How Do I Stop The Flow Of Junk Mail?

Recently I participated in a marketing event and had an opportunity to speak to a number of people one-on-one about their challenges. More than one person complained that their email inbox received so much junk that it was almost unusable. They also complained of too much paper mail in the mailbox as well. If you find yourself in this same situation, there are ways to help reduce that influx whether it is coming via emails or paper mail.

Email Is Cheap To Send

Unlike paper mail, that has to pay for each item sent, the incremental cost between sending ten thousand emails and ten million emails is very low. Kaspersky, an anti-virus vendor, estimates that 46.5% or almost half of all email sent in 2023 was spam or unwanted advertising.

There are two types of bulk email being sent. One is from spammers who don’t care about following the email rules in the United States. The other is from real businesses who do want to stay within the law when sending emails. The method to stop emails is different depending upon which category it is.

Email From Spammers

To tell the difference, emails from spammers will often not come from the business represented in the email or from one of the major bulk mail systems such as Constant Contact or MailChimp. The sending email address (not the name) may be Yahoo, Gmail, Verizon.net, Comcast.net or another company used mostly for personal email.

If it looks like it might be a spam email, or you aren’t sure, don’t click on the unsubscribe link. That will often tell the spammer that it is a live email address and will send even more messages. Instead mark it as “junk” or “spam” which will start to teach the email system what is spam. It will also automatically start to not deliver exact copies of the email to other users. This will help deliver more of these types of messages into the junk/spam folder rather than the inbox.

Email From Real Businesses

There are also emails from companies you’ve done business with, and the sending address is the company’s domain (e.g. target.com). These emails will also sometimes have something at the top or bottom asking you to allow emails from and that address should match the sender’s email. Clicking on the unsubscribe button should allow you to unsubscribe or change your preferences to receive email less often.

Unsubscribing Apps

There are also services that claim they can rid an inbox of junk email. Often, they don’t help curb it enough and they require full access to your email address to do this. One company offering this service was found to have sold their user’s emails to others. If considering a service, it is important to vet the service fully before subscribing.

Sometimes You Just Have To Walk Away

Unfortunately, if the inbox is flooded each day with so much spam that it is hard to find the emails you want, it may be necessary to give up and create a second email address just for personal email from friends and family. Keep the first email address around and give that one out to any business or organization that wants an email address. My first email from the 1990s gets nothing but spam these days so if a website or business needs my email, that’s the one I give them. If I want to go to Staples and I want to see if any of their email coupons are worthwhile, only then will I check that old email address for the latest from the company.

Reducing Paper Mail

There are a few ways to reduce paper mail. Unfortunately, any mail that is addressed to postal customer is still going to be delivered to all mailboxes in a certain area. These are things like coupons and advertising flyers. Some paid political postcards will also be in that category. However, a lot of political mail can be reduced using the below methods.

Call Or Write To Them Directly

Other Services That Can Help Reduce Mail

There are a few websites that will allow removal of your address from multiple organizations. For direct marketing association members, go to the DMA’s website to fill out a request for removal. It costs $4 and is good for ten years.

For catalog mailings, go to the Catalog Choice website and request removal from their lists.

For credit card offers, go to the Opt-Out website to be removed from pre-screened credit card offers. This request will also show up on credit agency reports to flag your account not to receive these. This is good for five years. It is also possible to request this by phone at 1-888-5-OPT-OUT (888-567-8688)

I have used these techniques with a client who received nearly twenty-five advertisements, solicitations and catalogs each WEEK and over time the amount of mail declined considerably.

Finally, if an app is your preferred method to accomplish mail reduction, one called PaperKarma can help to remove names from mailing lists. While I have no personal experience or recommendation of this product, other daily money managers have indicated they have had success with this tool.

Don’t Expect Overnight Change

Keep in mind that even after the business or organization acknowledges the address has been removed, it may take up to three months for their mail to stop coming. They work with marketing companies well in advance of mailings and so it may take a while to get through the queue of their mail campaigns already destined for your address.