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Unsolicited Email: Yes or No? If Internet marketing is on your list of things to do, you will have to decide what role email will play in your marketing activities. Unless you've been living in a cyber-cave, you already know that the topic of bulk email is a contentious one. While opponents and anti-spam groups protest and lobby to ban the use of unsolicited email (spam), our mailboxes continue to fill with well, crap. And make no mistake; this influx is an inconvenience. Yes, you can set up email filters that send spam to cyberheaven, but in doing so, you risk filtering out what could be a genuine message. I found this out the hard way a couple of weeks ago when my filters trashed what turned out to be an authentic work offer from a potential client. In my view, the following activities are unacceptable under any circumstances and are poison to relationship selling. Use them and your reputation will be damaged and you leave yourself open to all sorts of retaliations. If you're serious about establishing your Internet business and if you see yourself as being around for the long term, I can only say, don't go here: · Mass mailings of get rich quick schemes and other nonsense. · Mailings designed to deceive -- and they come in many forms: Mailings with deceptive subject lines, mailings that remind the reader of conversations that never occurred, mailings suggesting the sender has visited my web site but containing subject matter that make this impossible to believe, mailings erroneously stating that "this message is in accordance with law such and such", are deceptive. How many people want to do businesses with someone who employs deceptive practices right from the beginning? · Messages sent to ezine addresses and autoresponder addresses. · Distributing opt-in email to other marketers without express permission. Although the items above are clearly no-brainers, recent columns published at Clikz.com
(www.clikz.com) offered some interesting thoughts on whether there can ever be an acceptable use for unsolicited email in B2B marketing. Clikz readers raised some of the following issues: If you attend a conference and collect business cards, are you spamming if you use their email address to make contact? Is it spam if a conference organizer emails past attendees to notify them of another upcoming conference? Is it spam if you email your customer list to notify them of a time when service will be unavailable or to notify them of a safety concern, for example? Is it spam if a company with whom you have previously done business contacts you without permission to announce a new service that could interest you?
I suspect that for many of us, the issues raised above constitute "gray areas." Some of us will say unsolicited email is never acceptable. Others will say, "Yes, there could be exceptions." On a personal note, I wouldn't object to receiving such emails if I weren't already receiving a couple of hundred of the unacceptable-under-any-circumstance spams every day. The sum total just gets to be too much. Many experienced Internet marketers advise that you use bulk email only if your list has opted in and you are certain that the list is "clean". If you decide to deviate from this policy for some reason, consider your options carefully and decide whether the risks are justified in your unique situation. JUNE CAMPBELL'S writing has appeared in several international print and online publications. Website: "How-to" Booklets, Guides, Templates, & eBooks -Business proposals -Business plans, -Joint Venture Contracts... More! Visit to Claim Your FREE GIFT!
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