By Ed Hadley, Senior Marketing Manager at Neolane 

Imagine  world where the email that hit your spam filter actually came from the people and brands you know and trust, via your social networking news feed updates. We can become so bombarded with status updates, new “likes” and “shares”, and sponsored stories, it feels like it will only be a matter of time before this happens.

Would you still trust your social network? What if you missed the important updates, the real life events of your friends and family, or even the important promotions and actions of the organizations you actually wanted to see, because “Cousin Ed” took only “six weeks to get that diploma” or every other update was about the “free iPad” you could win when filling out that survey. Organizations interested in leveraging the opportunity of the social network—or any new communication channels to come—must apply the same campaign management and email marketing best practices that drive successful direct marketing strategies. In order to stand out from the rapidly growing noise, and avoid delivering messages that are perceived—or worse, flagged—as spam, consider the following:

• Obtain permission
• Set appropriate expectations about what you’ll send and how often
• Provide relevant messages
• Perform regular data hygiene
• Make opting out easy for the audience

Even legitimate marketing communications can go wrong and appear spammy because of poor customer or prospect data, irrelevant content, or unintended violations of permission/trust. It turns into campaign mismanagement. Seriousness aside, Neolane would like to take you on a whimsical, visual tour through what it might look like if your social networking page looked like the hoard of spam emails you probably receive (and hopefully block!) every day.

Let us know your thoughts and feedback via comments below.