How much is my time worth for you to market to me?
Okay, I'm not even in product development or in an executive-level position, so I should theoretically have a low cost of entry for rewards based e-mail marketing.
Background:When I signed up for BonusMail (ten years ago?) The reward system was a flat rate cost-per-click model, with variable reward cost-per-action layer: An ad would come in your e-mail. You received 5 cents for clicking on the ad and maybe 10 cents to $20 dollars for following through on some action. The "actions" could be as simple as signing up for additional opt-in e-mails to as complicated as signing up and getting approved for the NextCard Visa card ($20 reward--you'll notice that NextCard went under long before the latest crisis). BonusMail got bought by MyPoints, which is now part of United Online, which owns FTD, Juno, NetZero, and Classmates.com. Along the way, the 5 cent reward was converted to a "points" system--a nice, easy way to obscure the reward amount being received. The new reward was 10 points per click. Then, there was rescaling of the "points" accumulated, and an adjustment of the reward down to 5 points per click. In the meantime, I signed up for the MyPoints rewards card which was operated by the now defunct Washington Mutual bank. At 1 point per dollar spent + double rewards for purchases through MyPoints, the points racked up considerably quicker than through the e-mail clicking. What's the point system worth today?
Points are redeemable for gift cards through various merchants, and vary depending on the merchant. Merchants with higher markups require fewer points per dollar, etc., so for the most "efficient" point redemption example through the lowest markup merchant, let's look at Wal-Mart:
- $50 gift card
- 7500 points
- 150 points per dollar or 3 1/3 cents per click (5 points)
What's my time worth?
Since I'm not a targeted expert, I wouldn't expect to be compensated as a seasoned professional for my time. However, I also consider any compensation for activities outside of my day job as being paid at an "overtime rate." (In other words, divide the the hourly compensation by 1.5 for comparison purposes.)
Could I have gained anything from that time?
I still play addictive online games, etc... but I refuse to buy a gaming console. I do not wish to commit money to something that will likely eat up free time being non-productive. I get on Facebook to maintain the friends and family network. I get on Twitter to engage in conversations and to get quick knowledge via the Twitterized blog feeds.
I may not have gained anything in that time wasted, but there was definitely an opportunity cost in terms of time. I may have delayed the completion of my Master's thesis by 3 years because I broke my concentration too often with such wastes of time--at my retirement, that may be a 7-figure mistake.