Join Sierra Trading Post, Guitar Center, Cuddledown, Rod’s Western Palace and others who are using new personalization features in Catalog Choice. This week, we launched features that allow merchants to configure the mail preference process.

Merchants will be able to:

1) Add a photo

2) Configure a message on the Mail Preference Page; and

3) Configure a message on the Confirmation Page

Look how good Rod’s Western Palace’s mail preference page looks! This is the page users see when they register their mail preference for a particular catalog.

In the next couple of weeks, we’ll be unveiling even more features for merchants. If you’re a merchant and would like to activate your free account, please contact us at merchantservice@catalogchoice.org.

The fruits of merchant account managers’ labor are ripening. Every week, more and more merchants are signing up to our free, secure service to honor consumer mail preferences. In the past week, PC Connection, Van Bourgondien, Wisconsin Cheeseman, and Duluth Trading Company have all opened accounts and started the process of honoring consumers requests.

These and the other Bravo Merchants, are saving money in many ways by setting up a merchant account. First, it is easier and faster to honor the request through our secure download rather than transcribing requests sent via our push email fulfillment service. Second, there is no sense in sending a catalog to someone who does not want it. If you want a free merchant account, contact us at merchantservice@catalogchoice.org.

The other day we came across a note from a Catalog Choice member.  They wrote to inform us that one of the catalog merchants, Fahrney’s Pens, has printed a notice within their recent catalog instructing readers that if they wish to no longer receive their catalog to head on over to Catalog Choice and set their mail preference.

Fahrney’s made the decision to make it easy for customers to set their mail preferences through Catalog Choice.  They certainly earned my respect and my business.  If you want to applaud Fahrney’s Pens, head on over to their website and buy yourself a pen.  Perhaps you could use the pen to write a note to those merchants who are not honoring your mail preference request through Catalog Choice.

Catalog Choice was formed with one primary purpose: conserve our planet’s precious natural resources by reducing the enormous amount of unwanted catalogs mailed every day.

In spite of our efforts not to demonize the industry, the Direct Marketing Association continues to send messages to catalog companies that paint Catalog Choice as the devil. The nasty things they say about Catalog Choice make us think that they are worried about the power of your wishes. Instead of working in the best interest of consumers, the actions of the DMA are driving a serious wedge between consumers and catalog companies. We think that’s bad business.

Our business is to help you quickly, easily and efficiently choose what catalogs enter your mailbox. Catalog Choice will do whatever it takes to help you exercise your right to choose and fulfill your wishes.

Our merchant service team is contacting catalog companies every day on your behalf. Our board and executive team are talking with executives throughout the direct marketing industry every day.

We have this one purpose and we plan to fulfill it - 100%.

Thank you for your continued support. If you have any questions, you can leave a comment on our blog - we read every comment.

If you get a catalog mailed to the same name and address but there is a new customer number, the system now allows you to enter this as a new opt-out request.

We have also made the Still Receiving area much easier to use. If you get a catalog in the mail that you have already opted-out of (sorry, this will happen in the short term until we get better merchant compliance), you can find the catalog title in your My Choice page and select Still Receiving. We then show you all the name address combinations that you have entered for that catalog. If you can match the name address combination with the catalog you just got, select This One to report the infraction. If you don’t see the name address combination, you can add a new entry at the bottom of the page where it says Create a new opt-out.

So, why do we need your help reporting infractions? Well, as it stands honoring mail order catalog opt-out requests is a voluntary process. We need your help to let us know who is not honoring the consumer’s choices. We are working on a process where the industry can self-police rather than having the consumers do the work. You will be the first to know when we get this in place. In the meantime, thanks for your help.

Last week we added a new feature to the Decline Catalog page in which we ask you to let us know the primary reason why you are declining to have the specific catalog sent to you in the mail. If you have not seen it yet, here are the list of choices that we provide. If you don’t want to answer the question, we make it easy by pre-selecting the Prefer not to answer option. But, for the benefit of our team and the merchants, we really want to know why you are making this choice.

Some of you probably saw this question when you were making your choices last week. We rolled it out quietly so that we could get some initial feedback from users. We quickly learned that we needed to add the option “I want to help the environment” as many members were adding this answer or the answer “I don’t want to waste paper” to the Other category.

We will be creating a page for existing members to quickly go back over their existing opt-out requests to answer this question, if you wish. In the meantime, you can find the question for each opt-out request by going to My Choices and selecting View Details.

As the data starts flowing in, we will share it with the merchants that have signed up for our service so that they can better understand the customers’ perspective. We will also share aggregate data with the community so that we all can better understand what drives our community to enter over 7 million opt-out requests in 3 short months.

The formula is straight-forward:

• an unwanted catalog is a waste of marketing resources and natural resources.  Bad for the financial and environmental bottom line.
• a wanted catalog is a pleasure to receive in the mail; you can browse the merchandise in the comfort of your home. It can provide you with the inspiration for a gift or that product you have been thinking about buying.
• the consumer is the one who has the right to decide what is wanted and unwanted.   That is why we built Catalog Choice.  Up until now, there was no straightforward way to communicate your decision about unsolicited mail.

There are other reasons to like catalogs, now that you have the choice of which ones to receive.  If you live in a rural area, a catalog can be one of your key ways of connecting to your favorite stores, whether online, by phone, or by mail.  Catalogs give you access to product selection beyond what you will find at Wal-Mart, the dominant general merchandise retailer in rural America.

