The list is dead, spam killed it. The money is not in the list
By Anton Groenewald
How many times have you heard or seen the phrase; "The money is in the list" Well, it is not. It certainly used to be, but spam just killed it.
Don't you just hate spam?
Who has not had their fill of spam emails taking over your inbox after you have unwittingly and trustingly submitted your email to some website on the internet? Have you felt the frustration when you can no longer look forward to opening your email account dreading the flood of unwanted email? When you find it difficult to find the good mail from amongst the rest, you know you are caught in the scourge of our time, spam.
The list is dead, that's not where the money is.
As a direct result of spam and the frustration it brings, the effectiveness of email marketing campaigns have suffered in recent years. In fact email marketing has greatly lost their appeal for most serious marketers and become a real pain for the recipient of those unwanted solicitations inviting you to buy things you do not even have the least interest in.
So when you are confronted with websites that invite you to build a list, my advice is to turn and run. These businesses as legitimate as they may be, are out of touch and have not kept up with what's happening.
By joining such a list builder you put yourself in the list, opening yourself up to receiving loads of unsolicited email from other list members, usually the Elite members at the top.
So unless you want spam, do not join a list. Turn and run.
Are all email campaigns bad?
The answer is definitely no. The concept of using your own personal email lists to cleverly market to a willing group of subscribers is still very relevant. The emphasis however is on having your own personal list of double opt-in subscribers that ask for and welcome your email correspondence. There are a number of ways of doing this, but none of them include joining someone else's list and risk losing your online business due to spam complaints. This is a very real threat and well worth taking note off. Yes, your ISP or Domain can be shutt down as a result of spam complaints lodged against you.
Let's all bury spam and rid the world of this scourge.
The money is still in marketing to the masses. However technology changes rapidly and the fad of two years ago is not necessarily the flavour of today. This is especially true of email blasting campaigns. The way they used to be run, will only get you into trouble. So if we can all realise this then we can start ridding the world of this unwanted email disturbance and start looking at making money in far more effective ways.
So where is the money? Build your own list or find another way.
There are many ways of building your own opt-in list of willing subscribers who ask for more correspondence from you. In this article we can only touch on a few of the most popular ways of obtaining such a list. One way is to have a landing page that offers something attractive to your visitors for free. in order to get the free gift they have to fill in their name and email address. You then need an autoresponder service set up to send out an email that requests your subscriber to click on a link that will confirm his address. this is called double opt-in and is the safest way of building your list. By clicking on the confirmation link in your confirmation email, they are directed to the free gift page. here they can access the free information or download. On this page you would normally also introduce your business or money making opportunity to them. Another very effective way to build a list is to have an invitation and form on your main or landing page to subscribe to some valuable course for free. The same procedure follows as explained above to obtain confirmation. They are now expecting your email and in fact looking forward to receiving the valuable information from you.
When do you start selling to your list? Telling vs selling.
Guard against the temtation to do a hard sell on your email as this will frighten many people away and they will unsubscribe. incidentally, this is something that is required, that you should have an unsubscribe link at the bottom of each email. Most autoresponders have this feature built in. The most effective approach is a soft sell where you give them the valuable information that they have subscribed to, and subtly give examples of how this can be achieved with links to introduce your sales page. There is a lot of material out there that covers the need for an effective sales page with information on how to build it. We cannot cover webpage design in this article.
Find pre-built opportunities that will provide all in one package
If you do not have the skills or the money to get your own pages set up and you are in a hurry to start making money, (aren't we all?), then search the internet and join an already successful venture that has all this set up and ready to go. Some may cost you money, and the test is; if you like what you see you can buy a turnkey business in a box. Complete businesses exist with professionally designed website, products and services and automatic follow up email system all built in. One such example can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/57nul4
However there is another way that is free. There are some very good affiliate re-sell opportunities that can even get you started for free. this will give you the opportunity to try it out before spending money on it. Over many years I have seen many clever marketing pages and as a general rule; if it excites you, it is likely to excite others. Find something that you can associate with and would feel proud to be involved with. Then follow the advice to market your site, but whatever you do, do not buy leads to mail to. You can see an example of a good free sytem here: http://tinyurl.com/6zszd7
In conclusion, email is a wonderful tool and is here to stay. How we use it is what counts. If we use it legally and responsibly, we can achieve good results. If we make it our tool for effective communication with our own list of subscribers, giving them some perceived value, they will welcome our email. If you don't then you wil not only be disappointed with poor results, but you could also end up having your email or website banned from all reputable directories if you are reported for spam.
I hope to touch on the importance of carefully selecting the best advertising vehicles and different methods of succesful marketing to get the best out of your internet business, in future articles.
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