Spam is a serious problem.  If you send bulk e-mail to people who have never heard of you, nor expressed an interest in your products or services, then you’re simply being a pest, and you’re breaking the law.

I’ve seen on more than one occasion someone implement the old “reply with remove in the subject line” method.  The problem with this is that the e-mail address that your “remove” system is going to verify against is the one that I’m sending my reply from.  In many cases, it’s not the e-mail address that you used to send the message in the first place, because I’ve chosen to forward mail from multiple addresses to one location.

The “remove” method is ancient in digital years.  It’s also impossible to know if you’re actually using an automated script to remove addresses, or if you’re manually removing them when you get a message that says “remove” in the subject line.  The latter method is a joke.

The Right Way

Whatever you’re using to send bulk e-mail should provide a link at the bottom of your messages that allows for single click un-subscription.  When you send me something I don’t want, I should not be expected to do any work to eliminate future mailings.  I shouldn’t have to be inconvenienced by your system’s antiquity by forcing me to write YOU an e-mail to ASK you to stop sending mail that you weren’t supposed to send me in the first place.

If I can’t one-click unsubscribe from your message, I can guarantee I’ll never use your services.