With the tracking that is possible today, so much information is available on the success of marketing campaigns, and despite your question it is comforting to see it being used.

I think as an attempt to make contact with potential clients and begin a  conversation email is a great way to do this, I would probably be impressed enough by the follow up to start that conversation if I were not working in digital myself and understood how they were doing this.

If we assume that they have gone about getting their mailing list for this campaign correctly, they may be affiliated to another company which you once didn't tick the 'don't spam me from third parties' option and so are legitimately contacting you. Their second email shouldn't have come through if you had unsubscribed from their mailing service - was that option available?

I am not sure that this is a question of morals or ethics, just a marketer using their data to take the campaign further, which is something I am very much for.

It is perhaps a little strange to think that a visit is recorded to a site by your email address, but this then opens up the debate for behavioural targeting and behavioural marketing, which is a great way to drill down to a core buying audience and improve conversion rates in digital marketing.

Depending upon the platform, an email marketer can easily a report to discover whom had clicked through to the site from the email and sent out another email thanking you for coming to the site, so both yourself and a number of other people could have received a follow up for this. 

Marketing data is available and being used to segment further messages. It was very fast to send again 10 minutes afterwards, and they may have sent the wrong sort of message to you, but I am still impressed that marketing data is being used and personally have no issue with this use of behavioural marketing.

No problem :) tbh I didn't check out their service. It sounds a little suspicious from your description and I think I will definitely take a look and see what happens!

Hi Rob, I am sure that's a possible/valid point of view, I am again not sure if I share it though and in fact I wonder if that is a common view of the internet. Taking the walking into a shop scenario yes, that’s my choice and I expect to be approached by a sales person while I am there, and even after I’ve left the shop – however in the latter case only if I consented to it by giving out my contact details beforehand. Otherwise I definitely want to stay anonymous and be left alone!

Looking at this http://www.prospectvision.net/demo/walkthrough/ it seems as if the software can process website visitor information to an extend where real people are identified?? As they say “turn anonymous visitors into qualified web leads”??

Unless I clicked through on your campaign, didn’t unsubscribe, completed a form on your website, or confirmed that I have read your (“dodgy”) privacy policy, please don’t’ remind me (I obviously know it’s possible) in any way that you actually follow me and know what I am doing on your site, that’s scary!

Obviously I’ve got lots to hide ;) No, seriously I am not taking this one lightly and looking at various discussions think there’s no clear consensus on this one yet?

http://www.advanced-web-metrics.com/blog/2009/08/04/should-you-focus-on-website-visitors-as-individuals/

http://www.linkedin.com/answers/marketing-sales/advertising-promotion/internet-marketing/MAR_ADP_INM/475285-9505648

Hi Birgit,

I understand your feelings on this matter, however, doesn't this just underline how broad the 'third party/partner' group is in most sign-up/registrations? Sarah mentioned this and I am sure that this is the source of the personal contact info.

All/most analytics and b2b lead gen companies pick up IP data and can translate it into country, city and often company data. But by cross referencing this data with a richer set, ie. from the readership of an industry related publication, you can enrich the data further.

As a result you can opt-in to Org A whilst giving permission to Org B (3rd party) and ending up getting contacted directly by Org C.

On another note - you are not obligated to visit the website of a company...you have no 'right' to visit it for 'free'. However, as in the car showroom, you may wish to go elsewhere should the salesman be too pushy :)

Rob