPs that send political spam. Both the Obama campaign and the Romney campaign have been listed in the SBL this spring, for example. Both have also hit one or two of my spamtraps. :/ Obviously I won’t be deciding who to vote for based on which campaign has spammed less (more important issues are at stake), but this does not reflect well on either campaign.