To loathe these pushy marketing techniques?

[HolidayAtNight]

I've got used to the pretending-they're-your-friend kind of marketing emails, which seems to have become pretty standard across a whole range of shops.

What I can't stand is the more recent development of them desperately trying to drag you back to the website, either by having a pop-up appear when you move your mouse towards the X ("Don't go! Here's 15% off") or by emailing you a few minutes after you leave the site. The former is annoying enough, especially as loads of people browse in tabs anyway. The emails, however, seriously put me off shopping at the places that do it. They have begging/"cheeky" subject lines like "Why don't you take another look at this?" or "We saw you looking 👀"

It gives me such secondhand embarrassment. It's so desperate and pushy. If I liked the thing I would have bought it or bookmarked it for later; sending these emails makes me LESS likely to buy it. This isn't an offer or discount thing - it's purely a weird attempt to guilt-trip you into going back to the thing you didn't buy.

More and more shops seem to be doing it, and I'm surprised as it seems so obviously bad. So does anyone like these emails? Or even better, does anyone work in marketing and feel like explaining the reasoning behind it?

Can't you avoid this by not signing in? Delete your cookies, browsing history and autofill data including passwords from your browser.

I used to work in marketing. It's because these tactics work unfortunately. That is, until they don't. Companies spend a fortune on marketing experts who all copy each other, until whatever tactic reaches a saturation point (right about where you are now) and it stops being effective. Then they check out what other companies are trying differently that seems to be working and they all do that instead. And so the cycle continues.

Almost all traffic to websites leave without buying anything. It does make sense to give them a pop up with an offer and capture some of those 'on the fence' and chasing them into their inbox will convert a few more people into customers who otherwise wouldn't have bought.

I looked it up and it's cookies, as sometimes it happens when I'm not signed in. Turns out it's called retargeting: Behavioral retargeting - Wikipedia

Clearing my cookies and data immediately after browsing any site seems like a bigger pain than deleting the emails, really. What would be better is if they would stop doing it.

Interesting! Offering a discount makes more sense, although weirdly I'd prefer to get the same discount via signing up to their mailing list or as a first-purchase discount rather than because I changed my mind about leaving, so would not use the code they offer. That would seem somehow mean, like I'm taking advantage of their desperation.

Do you think the email thing works? It's not even a few days later when you might have forgotten, it's close to right away.

Well it doesn't work on me! Seeing 'You forgot something' in my inbox just makes me think, 'No actually, I didn't...'

It's funny you frame it as desperation. In the marketing world it's seen as picking up extra orders from otherwise lost traffic, and a good thing...!

I think it was the CEO of Macy's or Bloomingdales or somewhere that said decades ago, 'Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted. The trouble is, I don't know which half!' Nowadays they can chase you around the internet and invade your inbox, and it makes sense that if they can pick up a few extra orders for little to no effort then they will do. But that 'fatigue' you're experiencing with seemingly every company doing the exact same thing means that eventually they'll have to try something else, which will probably be just as annoying

Ahhh I used to be that annoying person who designed these emails, although I don’t work in retail or email marketing anymore, so there’s some solace in that.

Sadly as Sparklfairy has said it’s a marketing tactic that works, it won’t stop being an industry tactic until it stops working (and I somewhat doubt it ever will). There’s a few things you can do if it’s getting a bit annoying.

1. Clear your cookies (which I think you’ve already done) so you get rid of anything historic. That will wipe the slate clean.
2. NEVER accept cookies when you see a ‘pop up’ on a website. If you press accept you’ve basically given that particular brand carte blanche to email you and follow you around the web. You only need to do this once and then the website should remember your settings and it won’t drop the cookies on to your device when you next visit.
3. To be able to email you there’s got to be a link between the cookie and the email address so sign out of any websites (if feasibly possible) until you’re ready to make a purchase. I usually use Guest Checkout when I’m ready to buy. I have very few accounts with major brands.
4. Unsubscribe. These emails can only be sent to you if you’ve either given consent, or because the business feels they have a legitimate reason to send you something. Legally there has to be an unsubscribe in the email. You’ll usually find it right at the bottom in the footer either above or below their address / company details. If you unsubscribe they can’t email you anymore. It won’t stop you getting the emails you need, just the marketing ones, but obviously that means you’ll never get another offer from that particular brand, regardless of whether you’ve been on their website or not.

Hope that helps, it won’t stop it completely, but it will reduce it. Personally, I love some of them because it means I never pay full price for the things I like, but I use the above tactics when I don’t want to be bombarded!

Thanks! I don't mind getting regular marketing emails and having accounts, especially as lots of places have loyalty schemes and so on. It's just the embarrassing "Aren't you forgetting something? 👀😢Please come back!" ones. I wish you could just opt out of that particular arm of their marketing strategy without having to sign out, etc.