Direct Marketing Incompetence – A Vexing Problem

[CaptTom]

No return address is a good indicator it's junk. As is anything marked "Important!" or "Open Immediately!" or "Response Required!" Now that I think about it, anything with an exclamation point. Phony, printed handwriting-like fonts are another give-away. And, of course, the larger, heavier, glossier or thicker the brochure, the smaller the amount of your money would go toward products, services and/or charity.

 

[Walt34]

Just today we received a big fat stuffed envelope addressed to DW's father, who has never lived here and died ten years ago. When he was in full nursing care DW was POA and had his mail sent here. That's the only connection. So it goes straight to the trash can.

 

[brett]

I believe that direct marketing is only 'vexing' if you allow it to be 'vexing'. You have a choice. Answer that unknown caller, open that junk mail, whatever.

Lots of ways to shut it out of your life if you are so inclined....as we have been for a long time.

 

[FlaGator]

I believe that direct marketing is only 'vexing' if you allow it to be 'vexing'. You have a choice. Answer that unknown caller, open that junk mail, whatever.

Lots of ways to shut it out of your life if you are so inclined....as we have been for a long time.

And with that, I will say when you watch your wife of 30 years slowly die and you get reminders of that 10 years later, you might have a different point of view.

I know a lot more about direct marketing than the average bear, read my OP. I don't need any reminders of her slow, painful demise and want them to stop.

 

[brett]

For at least the last ten-fifteen years neither of us answers phone calls from unknown callers. Call display is a great tool. Two calls from UK numbers just this week that we did not bother picking up. No message of course.

For even longer, neither of us bothers with mail from unknown persons, firms, etc. It goes straight to the bin. We cannot be bothered opening unknown mail adressed to resident, addressed to us, or addressed to previous home owners. Since moving most of our personal mail to the web ten years ago it is surprising how little relevent mail we actually get. Nor do we open email from sources/adressees that we are not familiar with.

If we answered those phone calls or opened/read that unknown sender (to us) junk mail it might be a problem.

I really do not know nor do I want to find out by changing our practice.

 

[athena53]

For even longer, neither of us bothers with mail from unknown persons, firms, etc. It goes straight to the bin.

I got a PO Box years ago because of mailbox theft issues. Most of my mail doesn't even get into the house- I throw it into the trash before I leave the PO unless it's something like a credit card solicitation that might have sensitive info on it.

 

[brett]

I got a PO Box years ago because of mailbox theft issues. Most of my mail doesn't even get into the house- I throw it into the trash before I leave the PO unless it's something like a credit card solicitation that might have sensitive info on it.

Our goal has been to have as little hard mail as possible go through the postal system that contains any reference whatsover to our personal, financial or tax data.

Especially important now since we get our mail from a community box at the bottom of cul de sac.

We still have the occasional piece come along. It makes it way to the re-cycle bin via our shredder.

It makes me wonder about the value of direct mail and phone solicitiation. We know lots of people who do exactly as we do. No call answer or straight to the bin.

 

[Koolau]

It makes me wonder about the value of direct mail and phone solicitiation. We know lots of people who do exactly as we do. No call answer or straight to the bin.

I have wondered the same thing, and yet, the fact that we still get such unsolicited mail and calls makes me think unsolicited calls and mail MUST be worth it - otherwise, I guess they wouldn't do it.

Mailing permits for bulk mail are cheap and USPS could raise those rates. The fact that they don't charge more suggests it's cheap for USPS to deliver all this garbage to us.

I recall when my mom was starting into Alz., she was sending $5 checks to perhaps 35 "charities" every couple of months. The inbred nature of these charities meant that they all sold their mailing lists so she would sometimes get solicitations in slightly different names from the same charity. She could afford it then. I tried to get it all stopped and finally got her to put my name on her checking account and require both signatures. That helped a lot AND the volume of junk/bulk did slow down a bit once she quit sending to every Tom, Dick and Harry charity.

It's pretty disgusting that charities take advantage like this. YMMV

 

[SecondAttempt]

For at least the last ten-fifteen years neither of us answers phone calls from unknown callers. Call display is a great tool. Two calls from UK numbers just this week that we did not bother picking up. No message of course.

For even longer, neither of us bothers with mail from unknown persons, firms, etc. It goes straight to the bin. We cannot be bothered opening unknown mail adressed to resident, addressed to us, or addressed to previous home owners. Since moving most of our personal mail to the web ten years ago it is surprising how little relevent mail we actually get. Nor do we open email from sources/adressees that we are not familiar with.

If we answered those phone calls or opened/read that unknown sender (to us) junk mail it might be a problem.

I really do not know nor do I want to find out by changing our practice.

I got a new Google Pixel phone a couple of years ago and it comes with a feature to screen calls. I love it! I almost never get spam calls now and the odd caller that is legitimately contacting me leaves a message and I can call them right back. It's awesome and free.

 

[CaptTom]

Now that I think about it, I can't remember the last time I got a spam/scam phone call. It's been weeks, at least. Maybe months.

