This is a great story about Kyle MacDonald who is using his blog to trade a red paperclip for a house. There are a few intermediate steps that need to be made, but he’s well on his way.

“Respect the elders. Embrace the new. Encourage the impractical and improbable. Without bias.”
—David Fricke (and Vin Scelsa)

There’s a disturbing story floating around about a proposed new law that would enable software companies to sniff around and look at everything on your hard drive by virtue of you clicking “accept” on the end-user license agreement (the fine print that no one ever reads but everyone accepts in order to install the software). Thanks to John C. Dvorak for alerting us to this over on his blog.

eMarketer reports on an April 2006 survey of 190 U.S. online merchants by the e-tailing group. It’s packed with interesting information about conversion and abandon rates.

The largest group of respondents (21 percent, up from 15 percent last year) enjoyed a 3.0 – 3.9 percent conversion rate, while 41 percent (down from 51 percent in 2005) were under 3.0 percent. Eight percent reported conversions of 10 percent or more; that’s up from five percent last year.

What’s not clear is whether different merchants define a conversion differently. A conversion is typically a sale, but some merchants might consider a catalog request or the capturing of an email address a site conversion.

Also in the report: some interesting information about shopping cart abandon rates. Fourteen percent of sites see a 41 to 50 percent rate, while 13 percent see a 51 to 60 percent rate. Three percent are at 80 percent or above — owtch! What’s most interesting is that a full 30 percent don’t know their abandon rates at all.

Takeaway for marketers: If you don’t know your shopping cart abandon rate, take steps to find out. Then take steps to reduce it.

I thought I’d finally made it when I read the email that came late yesterday:

Dear Craig

I would like you to be our guest for the 2006 Email Insider Summit. As a Summit VIP, the cost of your airfare, hotel accommodations and conference registration will be paid for by MediaPost.

The Email Insider Summit Advisory Board has identified you as a senior level marketer or agency executive decision maker within your company. You are among a select few to whom we are extending this special VIP opportunity.

All right! The Boulders in May! Maybe my blogging for ad:tech paid off! Maybe someone at MediaPost heard about the 20 million or so emails I sent out at my previous job that kicked butt in the ROI department! Maybe that new digi-portrait finally put me over the top!

Then came the denouement, as deflating as an audit notice from the IRS:

Dear Craig

We apologize if you received an email from MediaPost earlier today inviting you as our VIP guest to the Email Insider Summit. That email was intended to be sent to a list of 50 top brand marketers in the industry, that have already agreed to attend the event. The email below is the email that you were intended to receive. If you would like to be a part of the inaugural Email Insider Summit please read below about the summit and how to register. Again we apologize for the confusion and inconvenience that error may have caused you.

And it’ll only cost me $2,495 … plus airfare … plus hotel.

I wonder if I can still hold them to their original offer. After all, the local supermarket has to honor an erroneous price on the shelf or in a newspaper ad, doesn’t it?

Takeaway for marketers … particularly email marketers … particularly email marketers trying to sell an email marketing conference and looking to avoid the bitter sting of unique irony: Double-check that email message before you click that “send” button. Then check it again. Then send.