03.24.05
EMail Thousands Per Month - Without Spamming
The recent rash of spamming is a real irritant.
Yet I understand why some are tempted to do it. Of
all the methods of selling items over the internet,
none is more effective than emailing your message to
a customer. All of the other methods require the
customer to look for or stumble across your offer.
With email your message is right in front of your
potential customer and many will look it over.
This has generated a blatant disregard for many
folks not wanting to receive unsolicited emails.
Solutions I see discussed include stronger
legislation, some ISP’s banning certain email domain
names, and very strong legal action against
spammers. I also read regularly about firms whose
internet service providers do close them down. I
hear regularly from internet marketers who go out of
their way to shut down spammers - launching massive
campaigns. Fortunately - I am not on the receiving end
or their efforts because I try to market responsibly.
Here are a few suggestions I wanted to
offer my readers who want to get their offers before
more customers without breaking any rules or creating
any ill-will.
The first suggestion- that I use with considerable
success - is getting your own free classifieds ad
site. There are several firms that will set you
up free with a site on their servers. They make
their money with links on the site leading to
their products, banners, etc. The script for
the site I use allows you to send a thank you
note to anyone who posts to your site. This note can
be changed any time and I change mine regularly.
This thank you note should naturally mentions a
product or two that you feature. Or at least
a signature file that lists your webpage URL.
To see the page I use, place your free classified
ad and even sign up for your own page, visit my site at: http://rodweb.localweb.com/classads/sites/rich.htm
I promote my site heavily and as a result send out
several thousand emails per month with my pitch.
A second suggestion, using the same strategy is
to set up a free for all links page that sends
a thank you note/pitch. Link-o-matic recently
modified their script to do just this. They
are at http://www.linkomatic.com Before this
recent change, it costed anywhere from $25 to $300
for this same service. The fact that folks paid
up to $300 per year for this service shows the value
of getting your message in front of customers who
implicitly give you permission to do so. (The
script on my free for all page, and my classifieds
page indicates that I will send an email thank you).
With this second suggestion, you do need an ISP
that gives you cgi access. The classified ads site (first
suggestion) is on the server of the firm which created the script.
Most of your providers of free web pages does not allow
cgi access. Two exceptions are Hypermart and Web Quarry.
Their addresses are http://www.hypermart.net and
http:///www.webquarry.com/cgi-bin/webrefer.cgi?wquser=williec
The last part of the address above just tells them that I
sent you. I have had sites operating on both their servers.
Most paid hosts also allow cgi access. There mare lots of good paid hosts out there. Just look around and find one that offers what you
are looking for. I use Virtualisys http://www.virtualisys.com/vr/wcrawfor I am
also a reseller for their program which pays
me a steady monthly commission from any customers
that sign up through my sites.
The third method I use to send email to prospects
without spamming is I join opt-in lists. These
are list that you join and agree to allow list
members to send you their offers. You are also
allowed to buy the list, usually at 2 to 10 cents
per name. Members of the list sign other up and
when their recruits buy the list they earn a
commission. They get good names to mail to and
a chance to earn money too. If you would like
specific recommendations in this category
email me, as opt-in lists providers change frequently,
and I see new ones popping up daily as others go
out of business for various reasons.
I am aware of a problem that one such opt-in list
had in the past. Some over zealous list
members were signing others up without permission.
When these folks showed up as opt-in members and
began receiving lots of unsolicited email they
complained - LOUDLY. This cause one very
responsible and successful opt-in list to have
to find another ISP and to rewrite their program
to prevent this problem from happening again.
Despite this potential problem, you get some very
good names to email your offers to - with their
permission - for only pennies each.
A fourth and final method I recommend is to join
one of the discussion list offered through
services such as One List or Listbot. Their
addresses are : http://www.onelist.com and
http://www.listbot.com At either of these sites
you can join or create your own list/discussion
group. Many of these groups invite you to email
your offers to the list. Others only invite
discussion, but you can include you signature
file and still generate lots of traffic.
With all of these methods out there for ethically
getting your offers directly in front of prospects
there is never a good reason to spam. It gives
the industry a tarnished image and causes lots
of folks to set up filters excluding whole
domain names. Lots of struggling small businesses
are consequenlty hurt, and don’t survive to
eventually become your customers!
Willie Crawford has been teaching others how to build an
on-line business since late 1996. Frequently featured in
radio, magazine and newspaper articles and interviews, Willie
teaches the average guy what the top marketers are doing but
seldom talking about. For example, Willie demonstrates the
power of automated residual income through his system at:
http://ProfitAutomation.Com
Visit now for a business boost.