Why Brands Keep Emailing You To Ask How You Feel About Them

Brand emails can be controversial. Business Insider ran an article last year about how “Stores ‘bludgeon’ their customers ‘to death’ with emails.” LinkedIn settled a lawsuit for unwanted emails in 2015, paying out $13 million to complainants. Glossier, the cool-girl cult beauty brand, is notorious for its emails, which are sometimes just pictures of bathtubs or goats, and other times are aggressive reminders that the recipient left items in their online shopping cart, and shouldn’t they go back to buy them? As someone on Twitter put it last summer, “glossier needs to cool it w the spam. i gave u my email so u could let me know when ur overpriced items r on sale not for this shit!!!!!!” Brands you’ve ignored for a while are fond of shouting “WE MISS YOU!” in their subject lines. Or, as Eliza Brooke described for Racked last year, “trying to dupe people” by putting “FWD:” or “Re:” in the subject line, making it look like the message is coming from someone you’ve intentionally started a conversation with. Read more at Vox.