Nuisance spam emails won't stop from Hornet

[sjm]

That makes no sense.

When you conduct a survey, one of the things you try and do is get what is known as a representative sample. That means that your sample demographics are a subset that provides a good representation of the larger population you are interested in. In the case of Hornet, the demographic that is interesting is the user base (and possibly potential customers). Only by surveying a representative population can you draw any conclusions about how that customer base feels about the emails that are being sent.

What has happened instead is that the sample population has been chosen so that it only represents those with a positive attitude towards the emails. That makes the survey results a bad reflection of what the population (i.e. user base) as a whole feels about the emails. In other words the conclusion that Saverio has drawn is not the conclusion you should be drawing from the survey. This is the phrase that I am taking issue with:

We regularly survey our subscribers and the majority tells us the current frequency and content work for them.

So it's actually this conclusion and the survey methodology that makes no sense.

I will give yoiu an analogy to help you understand. It is the early 1900s, and you want to figure out how widespread the adpotion of the telephone is. So you decide to conduct a survey. By telephone. Evern you must be able to see the fundamental flaw in this approach. And while this is obviously a situation that I have constructed to hammer home the point, there were in fact telephone surveys conducted around that time, such as voting polls, which absolutely failed to take into account that the early adopters of telephones were not representative of the population at large. The first people to get telephones in their homes were the well off, who typically tend to vote for a particular party, and not the same party as the average member of the working class. Hence these polls predicting election results that were completely off the mark.

Has the penny dropped yet?

[morelia]

Who should they survey and send it to if not the people on their e-mail list???

I'll grant you it makes it tough, but the assertion that subscribers are not the best indicator of broader views on subscribing are valid. About the best way I can think would be on forums and their own website. For example, if there was a permanent survey on the Hornet website they would have ongoing data reflecting current perceptions and it could come from the wider user base.

[Frantz]

Has the penny dropped yet?

It's hard to tell. Why not conduct a survey to see if people understand your point? You could send telegrams to a representative sample of KVR members.

[sjm]

Who should they survey and send it to if not the people on their e-mail list???

I'll grant you it makes it tough, but the assertion that subscribers are not the best indicator of broader views on subscribing are valid. About the best way I can think would be on forums and their own website. For example, if there was a permanent survey on the Hornet website they would have ongoing data reflecting current perceptions and it could come from the wider user base.

The question of how you do this is an interesting one, and definitely harder to answer than pointing out the obvious flaws with the current survey. One of the obvious places is the website as mentioned above. I'm sure that it's possible to come up with other solutions, be it a (dismissable, non-intrusive) invitation to participate in the products themselves, or implementing the unsuibscribe function in such a way that you can (optionally) choose to tell Hornet why you are unsubscribing.

These will all have their own flaws of course - not everyone visits the website regularly; not everyone is going to tell you why they unsubscribed. But by collecting data from a variety of sources and across a wider cross section of the user base, you'll get a more complete picture. It probably also makes sense to include other data, such as those provided by the mailing list provider - open rate, the number of people who unsubscribe (and, you'd probably like to know how quickly they unsubscribe). Essentially: the lower the open rates and the more (and quicker) people unsubscribe frome the list, the less value you are delivering and the more annoying people find your emails.

[sjm]

Has the penny dropped yet?

It's hard to tell. Why not conduct a survey to see if people understand your point? You could send telegrams to a representative sample of KVR members.

We need a poll!

[Frantz]

We need a poll!

This would instantly result in a thread titled "Nuisance spam polls won't stop from sjm!"

The only way forward is to setup a global, double-blind, multi-modal, randomized controlled trial designed to isolate the least annoying method for gathering opinions. This will be the most important research effort of our times.

[TheMaestro]

That makes no sense.

When you conduct a survey, one of the things you try and do is get what is known as a representative sample. That means that your sample demographics are a subset that provides a good representation of the larger population you are interested in. In the case of Hornet, the demographic that is interesting is the user base (and possibly potential customers). Only by surveying a representative population can you draw any conclusions about how that customer base feels about the emails that are being sent.

What has happened instead is that the sample population has been chosen so that it only represents those with a positive attitude towards the emails. That makes the survey results a bad reflection of what the population (i.e. user base) as a whole feels about the emails. In other words the conclusion that Saverio has drawn is not the conclusion you should be drawing from the survey. This is the phrase that I am taking issue with:

We regularly survey our subscribers and the majority tells us the current frequency and content work for them.

So it's actually this conclusion and the survey methodology that makes no sense.

I will give yoiu an analogy to help you understand. It is the early 1900s, and you want to figure out how widespread the adpotion of the telephone is. So you decide to conduct a survey. By telephone. Evern you must be able to see the fundamental flaw in this approach. And while this is obviously a situation that I have constructed to hammer home the point, there were in fact telephone surveys conducted around that time, such as voting polls, which absolutely failed to take into account that the early adopters of telephones were not representative of the population at large. The first people to get telephones in their homes were the well off, who typically tend to vote for a particular party, and not the same party as the average member of the working class. Hence these polls predicting election results that were completely off the mark.

Has the penny dropped yet?

