Business to Business - News and Blog

For me, spam is unwelcome email - if I don't want it, it's spam.

The send speeds of ESPs are increasingly being looked at as a key selling point. Being able to pump out over a million emails per month is regarded as a benefit by many clients.

Most major UK-based ESPs are able to provide these speeds, often through a partnership with companies such as Strongmail or Port25 Solutions.

But is this important?

A simple Santa hat, some holly or a bit of tinsel hanging off the corporate logo is often the most companies do to make their email marketing festive. 

They are missing a trick.

Professional social network LinkedIn has launched a developer platform as well as a redesign of its website.

As previously outlined by CEO Dan Nye, the new "Intelligent Application" platform will not be as open as that of rival Facebook, and will be limited to ‘business productivity applications’.

Dela Quist looks at why 40% of subscribers to an email database may not open a single message they are sent for six months or more.

He says this is not necessarily a bad thing as they are ‘unemotionally subscribed’ – they still want to receive messages from you but are not in a position to take up your offer today.

The BBC, Channel 4 and ITV have confirmed that their long rumoured joint video on demand (VOD) service will go live next year.

The venture, dubbed 'Project Kangaroo', will operate independently of the three broadcasters and offer video content from a range of providers.

B2B social network Xing is planning to introduce advertising for the first time before the end of the year, giving the company an extra revenue stream to add to subscriptions.

According to Xing, the targeted ads will only be introduced in certain sections and will "not compromise the usability of the website". But it says the volume of ads will increase over the next year.

The Times is to make it easier for readers to contribute to its website by allowing them to blog by phone using voice to text services provided by SpinVox.

The service is initially aimed at travel bloggers as part of the site's YourWorld promotion with BMW. TimesOnline users will be able to give accounts of their travels from anywhere in the world, and read those posted by other readers.

MySpace has joined up with Google for the launch of its OpenSocial platform, which aims to create a common platform for developers to create applications for social networks.

Bebo also joined in with OpenSocial yesterday, while LinkedIn, XING, Friendster and Orkut are already on board. The big question is whether Facebook will decide to join Google's initiative.