Zinio Warning

bobtomay · Feb 12, 2011

As much as I like the magazines.... I've had enough!!!

Anyone that hasn't downloaded the Zinio app yet for magazine subscriptions, but are planning to, here's a warning:

Make sure you opt out of receiving notifications from these guys.

They will fill your inbox with spam.

And no, I'm not talking about 2 or 3 a week here...

I've received as many as three per day!!!

If I haven't already deleted any of them - here's 22 of them during the month of January!!! This is over 5 per week. Every week...

Yes, I realize some of those are notifications my new mags are ready for download.
But you can officially leave me alone already.

Not only that, they've figured out some way to get around the junk filter in Mail, so no matter how many times you flag them as junk, the next one still shows up in your inbox.

For those that have been putting up with this for months like I have - I urge you to click that opt out link in the spam you just received today.

For the new Zinio rep that's recently signed up here - take that back to your management team.

Zinio · Feb 16, 2011

bobtomay said:
As much as I like the magazines.... I've had enough!!!

Anyone that hasn't downloaded the Zinio app yet for magazine subscriptions, but are planning to, here's a warning:

Make sure you opt out of receiving notifications from these guys.

They will fill your inbox with spam.

And no, I'm not talking about 2 or 3 a week here...

I've received as many as three per day!!!

If I haven't already deleted any of them - here's 22 of them during the month of January!!! This is over 5 per week. Every week...

Yes, I realize some of those are notifications my new mags are ready for download.
But you can officially leave me alone already.

Not only that, they've figured out some way to get around the junk filter in Mail, so no matter how many times you flag them as junk, the next one still shows up in your inbox.

For those that have been putting up with this for months like I have - I urge you to click that opt out link in the spam you just received today.

For the new Zinio rep that's recently signed up here - take that back to your management team.

Please accept our sincerest apologies, according to our company policy and communication guidelines we should not send more than a mailing once every 3 days or so per registrant.

Before sending each mailing, we exclude any address lists that have been used the previous 2-3 days to make sure we’re not over-mailing anyone although obviously there is a flaw in our process for which again we apologize.

We also offer the option when registering to select which categories our subscribers are interested in to make sure we only send relevant content so in case multiple categories were selected this could also lead to receiving emails relevant to each category. However this is definitely not an excuse!

Thank you for your feedback, any comment (positive or negative) is vital for our efforts to improve and be able to offer a better service to our customers.

bobtomay · Feb 16, 2011

I've had this on my iPad since the first week after it was released. That's 10 months now. At January's average of 15, I've already received 150 sales promotions. Just what in the world are you guys selling that warrants 180 sales promotion emails to a single customer over a 1 year period of time.

Every 3 days - that's still 120 sales promotions in a year - 120 a year - really?. These are magazines for pete's sake. Just how many magazines do you all think one person can read, much less subscribe to?

What do you think happens - the 100th one, they're reminded of the magazine they've been wanting to get - or right click and delete. What do you do with the 150th sales promotion the same company has sent you in a 10 month period? I'll bet the answer doesn't include reading it.

Do you not realize that you have essentially desensitized all of your existing customer base with this practice? I would be willing to wager that your customers are not looking at more than 1 in 10 after the first 3 months (at least not looking at them in a way that results in any sales - and that's the whole purpose for them - right?). I personally have not "really" looked at a single one of them in several months.

Kash · Feb 16, 2011

Interesting, I only get the occasional email from Zinio and I haven't changed any of my email settings with them.

Zinio · Feb 18, 2011

bobtomay said:
I've had this on my iPad since the first week after it was released. That's 10 months now. At January's average of 15, I've already received 150 sales promotions. Just what in the world are you guys selling that warrants 180 sales promotion emails to a single customer over a 1 year period of time.

Every 3 days - that's still 120 sales promotions in a year - 120 a year - really?. These are magazines for pete's sake. Just how many magazines do you all think one person can read, much less subscribe to?

What do you think happens - the 100th one, they're reminded of the magazine they've been wanting to get - or right click and delete. What do you do with the 150th sales promotion the same company has sent you in a 10 month period? I'll bet the answer doesn't include reading it.

Do you not realize that you have essentially desensitized all of your existing customer base with this practice? I would be willing to wager that your customers are not looking at more than 1 in 10 after the first 3 months (at least not looking at them in a way that results in any sales - and that's the whole purpose for them - right?). I personally have not "really" looked at a single one of them in several months.

As promised I did raise a flag with our management and after we had a look at the email communication received from us I'm afraid that most of them are delivery notifications and receipts of purchase which we are required to send by law.

Actual promotional emails were sent every 3 days at the most.

Again when subscribing to receive our newsletters there are a few options to choose from, giving the registrants the chance to select their favorite topics so when selecting several categories the readers will of course receive relevant offers per each category however as stated previously we are trying not to send more than 2 promotional emails per week to each registrant.

Regarding the notifications and sales receipts unfortunately there is not much we can do, by law we have to supply them to our customers.

We are terribly sorry again for the inconveniences we have caused.

bobtomay · Feb 18, 2011

I suggest you not listen to their response and take a look at what has actually been sent to my inbox. I have already deleted a bunch - Have a look at these and then tell me they are only every three days. There has been a new sales email from you guys every 2 days for as long as I got them. See for yourself.

So yeah, this one you told me Beatles content is now available in a copy of a mag I already have - but, it not just a notice, it's more sales pitch.

Yeah, like 5 months from now as I still have 4 more issues per your notification!!
Just another attempt to get me to spend money now!!!

And the same day:

bobtomay · Feb 18, 2011

I deleted a bunch of them in this space of time already - here they start up again:

Today, I get this one along with two others.

Every 2 days there is a new sales promotion email. This is equal to 180 per year. Don't care what your department says. I've the proof on my computer.