The only interesting user base for surveying if e-mails are too frequent or not, are the ones that are already receiving the e-mails.

And if you want to ask people with telephones, about telephones, you ask people with telephones.

[sjm]

The only interesting user base for surveying if e-mails are too frequent or not, are the ones that are already receiving the e-mails.

So all the people who unsubscribed because there were too many emails in no way indicate that the emails are too frequent? Is that your assertion?

And if you want to ask people with telephones, about telephones, you ask people with telephones.

And this is where your logic breaks down. If you conduct a telephone survey, then 100% of respondents will have a telephone. That says nothing about the actual adoption rate. You might want to stop and think about this for a second; at some point you will see the light.

[Whoppa]

I'd just be content if their unsubscribe worked.

Never had this in over 30 years of using emails. At least those companies who I had to email directly to get off their mailing list followed through. Hornet no, a number of direct emails, multiple unsubscribes, a forum thread and still spam. I've tried the direct forum message now so we'll see.

You might say just use your email spam filter since it daily picks up stuff anyway. But those are anonymous, difficult to trace scammers whose emails eventually get kiboshed by my email provider. Hornet is right here/there and p-ing me off in person with pictures of him and his mates on Christmas Day of all days.

The irony of all this is that it started years back when I tried an old odd/even harmonic distortion of theirs that didn't seem to do anything at all anyway. Buggin.

[TheMaestro]

The only interesting user base for surveying if e-mails are too frequent or not, are the ones that are already receiving the e-mails.

So all the people who unsubscribed because there were too many emails in no way indicate that the emails are too frequent? Is that your assertion?

And if you want to ask people with telephones, about telephones, you ask people with telephones.

And this is where your logic breaks down. If you conduct a telephone survey, then 100% of respondents will have a telephone. That says nothing about the actual adoption rate. You might want to stop and think about this for a second; at some point you will see the light.

Why would you ask someone that doesn't use a telephone, or aren't subscribed to a newsletter, if they're happy with the rate of calls or newsletters?

You thinks it's logical in a newsletter situation, but it isn't.

[starflakeprj]

After attempting to unsubscribe from the HoRNet newsletters on three separate occasions, there was no further communication for approximately one to two months. On Christmas Eve, however, I received a Christmas greeting. While this was of course pleasant in itself, I have since received at least three additional emails. These messages were sent to my old email address, which I replaced earlier this year.

Below are several legal provisions that HoRNet may potentially be in breach of, each of which may carry administrative sanctions under EU law.

GDPR Article 6(1), Lawfulness of processing:
“Processing shall be lawful only if and to the extent that at least one of the following applies …” After withdrawal of consent, none of the listed legal bases apply to marketing emails, potentially exposing the controller to administrative fines.

GDPR Article 7(3), Withdrawal of consent:
“The data subject shall have the right to withdraw his or her consent at any time … it shall be as easy to withdraw as to give consent.” Continued processing after withdrawal may constitute a sanctionable infringement.

GDPR Article 17(1), Right to erasure:
“The data subject shall have the right to obtain from the controller the erasure of personal data concerning him or her without undue delay … where the data subject withdraws consent.” Failure to erase obsolete contact data may, potentially, result in enforcement action.

GDPR Article 5(1)(d), Accuracy:
“Personal data shall be accurate and, where necessary, kept up to date; every reasonable step must be taken to ensure that personal data that are inaccurate … are erased or rectified without delay.” Continued use of an explicitly replaced email address may therefore attract regulatory scrutiny.

GDPR Article 5(1)(a), Lawfulness, fairness and transparency:
“Personal data shall be processed lawfully, fairly and in a transparent manner in relation to the data subject.” Repeated ignored unsubscribe requests raise questions as to whether these basic principles are being observed.

ePrivacy Directive 2002/58/EC Article 13(1), Unsolicited communications:
“The use of electronic mail for the purposes of direct marketing may be allowed only in respect of subscribers who have given their prior consent.” Breaches of this provision are subject to national penalties.

ePrivacy Directive 2002/58/EC Article 13(2), Right to object:
“The customer shall be clearly and distinctly given the opportunity to object, free of charge and in an easy manner, to such use of electronic contact details.” Failure to respect such objections may also give rise to sanctions.

Pick the applicable provisions and complete the complaint accordingly, noting that GDPR infringements may potentially result in administrative fines of up to EUR 20 million or 4 percent of global annual turnover.

https://www.edpb.europa.eu/system/files ... orm_en.pdf

[uselessmind]

So did unsubscribe actually work for anyone recently?
Does not seem to for me.
Initially only took issue with the Spam, now i am getting a bit angry at the company in general.

[seangm]

Unsubscribe didn't work for me, I labeled them as spam now so my spam folder is full of Hornet emails.

[mcbpete]

Unsubscribe didn't work for me, I labeled them as spam now so my spam folder is full of Hornet emails.

Yep, ditto - have 10 of them in there since the 1st Jan (despite unsubscribing several times)

[Gamma-UT]

I unsubbed last year. The frequency was just getting stupid – I'm OK getting something once in a while but there seems to be no way to get that. They stopped until some started arriving late last year. But unsubbing seems to have worked again (for the moment).