I'm not ready for a two-piece.

The Hunt
It seems like everyone is getting ready for warmer weather. Here in the Windy City it has been slow coming but the promise of sunshine and weekends at the beach is nearly here. Marketers have been taking advantage of this change of season and clothing retailers particularly have been featuring the season's newest items through their email programs. We all talk about need for relevancy within email communications and seasonality offers a logical approach to ensure your product offerings are timely and geared to what the shoppers are looking for - if you are leveraging it correctly.

The Skunk
I recently received an email from Active Endeavors (from name and email stated the same) but the branding was that of Couture Candy. In the footer of the message the physical mailing address was for Active Endeavors as well. I'm thinking that this is an online brand that is either part of or affiliated with Active Endeavors but the discrepancy from the name and branding threw me for a loop.

Besides the branding discrepancy, the email as you can see below features only clothes for women - I'm a guy. The greeting is "Dear Valued Customer." I’m not sure how I ended up on this list. I probably have signed up for email from Active Endeavors since they have clothes for men and women. The ambiguous greeting however; leads me to believe that they only have my email address and no other information about me. My "valued customer" greeting doesn't leave me feeling so valued. I'm also curious as to how my possible sign-up to Active Endeavors get's me signed-up to Couture Candy as they appear and act like two separate brands.

After this message arrived, I did use my email to enhance my customer profile but the information they collect is very limited. If I choose to add my billing or shipping information I can add my name to my profile but that's about it. I wonder how many other recipients find themselves in the same situation - why am I getting an email trying to sell me on this season's hottest two-piece swimwear for women?

The Resolution
Email marketers should be crystal clear regarding the sender and actual brand being referenced within the messages. If this is a partner email that is being sent out by Active Endeavors, the communications should be branded as such. Confusing your recipient with a "from name" and email address that doesn't match the content of the message can lead to many issues, opt-outs and SPAM complaints are just a few of them.

I did a bit more digging on both the Couture Candy as well as Active Endeavors websites and both collect only limited profile information. All email marketers take note, if you have products or services that are geared to one sex or the other (or both) make sure that you account for this information within your registration process. Also, if you are going to send partner messages, make sure that you let your recipients opt-in or choose not to receive emails from partners, be clear about the message that you will be sending. There are many cases where an email recipient would want to receive both types of messages - especially when the recipient may be making purchases for other family members however; you can’t assume that irrelevant messaging will not do harm to your email programs.