I recently received an unsolicited commercial email from an esteeemed business owner and that got me thinking of what in the world West Virginia marketing and digital marketing companies are doing.

In essence, WV State Code prohibits the sending of unsolicited bulk email to WV residents. It additionally provides for reciptients of that bulk email to be awarded about $1000.00 PER EMAIL! Basically, if you are using a OPT-IN service for bulk e-mail you're fine, but if you are using an OPT-OUT email service you may be up a creek without a paddle (and liable!). Section 46 A- 6 G- 1 of the State Code clearly states the standing policy.

If your marketing or digital marketing firm advises the use of any OPT-OUT service, run like hell. Not only will it serve to increase the amount of spam (which we ALL hate), but it very well could make potential (or existing) customers relunctant to do business with you. They have to take minutes out of their already busy day to handle some thing they shouldn't need to - getting off the list you put them on. This can be a pretty harrowing experience depending what in the world YOU got them into. Not a positive user experience thats for sure.

Sure collecting e-mail addresses is a good business practice, but what to do with them is a whole other ballgame. Even an overall positive campaign can have some serious financial reprocussions if just ONE person decides that an email was 1 spam too many. So if your marketing firm said something to the effect of "get all the email addresses you can and send them mass emails", you could be getting yourself into trouble. Obviously, now, there is more to it than just sending a simple email to thousands of people.

There is a good way and a bad way to use list servs or bulk e-mail transports, the good way CAN increase business and customer relations. Digital Beckley provides a powerful solution for list serv/bulk e-mail use and can provide guidence on how to maximize its use without being spam.