WebProNews » Mail

Can the Post Office Survive the Digital Age?

Chris Crum — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 15:50:15 +0000

In an article earlier this year, we asked, “Is email killing the post office?” Well, the post office is not dead yet, but it’s not helping from the looks of it. The U.S. Postal Service doesn’t have the money it needs to pay its bills, and email and the web are clearly major factors.

Can the post office survive the digital age? Tell us what you think.

A report from the New York Times is all but predicting the U.S. Postal Service’s demise. “The agency is so low on cash that it will not be able to make a $5.5 billion payment due this month and may have to shut down entirely this winter unless Congress takes emergency action to stabilize its finances,” the report says.

“If Congress doesn’t act, we will default,” Postmaster General Patrick R. Donahoe is quoted as saying.

Whew we discussed the subject before, Bloomberg BusinessWeek had put out a lengthy report looking at the decline of the USPS and its contributing factors. While touching on email, it looked more at comparison of USPS performance versus that of FedEx, UPS and DHL, as well as their international counterparts.

Despite talk that social media might one day kill email, email has proven time and time again that it is still a vital part of the Internet. A report from Pew Internet recently found that email (along with search) is the top activity online adults engage in on the web – way more than social media (though that’s growing significantly).

Unfortunately for the USPS, that conversation is irrelevant, because social media and email go hand in hand when it comes to less communication by “snail mail” – a phrase that the post office no doubt despises.

One can only imagine how mobile has contributed to even more communication by web over mail. Now the Internet is in your pocket at all times, not to mention the phone – another classic non-mail form of communication. Last week, Nielsen put out a report finding that 40% of mobile users in the U.S. use smartphones.

Of course email isn’t the only part of the web that is hurting the post office. Online bill pay is a big contributor as well – also now handily available from your pocket.

It’s just easier, cheaper and more efficient to communicate digitally.

Total mail volume decreased by 20% from 2006 to 2010, according to that Bloomberg report. The numbers can only be getting worse for the post office.

There will always be packages, but the digital age certainly continues to leave its mark on those as well. Movies, music and books are all digital now. Earlier this year, Amazon announced that Kindle books were outselling print books. Tablet (namely iPad) sales are on fire. The USPS also has to compete with those other parcel services too.

The Postal Service’s payment is due on September 30. From the sound of it, consumers wouldn’t likely feel the effects so much until early next year. At least the post office should remain open for the holidays.

Is the USPS in serious trouble or is this just a temporary set-back? Let us know what you think in the comments.

Is Email Killing the Post Office?

Chris Crum — Sun, 29 May 2011 16:28:57 +0000

Is email killing the post office? It’s not a new question. In fact, it’s been around nearly as long as the mainstream use of email itself, but it’s also not gone away, and the USPS has seen better days. I’m not normally one to buy too much into the typical x is killing y kind of hype, but the Postal Service is clearly severely injured.

Do you think email is killing the post office, or at least contributing to its demise? Share your thoughts here.

Bloomberg BusinessWeek has put out a lengthy report looking at the decline of the USPS and its contributing factors. While the seven-page pice just briefly touches upon the subject of email, comparing the performance of the USPS to that of FedEx, UPS, and DHL, as well as counterparts in other countries, there’s no question that email and online communication in general have done their fair share of damage.

People have been using email for years now, and despite some predicting the death of email (at the hands of social media), it’s clear that it’s hear to stay for quite some time. Even if email were to die, it wouldn’t do much to help the postal service.

As we’ve seen just in the past week alone, email is an incredibly important part of business for companies like Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, and Twitter. Even Facebook has its own email now, and social networks all still rely on email to keep users engaged – that goes for the professionals too (ie: the newly public LinkedIn).

In a recent study, 45% said that their use of email at work will most likely increase in the next five years. 51% said that it would likely stay the same. Only 4% thought it would decrease. At home, 36% of those surveyed thought their email use will increase, 55% said it will stand pat and 6% said it will likely decrease.

