It does not seem like good news for email marketing following the GDPR regulations came into place following the 25th May 2018.

That said there has been a massive shift in the way we sell and market.  There is a perfect storm building of legislation, change in society and it's values and changes in the way we buy and sell.

We all know that as buyers we undergo research on the products and services in (salesperson avoidance mode) before we buy.  As buyers we have changed the way we engage with companies, bringing B2C values and activity to the B2B buying process.  We are no longer willing to put up with companies that spam us, pitch to us, interrupt us, broadcast to us.  GDPR being at the centre of this where you can no longer push people down a buying process, you have to pull.  This is a fundamental change in the way we buy and turns everything marketing has done in the past 20 years and turn it on its head.

We all know from our own experiences, we don't watch or listen to ads anymore, we don't subscribe to email lists and actively block people or spam us with emails or spam us on social.  We avoid company and corporate marketing  as it tells us how great people are.  Every website is pretty much the same, telling us the same message.  Marketing today is just noise.

As Bob Dylan said "The Times They Are A-changin".  But there is some good news.

Our clients and prospects are on social media.  In fact 80% of the internet enabled world is on social.  560 Million people are on LinkedIn.  Worth having a look at social to support your selling process.