What do I use to start and maintain a giant email list? Google mail, outlook, other?

I've seen people talk about using email list software before.
I have a giant email list (thousands of people) and I need to send out an email with an invitation, a remove link, and be able to track response, etc.

What software should I be using?
Do I just add the CSV to my online gmail system for our site?
Would it be better to take care of it through thunderbird or outlook?

I've heard people on the forum mention online email list things or autoresponders that they use, but I know nothing about this.

 

Check out Aweber, it's pretty much the best autoresponder. It offers everything you are requesting. You can try it out for 30 days for only $1, so nothing to lose.

 

so is the word "autoresponder" what I am looking for?

Do you suggest I add personal contact information into email or if I do that am I risking THOUSANDS of replies to my inbox?

 

Yes, autoresponder sounds like what you need. Basically, you load it with email messages and it will send them out when you want them to be sent. The autoresponder will add a link for the reader to unsubscribe to each email, if they so choose. To sign up, they will have to opt in to a form on your website, and also confirm that by clinking a link that will automatically be sent to them after they submit the opt in form.

With Aweber, you have to provide personal information such as email, full name, and address. This is required to prevent spammers from signing up and flooding everyone's inboxes with junk.

 

Yeah, I agree, aweber is pretty good, I used it when I had my lists

 

aweber would be the high end model...there are other autosponders that can do the same for half as much.
They may just not be as popular as the well known aweber...right off hand, even getresponse.com is some
what cheaper then aweber....and if you are starting with 0 subscribers...I suggest you find a free email
script that can send newsletters, at least to the point that you are unable to send due to size...otherwise
you will be spending money each month while attempting to grow your list...why would I want to pay
$9/mo for a list that has 5 subscribers? start out free, and only pay when you really need too.

 

The two main autoresponder services you need to look at are http://www.Aweber.com and http://www.GetResponse.com

Out of the two, as the other individuals above pointed out, Aweber is probably your best bet.

You'll need to start creating some squeeze / landing pages to start capturing email addresses. Offer something of such astounding value free, so that visitors to your page/s feel compelled to take you up on your offer.

Every time someone gives you their name and email address they'll be worth to you on average about $1 per month each. Admittedly, this doesn't sound a great deal at first glance but of course the larger your list, the more income you will be able to generate monthly.

A good squeeze / landing page should be converting at around 50% - so the more highly targeted traffic you can send to these sites, the better it will be for you from a financial point of view.

Do not be tempted to try and sell to your list too hard. If anything focus like a laser on over-delivering incredible value to your list subscribers. If you overkill by constantly trying to sell, you will hurt your potential profit margin.

It's all about building up a fantastic rapport and relationship with your subscribers.

Give it time, be patient, work at it constantly and the rewards will be there.

Best,


Mark Andrews...

 

You should check out autoresponder tool such as Aweber & Getresponse. I used to manage my list with GetResponse and it help to save a lot of my time with the whole email-marketing process.

 

Just to make sure you guys fully understand the question... I have over 50,000 email addresses that i need to invite to an event.


You're all talking like I'm trying to build a list or something.

 

You should be very careful with mass mailing because it is easy to be totally overwelmed by the problems. Autoresponder helps you if you want to send an email with personnalized parts (example : put in the title the name of the receiver), managed the addresses in error, the duplicated addresses, the responses, ...)

 

What sort of problems?

 

There's such a word as thankyou when people try and help you.

Don't take others peoples assistance for granted. You're the one asking for help here.

With this kind of attitude, you can sort out the problem for yourself.

 

Try to use Aweber as what everybody suggested. It is an autoresponder service therefore you don’t need to get involved with any programming for the script. The system is extremely simple to use you just place in your emails and set the time period to send them.

 

You are still going to be better off with an autoresponder like Aweber. In the future you will be able to manage things far more effectively.

If you already have the email addresses you will have to talk to Aweber to get them loaded into the autoresponder system. Normally people would confirm their opt-ins and then Aweber can legally send them mails.

If you can show you obtained the addresses legitimately then this will be no problem.

 

I'm sorry that I didn't say thank you. I am very thankful for the people who have suggested options that look like they will help me. As always, I will repay the favor by continuing to answer questions on digital point that fall into my own area of expertise in order to pay it forward.

However, several responses, including yours Mark, have been answers to a problem that wasn't asked. I'm not trying to get people to opt-in, I'm not starting from 0, and I'm not trying to sell something. I'm trying to send out an invite for a university event.

As such I felt that maybe people either didn't understand the question or just skimmed over it. In that sense I feel it's completely fair to make sure that my question is clear and that we are on topic. (also my reply was on an iphone, so it was short and sweet. I apologize if it came out crass.)

 

Its ok mate. You are being such too emotional I bet

 

I obtained them through my university email system where the global address list is available to anyone, however it normally only gives the option to send several hundred at a time, so I exported the list.

Will this take time for them to add them? There is an important speaker coming this week and I need to try to get these emails out tonight.

 

Ahh...I don't think Aweber would allow you to add them then. They want to know if the email address you have has requested information from you in the past.

 

Really? How is that impossible mate? I never knew about it so please tell me....

 

...how adding unconfirmed prospects to a list is impossible?

You can add a list of emails to Aweber but the list will be sent a message asking them to confirm. And Aweber still want to know where the list signed up originally.

Wouldn't really help the OP in this case.