UK email marketing blasted as 'amateurish' by US guru

According to Brand Republic, an email marketing specialist has warned marketers that they are misusing email as a marketing channel by producing campaigns that are 'amateurish'.

The assertion was made recently by Bill Nussey, the chief executive of US-based email marketing specialist Silverpop, at the Advanced Email Strategies conference in London.

"If you were shooting an advertisement for a blue-chip brand, you wouldn't film it yourself using a camcorder," Nussey said in his keynote speech. "Yet many marketers are doing the equivalent of that in their email campaigns."

"There's a new breed of digital direct marketer emerging for whom email is about building relationships, not starting them. By following the old rules of email marketing, marketers not only diminish ROI, they undermine the brand."

Adding to the debate, JupiterResearch's forthcoming Vision Report was also previewed at the conference. In his speech, analyst Julian Smith highlighted the importance of relevancy and data management in email marketing.

"Lists are a key ingredient to relevancy and how we manage that data is critical to how we go forward," he said.