The majority of important online communication still takes place through email, whether that be B2B or B2C. C2C online communication may be trending more toward social media, but again, email still plays a role here, in terms of notifications, and there is still plenty of C2C communication through email. Even from heavy users of social media. Not everyone is on the same social network. That even goes for Facebook. Email is universal. You pretty much need an email address to have any kind of account online.

The rise of mobile, and smartphones in particular, must also play a role, as it caters to increased use in email and social media, not to mention text messaging, and even….the phone call! The point is, communication is always as close as your pocket. It’s a lot easier and cheaper (at least on an individual interaction basis) than writing letters. And it’s in real time.

“With the rise of e-mail and the decline of letters, mail volume is falling at a staggering rate, and the postal service’s survival plan isn’t reassuring,” Devin Leonard says in the Bloomberg BusinessWeek report, noting that the USPS is the country’s second-largest civilian employer after Walmart (with more post offices than the retail outlets of Walmart, Starbucks and McDonald’s combined). Last year its revenues were $67 billion, with even greater expenses, he says.

According to the report, first-class mail, which the USPS gets the majority of its money from, has been steadily declining, and in 2005 fell below junk mail for the first time. Total mail volume has decreased 20% just from 2006 to 2010. The USPS hasn’t been able to cover its annual budget in three years.

Well, there’s still packages right? Sure, but there’s also stiff competition from companies like FedEx, UPS, and DHL, along with an increase in digital goods replacing physical goods. Think movies, music, and books. Amazon, the largest retailer on the web, announced last week that Kindle books are outselling print books. Never mind that there are a bunch of free ones too.

Plus, everybody’s going paperless these days. The Director of Physical Infrastructure at the U.S. Government Accountability Office is quoted as saying, “What happens when Bank of America or Citigroup says you are going to have to pay to get your statement on paper? That’s going to change a lot of behavior. It’s going to affect the postal service. That’s how they make most of their money.”

The Bloomberg BusinessWeek report includes some interesting ideas on how the Postal Service could get back on track, at least to some extent, but the outlook is looking pretty bleak. You have to wonder what this will mean for the future of digital communication like email.

Are email taxes on the horizon? Tell us what you think.

Amazon Against Post Office Ending Saturday Mail Delivery. Netflix Ok With it.

Chris Crum — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 14:47:24 +0000

As you may know, there is talk that the U.S. Postal Service could end mail delivery on Saturdays. Internet companies that ship items to consumers don’t all have the same opinion on this matter, as is evidenced by comments from Amazon and Netflix.

Paul Misener, Amazon VP for Global Public Policy gave a testimony at a hearing in Washington on the future of the U.S. Postal Service (hat tip to Eric Engleman). Here are some notable quotes from that (the entire statement can be read here):

"Amazon enjoys a strong and extensive relationship with the Postal Service. The USPS is an integral part of the service we provide our customers. Globally, we spent well over a billion dollars last year on outbound shipping – an increase of over 20% from 2008. In dollars, we spend nine figures annually on the USPS, with over two million shipments per average week via the Postal Service."

…

"Our customers have come to appreciate and expect Saturday delivery, and this is an instance where the USPS currently maintains a decided advantage over other carriers."

…

"We believe this is a bad idea. Not only would it be bad for parcel shippers, who would face higher costs to reach their urban and suburban customers on Saturday, it would be even worse for rural consumers and for the USPS itself."

…

"While they may be willing to wait until Monday or Tuesday for a bill they don’t really want; an advertisement they didn’t ask for; or a magazine to which they subscribed long ago; they expect the items they purchased this week to be delivered as soon as possible."

Netflix takes a different view. "A well-functioning Postal Service, positioned over the long haul to meet changing customer and consumer demand, is more important than maintaining current delivery frequency," said Netflix chief service and DVD operations officer, Andrew Rendich, at that hearing. (via Bloomberg Businessweek)

While Netflix certainly accounts for a great deal of mail deliveries around the country, its interests are quite different than those of Amazon’s, so the difference in opinion isn’t that hard to believe.

