Two recent news items have got me thinking this week. Firstly, the collapse of the infamous mobile telephone directory, using bought in data, and secondly the ASA rapping Virgin Media over the fingers for not using goneaway suppression. Both cases represent a certain naivety on the part of both organisations...
All industries evolve. Things change, develop, improve. Direct Marketing is no different to any other sector, and the major change of the last ten years has been the growth of information technology. Is this a good thing? For me, the jury is still out. The first mailshot I organised, circa 1985, involved...
Good grief, when are we ever going to learn? Your starter for ten, why is the direct marketing industry hated by the consumer? Because we have allowed their data to be treated with disdain and disrespect, that's why. Spam, junk, confetti tactics, poor targeting...you name it, and someone calling...
Happy New Year, one and all. On New Years eve, just before the witching hour, I downloaded my first song. Previous to this momentous moment, I had stuck to the old ways, in other words, buying CD's...although I still call them albums of course. I do not own an iPod. And I was quite happy letting...
His Lordship, his Mandyness of somewhere near Hull, is a busy little business secretary, isn't he? Not content with telling Gordon which side to put his parting, he is also contemplating bailing out Jaguar and Land Rover (but not Woolies), whilst musing that it would be a fine idea to sell off 49...
Just when the muse has left me, and I am wondering where the next blog will come from, another survey hits the streets. This one, from Experian, has some shocking statistics about duplicate mailings. Apparently, some scandalous B2B marketers are still de-duping by hand! Others - now sit down, because...
By heck, this is bad. I know we don't want to admit it, but for the time being marketing is about as dead as an estate agents inbox. It is one of business life's true truisms, that when recession bites marketers are driven out of the city. If one in ten of people are going to lose their jobs...
Big red lines are being written across marketing budgets as we speak. No frills, look after the pennies, batten down the hatches until the storm abates. Of course, that is an understandable reaction, and this is no time for anyone to be wasting money. But to let the accountants get away with the impression...
Prospect Swetenhams are no more. DLG, financed from Iceland, may be as shaky as West Ham United...and who's next? For those of you who have never worked through a recession, this is what it is like. No one knows what is going to happen next. No one knows when it will end. The only certainty out there...
Market Location, a fine business run by good people with an excellent database, have axed their last remaining marketer, with reports suggesting that as the recession bites, it was wasted money. A great shame, especially for a company that sells to marketers, and lives or dies by the success of the medium...
