Foo - How much less would internet service cost...

...if Verizon didn't send me multiple-page, glossy print fliers twice a week for:

(a) service I already subscribe to (basic DSL)?
(b) service they don't offer in my area (FiOS)?

I'm sure it's at least a couple bucks a month.

Plus there's the cost of all the fliers they send to people who don't have it and similarly ignore the fliers, because face it, if they didn't know Verizon offered internet service in their area at some point in the distant past, they figured it out several hundred fliers ago.

Same goes for Comcast.

I receive similar flyers for Rogers cable and Internet service nearly once a week. They somehow think I have no clue what they do when each week I toss handfuls of their flyers into the recycling bin. Don't get me started on the oh so friendly phone calls fro my bank asking me if I'd like to pay for any extra services I have no use for but may have no idea that they can provide it for me. Irritating.

Ultimately, I wonder how this ends up happening. With somewhere around 10 million DSL customers, I would not be surprised if Verizon is spending 10 million dollars or more every month advertising to people who already do business with them. Be it savings for me or (more likely) extra profit for them, you'd think they'd at least remove current customers from their mailing lists.

And then there's non-customers - on top of billboards, TV commercials, radio spots, magazine and newspaper ads, and online marketing, how much difference could such a high rate of mail make? Do the marketing folks actually conduct research showing that their net earnings will be greater at a rate of one flyer per household every 4 days versus every 4 months? Or do they spend millions of marketing dollars purely on empty hope?

I have 1.5mb for around 25 bucks... let's say 30 with takes.

A magic jack gives me phone for 19 a YEAR trough the DSL.

Major networks like ABC let me watch my favorites shows online.... very cheap.