For one, Netflix believes the future is in streaming when it comes to movies, and it would just as soon have customers using its streaming service more. In fact, the company is making deals with distributors to bolster their streaming catalog. Don’t be surprised if streaming becomes the main business model for the company in the future.

At the same time, it is also in Netflix’s best interest for customers to rent a lower rate of DVDs by mail. This means less shipping costs for them while they get to charge the same amount to customers. Amazon on the other hand wants to get its products to customers as quickly as possible to keep them ordering more.

What do you think about the idea of Saturday mail delivery coming to an end? Are you for it or against it? Discuss here.

Yahoo Mail Socializing All About The Money

WebProNews Staff — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 11:54:29 +0000

Company CEO Jerry Yang told CES 2008 attendees Yahoo Mail would become a much more socially aware application, able to tap into multiple social networks.

The one-stop contact shop idea floated by Yang about Yahoo Mail getting smarter looks like it has another aspect. While advertising already has a place in Yahoo’s email client, the company may be interested in capitalizing on all that social data people will tap.

Resource Shelf pointed out a published patent application from Yahoo that relates to this point. The application bears the title, “Monetization Of Characteristic Values Predicted Using Network-Based Social Ties.”

The patent’s abstract illustrated how this would work to make money for Yahoo:

A method is provided to predict a value for a particular characteristic of a particular user of network-based services. A plurality of other users, other than the particular user, is determined, wherein the particular user has social ties to the plurality of other users.

The predicted value for the particular characteristic of the particular user is monetized, such as by selling advertising to be caused to be displayed to at least the particular user. For example, requested compensation for the advertising is determined based at least in part on the predicted value for the particular characteristic of the particular user.

By identifying a value for a given individual user, Yahoo could conceivably charge an advertiser more for reaching someone who, by virtue of their social networking relationships, should be a more valuable target for the marketing message.

The implementation of such a technology will be closely watched by the same privacy advocates and normal social networkers who complained bitterly about Facebook’s Beacon program. Facebook had to reshuffle its attempt to monetize people’s e-commerce activities.

Yahoo’s patent works behind the scenes, rather than the public fashion of Beacon. How people react to the technology could depend on how relevant and useful they find the sharply targeted advertising coming from it.

Yahoo’s Future: Smarter Email And Mobiles

WebProNews Staff — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 11:12:43 +0000

CEO Jerry Yang told the CES 2008 crowds about Yahoo’s plans to make its Mail client a social tool with all the widgets one could want.

Web browser? So 1994. How about a mail client that knows your social networks and will give the most important messages and people priority in the inbox?

Yahoo’s latest announcement from the big Las Vegas show noted the potential for Yahoo Mail to be what we remember Microsoft fearing from Netscape: a tool that doesn’t care about the underlying operating system.

Why have all kinds of applications and browser windows open when Yahoo Mail can do it all? That will mean opening Mail to third party developers, and the other big Yahoo told the CES audience this is close to reality:

“Yahoo! has today outlined what is possible and that the future is not that far away,” said David Filo, co-founder and Chief Yahoo!. “Yahoo! is uniquely positioned to make this all a reality – we have scale, a huge community of users, great applications and APIs and insightful data. We now have an open platform for third party developers to build some interesting applications.”

Yang suggested Yahoo Mail could tap the Facebooks and MySpaces of the world in a way to make the email client more “personally relevant” to its users. Important people, apparently, would not have their messages languishing in the inbox, awaiting attention, because Yahoo would bring them to the user’s attention.

Also, Yang talked about the big push Yahoo has been making into the mobile world. We think Yahoo believes it can win the kind of share of usage on phones that Google enjoys with search and ads on PCs. Millions of mobile users worldwide makes that a goal worth achieving.

