“Overall, spam definitely is regarded as more annoying, irritating and intrusive than postal direct mail,” said Mariko Morimoto, assistant professor of advertising. “That was pretty much our hypothesis, but I also wanted to know why.”

Morimoto and study co-author Susan Chang, assistant professor of advertising and public relations at the University of Miami, randomly assigned 119 college students to a survey that asked about either spam or direct mail. On a scale of one to seven, where one is most intrusive and seven is least intrusive, students gave spam an average intrusiveness score of 1.93 compared to 4.24 for direct mail. For irritation, the average score was 2.46 for spam compared to 3.87 for direct mail.

Results from a focus group study conducted by Morimoto and Chang found that people find spam more intrusive than direct mail because it makes it harder to get to legitimate and wanted messages. Discarding direct mail, on the other hand, wasn’t perceived as time consuming.

And while spam often contains adult content or other inappropriate material, direct mail pieces often contain potentially useful items such as sales promotions and easy-to-use coupons. E-mailed coupons must be printed, which is an extra step that consumers would rather not have to take.

Morimoto’s focus group participants also said that the cost associated with direct mail leads them to believe that they’re getting information from a reputable company. Because spam is inexpensive to send, consumers tend view spammers as being less reputable.

Despite the negative feelings associated with spam, Morimoto said it can be effective when used properly. Her focus group work found that people don’t seem to mind receiving e-mails from companies with which they have previously done business.

Morimoto, for example, doesn’t mind e-mailed suggestions from Amazon.com based on previous purchases. E-mails that read, “Mariko Morimoto, do you need a college degree?” on the other hand, are not welcome.

“If you cultivate your relationship with consumers in some other venue and then extend that effort to e-mails, then spam can be effective,” she said.

For more information contact Mariko Morimoto at mmorimot@uga.edu.