Email Dead? Nope, Not Even Gasping: Part Two

By Ken Magill

Well, lookee what we have here: another study showing email is not dead.

While just 5 percent of online Christmas shoppers reported being primarily influenced to visit top retailer sites by social media, 19 percent came to retailer Web sites as the result of a promotional email, according to the ForeSee Results E-Tail Satisfaction Index.

That means email drove almost four times the amount of Christmas-shopping traffic as social media.

Moreover, lowly email outperformed search. Just 8 percent of online Christmas shoppers said search engine results primarily influenced them to visit top retailer sites, according to the ForeSee report.

The study—which was mostly about customer satisfaction—comes on the heels of a study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project claiming that Email is the No. 1 online activity people across all age groups engage in.

“Email and search engine use remain the backbone of online activities, with 88 percent of the oldest generation using email,” the study said.

An average of 94 percent of all online adults use email, according to Pew Internet’s Generations 2010 study.

Now, is everyone clear on this? Email. Isn’t. Dead.

Wanna know what’s dead? Handwriting in cursive, that’s what’s dead. In the next generation, they’ll be teaching it like Latin. Kids don’t need it and unlike email they won’t have to use it to get and keep a job, communicate with their parents or shop online.

You know what else is dead? Some of the skin on my toes: That’s what’s dead. There’s some shit that’s alive down there, as well, but let’s not go into detail.

Oh, and hair. Hair is dead. That’s why it doesn’t hurt when we cut it. It’s dead.

And my tolerance for idiots who make proclamations about how new technology will kill something that preceded it when neither they nor anyone else has any idea how it will pan out: That’s been dead for more than a decade.

Heeeyyyy. I have an idea.

Here’s what we do. We all start carrying hockey air horns to conferences and whenever a speaker or panelist proclaims email dead, we blast ‘em. You know, right in the face.

Then we form a punching line leading from the podium out to the hall that they have to run through. Except we won’t punch. We’ll have tube socks with bars of soap in the toes to club them with.

Think about it! It’ll be like the junior-high boys’ bathroom and a military-boot-camp blanket party combined! Man, they’ll never say email’s dead again! Won’t it be great!?

So what do you say? Are you with me? Yeah? Yeah?

What? There’s no hitting in conferences? And no blasting faces with hockey air horns? We may want to do business with these people?

And the fact that I even know what punching lines and blanket parties are—and would suggest them—indicates a deeply twisted individual who should undergo years of therapy?

Oh.

Well, can we shoot paper clips at them with rubber bands?

No?

Then why do people attend these things?

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