Yahoo and JetBlue’s Arrangement

Pat McCarthy — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 18:46:07 +0000

The announcement that Yahoo! Mail and Yahoo! Messenger are partnering with Jet Blue to offer lightweight wifi services on flights is both extremely cool, and kind of sad at the same time for me.

Being that I’m traveling a lot now for work it becomes readily apparent when I’m in the air that it’d be nice to be able to connect to the web in order to get work done and communicate with colleagues, friends, and family.

However, in a weird way I also treasure those few hours of internet-free time to read documents or get stuff done that is harder to focus on with connectivity distractions. It’s also a good time to just relax on occasion by reading a book or watching a movie. I guess as connectivity hits the friendly skies it will just be another place I’ll have to learn to block out distractions to relax or be extremely productive.

Comments

Tag:

Direct Mail Advertising’s Online Effects

Doug Caverly — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 16:23:58 +0000

According to a new study, eBusinesses that want to contact people through direct mail advertising might be best off trying to reach men between the ages of 55 and 64. Compared to 2003, though, their odds of reaching just about everybody are significantly better.

Direct Mail Advertising’s Online Effects

“Twenty-one percent of total adults in 2007 have responded to direct mail advertising in the past month by visiting a sender’s Web site, up from 14 percent in 2003,” stated Vertis Communications. This may have happened as people became increasingly familiar with the Internet, or, to give marketers their due, may just be the result of more effective advertising.

Regardless, Jim Litwin, Vertis’s vice president of market insights, has an idea about why older men were particularly responsive – “men reach retirement and find more time to surf the Web,” he told Jack Loechner. If that’s correct, businesses should remain aware that many women participate in a similar end-of-working cycle.

Yet for whatever reason, reaching retirement seems to be a little more conducive to this behavior than retirement itself, as 28 percent of men between 55 and 64 responded to advertising and only 15 percent of men 65 and older followed suit.

It’s all stuff to think about when trying to reach people with direct mail advertising.

Will Yahoo Mail & iGoogle Become Social Networks?

Jordan McCollum — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 21:15:24 +0000

Yahoo has long realized that their strength laid in their already-strong web properties: their portal and their email service.

Two months ago, we reported that Yahoo Mail, still one of the top free Web-based email programs, could be leveraged as a social networking platform of some sort. Susan Decker, President of Yahoo, said in July that the service was “one of the Web’s largest dormant social networks and one that we are aggressively pursuing ways to activate.”

This week, the New York Times reports that they’ll be doing just that—and not only them, but Google, too. Google’s plans are pretty sketchy (or secret) at this point:

I don’t have a lot of detail from Google, but I’ve heard from several executives that this is their plan. When I talked recently with Joe Kraus, who runs Google’s OpenSocial project, he said: “We believe there are opportunities with iGoogle to make it more social.” And when I pressed him about the relationship between the social aspects of iGoogle and Gmail versus Orkut or some other social network, he said, “It is much easier to extend an existing habit than to create a brand.”

Yahoo’s plans, while not “detailed” per se, are pretty extensive. The Times spoke with Brad Garlinghouse, author of last year’s Peanut Butter Manifesto and Senior Vice President of Communications, Communities, and Front Doors. As a reminder, just two months ago, Garlinghouse predicted:

a future where Yahoo Mail could include a widget from Web invitation site Evite, a subsidiary of Yahoo competitor IAC/InterActive, that could let users share events with their Yahoo contact list. Garlinghouse also sees potential for Yahoo users to include links to profiles on social networks such as News Corp.’s MySpace within new Yahoo profiles. “We are going to experiment, we are going to take more risks,” Garlinghouse says.

As they progress toward some sort of social network, Garlinghouse

didn’t-have dates or specific product details. . . . But he did say that Yahoo was working on what he called “Inbox 2.0.”

