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B2b Opt In Email

More Permission Failure - Friend Requests

Wednesday, July 29, 2009 by Dawn DeVirgilio
Being an avid participant in the social media sphere - I’ve found myself subscribing to more and more email. (So much for email being dead!) I generally keep a separate email for these opt-in’s and check in once a week to see what cool things other companies are doing with their email marketing. 

Randomly a B2B opt in email started coming in to my personal account from a company who I had NOT opted in to. I started doing some sleuthing on how they acquired my email address. 

We had two things in common:
  1. The company was in Fort Wayne, Indiana - my hometown
  2. They were in the communication/advertising industry
Then one of the emails advertised an event.  Since I don’t live in Fort Wayne anymore – it wasn’t relevant to me.  But as I was making my daily social media check-ins - Twitter, Facebook, LinkenIn - I noticed someone’s status promoted the event.  This was a person I had accepted into my network, not because we were actual “friends” but because we had similar things in common.  The SAME two things in common from the list above. 

I had solved the case.  This company received my email because I had added one of their employees to my social network. 

But did that constitute opting into their email campaign? Just as my colleague (and true social media friend) Al Iverson has said, giving someone your business card does not imply permission. The same should be said for all your friends, connections, and followers in your social network.  By adding you into my social network, the only one to one communication I’ve opt-in to is that you communicate to me personally, thru that network. 

I'd be interested in your thoughts.  Does adding someone to your social network equate to opt-in permission? Does it matter what network you’ve accepted them on (LinkedIn vs. Facebook)?

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