I remember telling me "Spam is a sin". Dude, opt-in is spam too. I get a shit load of emails advertising different products from some "New York Marketing Group" that I supposedly subscribed to. So basically even though an email is opt-in, it was opt-in through another company, and probably not yours. They sold you this "opt-in" list. And now you take that list and you send your advertising emails. The user doesn't even know you and never wanted your email in the first place. So, why does everyone cringe when I tell them I'm sending Spam? (i have a list with both opt-in and non-opt-in) If you think about it, if you're advertising your product and the recipient doesn't know it, it's SPAM. Period. It doesn't matter if they "subscribed" to a legitimate marketing company that sold you the email list. Opt-in is pretty much SPAM. Am I right?
To my mind, it's only really an opt-in list if they opted-in to receive messages from you. Yes, if you send a purchased list messages you are probably spamming them (the exception being if they signed up to receive messages from multiple advertisers). So yes, if I get messages from you because someone sold my email address, they go right into the junk folder. On the other hand, true opt-in isn't spamming at all. If I sign up to be on your mailing list that means I want to receive messages from you. That's why real marketers spend time and effort building their own mailing lists. People who signed up to hear from you are more likely to buy from you too. As an added bonus, if you only send messages to people who opted-in to your list, your email address and web site URL are much less likely to get blacklisted by the big ISPs, meaning more people actually read your message. It's a win-win situation.
There's single opt-in and double opt-in. If you're sending emails to people who aren't double opt-in you are going to be sending a lot of spam and are in danger of being blacklisted. Best to only mail double opt-ins. donrock
because optin are intersted to receive offers. and spam may also can harm your computer or may be fraud.
Opt In lists without an opt-out can certainly cross the line, but for most people, opting in is just what they wanted, so they will not call it spam, or disruptive. However, I have signed a few "friends" up for opt-in lists... including a pregnancy site mailing list to tell him how his child was coming along inside his womb *smirk*
The basis behind opt-in stems from the concept of 'Permission Marketing' which is really powerful stuff. The problem is that unethical losers apply the terms coined by permission marketing/ers to their sleazy practices and they lose their value. Opt-In is amazing; it gives you a list of the most interested people who are saying to you, "I like you. I am willing to give you some of my time to hear more." If they did not give you this permission, it is not an opt-in operation. Here's some reading for you: http://sethgodin.com/sg/books.asp 'Permission Marketing'
In my opinion, the real problem is when you get the same viagra email every hour. It wouldn't be so bad if they just sent it once a week or once a month. But it's literally the same message from the same people over and over again. These are the jerks that ruined legitimate email marketing for everyone!!
I don't think it's legitimate. I did not ask to receive these emails or give anyone my email knowing I would be getting them, ergo it is spam.
Email marketing could really be effective for legitimate businesses if it weren't for the greedy spammers! I never send out promotional emails as I am sure it would be considered a SPAM even if it wasn't!
I agree with you. Buying a list of emails is spam, regardless. Opt-in to me is a site/store emailing THEIR customers who checked something in the check out process saying they wanted to receive emails.
Spam is spam and Opt-in lists are spam with toast, and I hate spam Opt-In is so that we can decieve ourselves into thinking "well, these people asked for it", it is also a selling point for the list "these people said they were interested in viagra and have small man-hoods..." so the list is "focused". I don't believe anyone on the receiving end of these "opt-in" lists likes it any more than they like spam. It is the those who purchase these lists who see them as better than just a list of email addresses. Uclue.com (the place all the Google Answers Researchers went ), just opened up a Private Question feature, so now you can ask questions and get answers without telling everyone in the world as well. Start Looking for them on YouTube soon as well.
I signed up for the Hobby Lobby mailing list, and look forward to it every Sunday so I can see what is on sale. The nearest hobby lobby is 45 minutes away, and we do not get the local paper...so getting it emailed to me is my best option. I opted in for this mailing list, and love it. I also signed up for their promotional/affiliate list, but that was did seem a bit spammy for my taste (even with toast), so I opted back out, and that seemed to have worked. So there are good opt in lists out there. Q
One of the reasons that SPAM is so hated is that you have to wade through a pile of crap to get to communications from those you know/care about/need info from. These vermin only ever win because of the fact that YOU LET THEM! How many times have you gotten something that you KNEW was an outright scam, but you e-flushed it and went on to hurriedly crack open a Bratz or Polly Pocket online membership (lol!)? Did you bother to at least find out what domain it claimed to be from and then tried to contact the webmaster of the domain or at least the ISP to notify them that someone was running scams over their servers? The best way to protect yourself is to obviously safeguard your computer and the way it functions on the internet, or what communications it receives and from where; MONITOR. Keep your eyes open for things that don’t make sense to you, and don’t be afraid to trust your instincts. If that email mail subject line has no rational language connection structure – DON’T open it. That’s what the Delete function is for. Risks from unsolicited emails can net you viruses and other nasty infections that can crash/kill your machine (and, it’d really hurt to lose those precious baby pics off your hard-drive – BACK IT UP!!!!! You’ll thank me, honest.). What I recommend is one of two ways of reading emails besides off your machine client (i.e. Outlook, Outlook Express – if you’re traveling IE7), to void potentially dangerous email before it ever gets to your computer. First, you could have your ISP’s web version of the email program. The obvious benefit of this is that there is guaranteed virus/spyware/etc protection keeping any potentially dangerous replicating programs from automatically executing. The other way is to log on to where your ISP keeps your mail on the server, and preview the email before it ever gets to your computer.