Yesterday I read this post on the Email Marketing Voodoo blog. The author claims he/she has received 4 apology emails from VistaPrint this month and is wondering if it’s possible to apologize too much.

I too received 4 apology emails from VistaPrint in the last two months and as from the second one I started to feel that it was more of a marketing stunt rather than a sincere apology.

I must say I’m a bit puzzled with their email marketing tactics overall. Last December I purchased some business cards on their website and have received over 60 promotional emails from them since. I received 5 emails from them in February, 8 in March, 12 in April, 20 in May and so far I’ve received 15 in June… So I’m wondering: is sending more emails to unresponsive/lapsed customers a good tactic? Do they really think it works?

Personally I don’t think so. If it weren’t out of professional interest I would have unsubscribed long ago.

Legally it’s perfectly okay in Europe to send emails to customers, but in my perception I feel spammed to death by them. One email per month to remind me of their existence and keep the brand awareness up would be more than enough. I would even consider purchasing from them again. But now I’m not so sure: would purchasing more products from them trigger more emails? I’m not willing to give it a try!

What annoys me most is that sending practices like this are giving the industry a bad name.

If anyone at VistaPrint is reading this post: do something about it! Please!