More than three years after it became law in the U.K., nearly a third of retailers still don't comply with the EU Directive on Privacy and Electronic Communications, U.K. direct marketing firm CDMS has found.

The Europe-wide legislation, which governs email communications with private individuals, forbids companies from sending email marketing messages to recipients who have not explicitly opted in to receive them. It clearly spells out that offering someone the opportunity to opt out of receiving unsolicited messages (or pre-checking opt-in boxes) does not comply with the directive.

Repeating a similar study conducted in 2005, the CDMS examined the opt-in practices of 200 companies across 12 big consumer business sectors. It found that just 69 percent—only 3 percent more than last time—are complying with the legislation.

Although this increase is a positive step, it also means a significant percentage of U.K. companies are still putting their carefully built brands at risk. To have a successful email program you need permission. It's not only a matter of consideration; it is now also legally regulated.

To ward off potential future legal and public-relations woes, the CDMS urges non-compliant companies to begin implementing solid permission practices and focusing on recipient concerns over spam and privacy. You can read the article here.

Posted by Bill Nussey at 09:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The big news this weekend is Google's acquisition of DoubleClick for $3.1 billion--reportedly beating out Microsoft and Yahoo for one of the top online advertising providers. The media is abuzz with discussions on why Google paid so much (DoubleClick revenues are fuzzy, but reports put it somewhere between $150 million and $300 million per year) and what the acquisition means to the industry. I figured I'd throw in my two cents...

The ad banner space is far more mature than search so it's unlikely Google expects DoubleClick's business to grow at anywhere near the rate of Google's core business. From this, I think its acquisition of DoubleClick was a largely pre-emptive move to keep Microsoft and Yahoo from gaining ground in the online advertising space. (Yahoo, in particular, has a strong ad banner business.)

Google will likely push DoubleClick's ad system into a more self-help, middle-market focused offering like Google's own AdWords offers today. Meanwhile, on the enterprise side, I expect to see the two sales forces quickly align to cross sell large customers on both companies' advertising solutions. For marketers, this will mean a convenient one-stop shop for all forms of advertising.

I think this could play well for consumers. For example, Microsoft and Yahoo are going to have step up their investment in innovation and user-facing features in order to offset Google's growing lead on the advertising space. I expect Microsoft and Yahoo to focus more on their own content and user-centered features in an effort to counteract Google's success in monetizing the traffic and content of other sites through search and ad banners. In other words, if Microsoft and Yahoo can't buy any more billboards on the side of the road, they will build more roads.

Additionally, both DoubleClick and, particularly, Google, have some impressive technology for driving relevance in advertising. The combination of the two companies' technologies promises consumers increasingly relevant advertising across the Internet.

However, it is worth noting that some sources are saying that this merger gives Google almost 80 percent of all the advertising on the Internet. If this proves to be true, you can bet their rivals and the federal government will not sit by and let these companies combine--not without a fight.

All of this reminds me why I love being in this industry. It's never boring. There are endless opportunities for those companies that can take advantage of the change to drive innovative marketing campaigns and pull ahead of their competitors.

Posted by Bill Nussey at 09:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

A recently released report from Forrester Research shows a sharp rise in the use of RSS among marketers.

According to the report, "Interactive Marketing Channels to Watch in 2007," 40 percent of marketers surveyed by analyst firm in December and January say they will use or test RSS this year, up from just 10 percent last year. The reason? Marketers are seeing proof that the emerging channel works. Forrester recommends that marketers start adopting RSS now in order to keep up with their customers who already actively use the emerging technology.

Posted by Bill Nussey at 01:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)