If you read any of what I write you will be aware that I don’t talk about work a great deal. This is supposed to be an outlet separate from anything to do with my working life but today I wanted to solicit you opinion on a trend I am seeing emerging through work.
Like all companies, on an almost daily basis we deal with new customers, prospects or organisations relating to our business. Often we will have meetings and presentations and start to build – what we hope will be – a good business relationship. Like most people who meet others in their sphere of work I hand out business cards to new contacts.
Three or four times in the past month I have found that – a few days after meeting somebody new – my email address will be subscribed to their company mailshot/newsletter etc. I know this is a reaction to the new rules on spam in the UK where there has to be some kind of business relationship before you can receive arbitrary messages from a company but I don’t like the trend. When you’re on the lookout for new business it’s a little hard to say ‘stop this’. Perhaps we should start doing something similar.