If a merchant operates in all three channels (catalog, online, physical store), the catalog lets you check out what a retail merchant is now featuring before you decide to go shopping.

Another thing we like about catalogs is that the store is always open.  When we are ready to make a purchase, we can pick up the phone and talk to a knowledgeable customer service representative or point our browser to the merchant’s website and make the purchase any hour of the day or night.  This is a real boon to those of us who work or are busy during the day and usually take the time to peruse a wanted catalog or website in the evening.

In addition to these benefits, several catalog merchants are leaders in the effort to reduce their environmental footprints.  Some use recycled and/or Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)-certified papers.  Some ask if you want to combine multiple products into one carton, reducing the amount of natural resources used (both in terms of packaging and transportation emissions) to send your items.  Some have information in their catalog and website to educate consumers on the environment and sustainability issues.  And, some merchants are starting to let the consumer specify the frequency and media channel (print, online, email) in which they communicate with you.

One of our goals is to help you find those catalogers that care about your choices and the environment so that you can incorporate that information into your purchasing decisions.  We plan to work with merchants to identify those “best management practices”, and to communicate those findings to you.

The facts: Catalog Choice for Merchants is the only free, secure, easy-to-use solution for companies to respect the mail preferences of consumers.

The alternative: Consumers can call a company’s customer support line to make the opt-out request. Based on industry research, it takes three to five minutes to complete a call, and at .70 cents/minute, that will cost the merchant between $2.10 and $3.50 for each opt-out request.

The merchant math: 10,000 opt-out requests @ average cost of $3.00 per call = $30,000.

This is much more expensive than downloading a file. The economics seem compelling to our industry experts and many merchants that we’ve spoken to.  In addition to the pure dollars and cents, every merchant we have spoken to knows that it makes good business sense to respect your customers’ mail preference.

On the consumer side of the equation, it takes approximately 10 seconds to complete the opt-out form in Catalog Choice. If you are required to call the merchant to make your request,  you can complete your opt-out request for an individual merchant in four minutes, on average.

The consumer math: 50 opt-out requests will take 8.3 minutes to complete at Catalogchoice.org. 50 opt-out phone calls will take 3.3 hours or almost 200 minutes.   These are the kinds of productive gains our economy needs - a service that is 24 times faster than the current method and saves resources all in one step.  So instead of 550,000 people spending 433,333 hours (18,055 days) opting-out of over 6.5 million titles, Catalog Choice members are applying the power of the Internet and skills of great software developers to do the work much faster.

That is what I call a  win-win.  Cost savings for merchants and more time in the day for consumers.

If you had three extra hours, what would you do?

Herb Weisbaum wrote an article for MSNBC describing the Catalog Choice service and the Direct Marketing Association’s service DMAchoice.org.

Herb’s two cents: … some people might prefer using the Catalog Choice Web site because it does not require them to enter a credit card number.

Herb also quotes Pam Dixon of the World Privacy Forum regarding the DMA’s requirement for a credit card to opt-out of a catalog: “We think it’s a problem,” says Pam Dixon, executive director of the World Privacy Forum. “There are people who are not going to give out a credit card number to stop getting a catalog.

Do you think that you should have to provide your credit card number to use a service to stop getting unwanted mail? The DMA does. Catalog Choice does not. Leave your comment to let us know what you think.

We received this email from a Catalog Choice Member in our customer support system. It was one of over 5,000 emails we received over the past week. Thanks to Ross and Paul, who read every message, this one was forwarded to me. After contacting the member personally, he gave me permission to reprinted the email.

If you are a merchant reading this, we hope you understand that Catalog Choice can save you money by eliminating the production and distribution of unwanted catalogs. Also, by honoring the request from Catalog Choice, you will enhance your customer relationships. This customer speaks for thousands.

If you are a consumer, please show your support for the Bravo Merchants who are leading the way to a future of respecting choice. Tell a friend, neighbor or colleague about any of the Bravo Merchants who are working with Catalog Choice. Before long, we hope that all the merchants will be celebrated.

Now, in the words of a customer

I thought that I would send you the following email message that I have sent to non-cooperative merchants:

I have been a customer for about 15 years but this may end soon. Your actions will determine the future of our business relationship.

Specifically, I am writing today because I recently requested - via the Catalog Choice website - that you stop sending catalogs to me. I understand that you have declined my request. I request that you reverse this decision and that you cooperate with Catalog Choice in the future.

The internet has changed the nature of your industry, and I am not sure that you fully recognize the extent of the changes. When your catalog arrives, I immediately put it in the recycling bin without even looking at it. After speaking with several friends, I am sure that I am representative of many of your customers. After all, I can shop much more efficiently using your website. Therefore, from my perspective, your catalog is nothing but a waste and places a burden on me - your customer - to dispose of the waste.

Given this, why would you choose to not honor my request? This leads to my statement that I will no longer shop at XXXX, if you send another catalog to me. After all, if you will not honor my requests as your customer, why should I continue to give you my business?

I wish you all the best but I truly hope that you reverse your decision with respect to my request and also hope that you cooperate with Catalog Choice in the future. No other decision makes sense. Why would you choose to squander money, create unnecessary waste, degrade our environment, and alienate customers all with a single action?

Sincerely,

Your Customer