Why is it that so many direct marketers use traditional tactics sure to backfire in e-mail while ignoring old-school practices that most likely will pay off?

Two recent studies — one by deliverability firm Return Path, another by e-mail service provider Silverpop — found that a third of online merchants fail to send any e-mail to new subscribers within 30 days of sign-up.

Even more astonishing, 60% of online marketers don't send “welcome” e-mails to new registrants, according to Return Path.

DM 101 has it that one of the best times to approach people for a possible sale is just after they've done business with the merchant. They're presumably happy with their purchase, “surprised and delighted” — as industry talking heads say ad nauseam — with the company's customer service and in love with the brand.

Wouldn't it stand to reason, then, that the single best time to contact new e-mail registrants would be immediately following sign-up, when they've literally stated they want to hear more about what the DMer has to sell?

Granted, implementing an automated welcome program involves interaction with IT. And yes, IT has a very long to-do list and often wonders why the marketing department exists.

But failing to send welcome e-mails is akin to a retail sales rep turning his back on customers just as they walk through the door.

The longer a marketer waits to send new registrants e-mail the more likely those people will forget having signed up and will report the message as spam. Better yet, they'll have bought from a competitor.

How difficult could it be to include, say, a percent-off coupon in an automatic confirmation e-mail to new registrants? Heck, once you get it in place it doesn't even have to be changed. It's marketing on autopilot, for Pete's sake.

Now for an example of a DMer implementing a traditional marketing tactic in an e-mail campaign that surely backfired: Columbia House recently sent a “reactivation” offer for its DVD club to a dummy Yahoo address I set up in my son's name to sign up for e-mail lists whose owners I think may be sketchy.

This e-mail address has never been involved in an e-commerce transaction. And I've never been a member of Columbia House's DVD club, so the company definitely was not mailing the reactivation campaign to addresses supplied by former members.

What's more, Columbia House put its name in the “from” line. Its executives apparently thought Columbia House would be a better branding tool than the tool from which they rented this list.

One sure sign an e-mail list is suspect is when the owner allows the renter to put its brand in the “from” line. Offers to permission-based e-mail lists should be sent by the list owner.

Can anybody guess what people tend to do when they don't remember giving whoever is in the “from” line permission to e-mail them? Anybody?

Why, they hit the “report spam” button. That's what they do. And then the mailer gets blocked.

Columbia House might not be having deliverability troubles just yet. But if it keeps mailing bogus reactivation offers to addresses on sloppily built e-mail lists, it most certainly will have them soon.