It must be human curiosity, but when the latest spam report came out from computer security expert Sophos I headed over to see, ‘what are people falling for now?’
The top spam categories are still medications (Viagra and its cousins account for 40%), and mortgages, but a growing concern is the rise in “pump and dump” schemes. These types of spam promote purchase of a stock with misleading or false information, sometimes ‘enhanced’ with real publication quotes to lend an air of legitimacy. Their aim is to target small companies with limited resources to combat such a campaign, elevate the stock price so that the spammers can cash out and leave investors high and dry and the company facing a PR crisis and worse.
Spammers exist only because there are enough people buying into their fraud. Many spam schemes are now run by the mafia, funding other nefarious activities including drug trafficking and arms dealing.
For the good of us all, isn’t it time to implement a user licence for the inbox?
Category: E-mail Marketing
Email is a great tool to use when you want to target specific individuals with relevant information. But how does it work with teens?
According to a recent Pew Internet & American Life Project report, U.S. teens prefer instant messaging (IM) over email for everyday “conversations”. They also believe email is more for communicating with adults. And it seems more girls than boys are using IM. Does this mean email is not an option for reaching teens?
Luckily the report indicates that teens still think email is best to use for longer and more complex messages. And if you want to build on brand visuals email is the way to go.
Here are some highlights from the “Teens and Technology” report, covering a November 2004 survey of 1,100 U.S. youth between the ages of 12 and 17, plus their parents:
Last week I mentioned that Black’s Photo was pre-announcing site changes and I wondered aloud whether this was a smart strategy or not. Well, this week Future Shop takes a different approach…
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