This has several features. First, the e-mail service is made more personal because it displays messages more prominently from people who are more important to you. Yahoo is testing a method that can automatically determine the strength of your relationship to someone by how often you exchange e-mail and instant messages with him or her.

Yahoo Mail will also be extended to display other information about your friends as well. This can be a link to a profile page, and also what Yahoo calls “vitality” –- updated information much like the news feed on Facebook. There could also be simple features that are common on social networks, like displaying a list of friends whose birthdays are coming up.

By utilizing the information that “already exists on our network, but it’s dormant,” as Mr. Garlinghouse put it, Yahoo could create a natural and successful social network. Of course, for it to be a true “social network,” you’d need some sort of centralized profile page system:

There will be some sort of profile system attached to Inbox 2.0, he said. For people who use a lot of Yahoo services, this profile could be quite rich even at the beginning, as it can draw on activity on Yahoo Music, Yahoo Shopping and so on.

“If I get an e-mail from Saul Hansell, I should be able to click on his name and see his profile,” Mr. Garlinghouse said. “The profile page is where you can expose what you want people to know about you.

Garlinghouse denies that Yahoo Mash will be used for these purposes, telling the Times that “Mash is simply an experiment, not a product being readied for mass promotion.”

Of course, one key to this being a success would be the ability to opt out. Privacy is the #1 concern in social networking these days. It would probably be unwise to automatically collect and publish all the information about a person’s interaction with all of Yahoo’s services—while the controversy would garner them attention, it’s probably not a good strategy to get happy users.

Would you welcome a social network into your inbox?

Comments

Gmail Storage Ticks Upward, Lags Yahoo, AOL

WebProNews Staff — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 11:21:58 +0000

Google has given the storage counter for Gmail a little boost to its spin, but believe it or not they could be doing more.

Gmail Storage Ticks Upward, Lags Yahoo, AOL

Not very long ago, storage on web-based email measured in the megabytes, and not very many of them, either. When Gmail arrived with its 1GB inbox, invites to the service became a hot commodity.

Google’s decision to take advantage of what has become an inexpensive commodity, storage, spurred interest and gave the company another place to drop its signature contextual advertising. As of market close on October 11, Google’s $622 share price gave it a market cap of over $194 billion.

We can’t tie that directly to Gmail, of course, but Gmail likely didn’t get in the way of that rise, either. Google plans to give a little back to the Gmail users in the form of more storage:

In April 2005, we started increasing Gmail storage as part of our “Infinity+1″ storage plan. At that time, we realized we’d never reach infinity, but we promised to keep giving Gmail users more space as we were able. That said, a few of you are using Gmail so much that you’re running out of space, so to make good on our promise, today we’re announcing we are speeding up our counter and giving out more free storage.

In Google Apps, Gmail accounts start at 2GB, except for Premier Edition accounts, which begin at 10 GB. Now, the 2GB accounts will receive their own spinning counter, while the 10GB accounts receive a nudge to 25GB of storage.

Nice numbers, and for someone who used to have to obey a 20MB email limit in the corporate world, they are huge. But when it comes to truly fantastic amounts of email storage, one has to look at Yahoo Mail and AOL Mail.

Both of these Gmail competitors have millions of users, and unlimited storage for their free webmail accounts. If storage is really an issue for email, Gmail is at best the third choice for people today. Tomorrow, who knows?

Yahoo Mail Marks 10 Years

WebProNews Staff — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 00:31:28 +0000

The service formerly known as Rocketmail, now with a heaping helping of Oddpost in the mix, reached a milestone anniversary this month.

John Kremer, vice president for Yahoo Mail, marked the anniversary on the official Yahoo blog with a list of highlights since October 1997.

That was when Yahoo Mail launched in its first incarnation, bringing people a whopping 3MB of storage space. In March of this year, Yahoo threw away the limits and gave Mail users unlimited storage.

Kremer also provided an interesting memory of the time before criminal spammers were operating in force online:

It