On April 23rd, I published “Will Google Kill Email Marketing”. That post generated a lot of feedback and online chatter. It was featured on Business2Community. There was enough response that I thought it justified a follow up.

Since that post went live, a number of things have happened that are worth mentioning. The list that I published of things that Google has done with Gmail has grown.

1. Gmail launched mobile versions of the Gmail Sponsored Promotions.

If you use the Gmail app on your phone, you may have started seeing these yourself. As of the first post, I had not seen one myself. But to prove that I’m seeing them now, here is a screenshot of the latest (ignore the fact that they are targeting an ad for wedding dresses at me I guess):

2. Gmail added a second layer of Gmail Sponsored Promotions on the desktop version.

Again, back when the first post went live, I had only ever seen one ad at a time in the Promotions tab. But judging from the photo I used, you knew more were coming. And sure enough, in the past week it’s become a regular occurrence to find two in there, sitting at the top of my emails, pushing marketing emails further down the page. How many will they stop at? 3? 4?

On a personal note, I am now working on a project that will include testing the Gmail Sponsored Promotions. If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em, right? I plan on reporting back on the results of those tests so that we can keep this conversation moving forward.

Your turn to tell me what you think. Is Google out to kill email marketing? Answer below.