I don't screen my calls. Never have. I answer if I can, let it go to voice mail if I can't. If it's a scam, I might hang up, or maybe listen for a bit. It's interesting to know what's going on in the scam world. I never found it a huge inconvenience. Maybe because I simply refuse to let it irritate me.

 

[athena53]

Mailing permits for bulk mail are cheap and USPS could raise those rates. The fact that they don't charge more suggests it's cheap for USPS to deliver all this garbage to us.

I recall when my mom was starting into Alz., she was sending $5 checks to perhaps 35 "charities" every couple of months. <snip>
It's pretty disgusting that charities take advantage like this. YMMV

Yeah, that happened to my Dad, too, and he didn't have Alzheimer's. He got all kinds of plastic "gifts" from penny-ante charities. I donate mostly to major organizations, sometimes anonymously through my DAF and I've still accumulated a supply of return-address labels that may outlive me given how little I mail things.

Many years ago I started receiving a magazine aimed at advertisers for no reason I could fathom. What was interesting was their ads from mailing list brokers. They'd name the organization selling the list of donors as well as the average donation size. Most of the times the average donation was pitifully small but that makes sense- no organization is going to sell a mailing list of $1,000+ donors and jeopardize their own revenues.

 

[More Cowbell]

Brief background – I spent the fat years of my working life in the “information business”, specifically public records/real estate data. Did a lot of different things - sales, operations management, and worked closely with a variety of customers. I know what goes on in the kitchen when it comes to usage of that type of data.

My 1st wife died early in 20214, and I relocated the following year to a different part of FL. After a while, I started getting solicitations addressed to her in the new location – one she never lived in. Those companies clearly used the household USPS Change of Address for that to happen. I shut those down by calling the offending companies and had several years without seeing any direct mail addressed to her.

But now, it’s a few months away from what would be her 65th birthday, and the Medicare-related mail solicitations are showing up several times/week. I’ve contacted insurers directly, as well as AARP (one of the likely sources) and asked she be removed. Local insurance brokers are stupid – talked with one who told me “it comes from public records”, ignoring that death certificates are “public records” and the Feds provide access to a file (Limited Access Master Death File) which, if properly used, would permit this to never happen.

It is clear there are incredibly incompetent direct marketing firms peddling these lists. After none of the firms soliciting the long-dead woman for Medicare would (understandably) not divulge their vendor, I decided to move upstream of the sh!thead “list brokers” and “mail houses” and contacted the major providers I know of - Acxiom, Lexis-Nexis and Experian and requested she be purged from the files. With the death certificate uploaded, approvals to do so came within hours.

Have to wait a month or so to know if this was successful. If not, the rampage of firm, but polite phone calls will begin again and I’ll start filing complaints with the FL Office of Financial Regulation. I’m glad I understand how this could happen, I’d be even more p!$$ed than I am if I didn’t have any idea what to do about it.

Has anyone else dealt with this, and how did you stop it? Any other “upstream” companies I should contact?

I just got asked to help my mom control her junk mail, most of which is from charities.

This YouTube video details the process of reducing junk mail and goes down the rabbit hole to root out problem at the source (data brokers):

If you’d rather read the blog post from the video’s creator (Drowning in Junk Mail), here’s the URL:

How to Stop a Massive Junk Mail Problem

Today I’m going to teach you how to stop junk mail. Not just any junk mail, but a massive junk mail problem.

drowndinginmail.wordpress.com

 

[CaptTom]

Good timing on resurrecting this old thread. As I approach 65, I get daily junk mail from Medicare Advantage sellers. I've already mapped out who I'm going to talk to, and what I want, so it all goes into the recycle bin. But, wow, there must be a LOT of money in selling those plans!

As for the premise of the thread title, I don't consider it incompetence. It's just marketing. They're not going to research every individual to decide who should get their mail and who isn't interested (or isn't still alive.) They just send the junk mail to everyone on their list, and hope they get enough suckers responses to make a profit. Personally, I dislike marketing. But I won't let it bother me. I prefer to pick my battles.

 

[FindingForward]

And with that, I will say when you watch your wife of 30 years slowly die and you get reminders of that 10 years later, you might have a different point of view.

I know a lot more about direct marketing than the average bear, read my OP. I don't need any reminders of her slow, painful demise and want them to stop.

This won't solve the problem you're posting about, but a wee bit of revenge: most of these mailers include a postage-paid return envelope. Pack that sucker full of scrap paper - really stuff it in there - (include an angry message to STOP mailing if you prefer.) Then mail that right back to the sender - they get stuck paying return postage and get junk back in return. Just feels good!

 

[brett]

I empty my spam account every few months.

There must be a warehouse full of products waiting for me according to all those Fedex, UPS, Postal Service, etc email notices about pending deliveries, customs duty owed, etc.

Usually at least 10-15 in spam. Plus lots of prizes, free trips, free dinners that we have missed. Opportunites lost?

Fortunately the delate all key takes care of them in one or two simple key stokes.

Junk email, junk hard mail, and junk calls will never go away. Simply deal with them...and never encourage them by responding in any way or form.