Inside Best Buy's Marketing Department

Let me share a little story with you.  It may not be true, but when you see what Best Buy really did later in this post you just may believe it.Marketing Wonk 1: You know those two email lists we have here in the Best Buy Email Marketing Department?Marketing Wonk 2: You mean List 1 that makes us money and List 2 that makes us NO money?Marketing Wonk 1: Yeah.  Well, we just realized that List 1 is empty and List 2 is huge!Marketing Wonk 2: That sucks.  It makes me sad.

photo credit: shawncampbell

Marketing Wonk 1: No shit.  But we’ve come up with a clever "Blue Shirt" idea.Marketing Wonk 2: I’m listening.Marketing Wonk 1: Let’s combine the two lists so we can send promotional emails to the bigger audience and make more money.Marketing Wonk 2:  But List 2 doesn’t want those emails.Marketing Wonk 1: Yeah, so I’ve put our best copywriter on that.  She’ll sell it as an enhancement.Marketing Wonk 2:  Genius!

It's A True Story

Yup, that’s exactly what they did on 10/29/2010 with the following email to me and many of my friends.  Hell, if one of my friends hadn’t pointed it out to me I wouldn’t have noticed.Here's the plain text version:

You are receiving this e-mail because Best Buy® has changed the way marketing e-mail communications are managed. Currently you are registered to receive marketing communications from the Reward Zone® program, but have opted to not receive marketing communications related to Best Buy generally.We are writing to let you know that Best Buy has changed the way it manages opt-out preferences. Going forward, opting out of either Reward Zone or Best Buy marketing communications will result in being removed from both marketing lists. In order to honor your request to receive Reward Zone program e-mails containing special offers, invitations to events and account updates, you have been opted-in to receiving Best Buy marketing communications generally. If you do not wish to receive these e-mail communications, you will need to update your opt-out preferences. Please note that if you do opt-out of Best Buy marketing communications, you will also opt-out of marketing communications from Reward Zone. You would continue to receive e-mails regarding your accounts and purchases at Best Buy, services with Geek Squad and Reward Zone certificates.

Oh No They Didn't

Sure enough, 11 days later I get my first promotional email from them. You would think they would come out of the gate with a winner, wouldn’t you?

Wine?  Really?

If you manage your email marketing department or have any influence on those that do, please don’t do this!  It’s wrong.Their Email Marketing Department changed the rules on Email List 2 and anyone with their eyes open knows exactly why they did this.

Best Buy Email FAIL!

What Do You Think?

• Would you have done this differently?
• Have you seen any similar email mistakes by companies?
• What do you think of the University of Florida's failure in email?

Update January 14, 2011

My buddy feels our pain as well.  He sent me this much-too-common unsubscribe confirmation notice: