Hi, I am new to e-mail marketing, and thought someone here might be able to clarify for me as to what is considered spam. I went to the Spamhause website, and read about it there, and well, I'm still confused. I have had an Ebay account for quite some time now, and have decided to have my own web site selling, exactly the same items as I do on Ebay. Since I have a list of about 400 customers from Ebay, I would like to let them know about the new web site and provide a link to it in the e-mail. Nothing more, nothing less. I read about the part on Spamhause "it's not about content it's about consent", but still cannot understand how you are to get anyone to "opt in", if they have never seen or heard of the web site in the first place ? As I have few visitors to the site at present, having a subscribe button there would be pointless. So my question is two fold :- If the recipient of the e-mail has purchased from me before (albeit from Ebay), and therefore has had e-mail contact from me before, can this be considered an opt-in to send them my invite e-mail ? If the answer is no, then my next question is :- As long as you are not actually selling anything in that e-mail, i.e. you are simply informing them or the existance of the web site, is this still spam ? I do not intend the send these invite e-mails more than once, per e-mail address. Your clarity on this would both helpful and appreciated. Sincerely
email marketing = spam... IMO... and yes, I know most have an option to opt out and some may have signed up for a newsletter or something. If you're going to do it, just make sure you have an unsubscribe button at the bottom of your email.
It is federal law that there must be an opt-out. So here are your options to create or obtain an email list. Keep in mind that most email services and web hosts have a maximum send out, so it is usually better to find a service that will email for you. As to the list, you can do it the slow hard way, which by the way is also the best way and host contest, post good information through a blog or similar, give away a free e-book asking for email addresses. There are companies out there that also sell email lists though they are very costly, if they are to cheap beware... Any email that a person receives from you for any reason that they have not asked for can technically be considered spam. Even if you go to a website that has an email listed and simply send them an email that says "Hi there, I just visited your website, looks great! I could help you get some more customers if you're interested. Let me know" So, that email sounds safe enough right, just sounds like a casual between friends email, and I did actually visit their site in order to get the email address. But if they want to, they can turn it in as spam simply because they didn't ask you to email them and offer them help. Now on the other hand, is every person you email something like this to going to report it as spam? No, but it only takes one in today's world There are email services out there that offer tools like wordpress plugins and the like to help you build your list, they also email out your newsletter or campaign for you mailchimp.com is one popular one and there are others. Mail Chimp will send out up to 2000 emails/newsletters per month for free, they also have paid services. If you do a look up in Google stating "free newsletter service" you will see mailchimp and constantcontact. Check them out see if the meet your needs, or look at the other links and see where they get you, I am sure there is something out there that meets your particular personality or needs... Hope this helps Brad
I have had a few replies from the e-mail marketing web sites and I am still a bit confused, as some say it's fine, other say it is not, but some also mention link building through their web site, and what I get from this seems to be that they can send an e-mail asking the people in my address list if they would like to opt-in to my newsletter. This is something I do not understand, because if I have it right, then how can they contact them when they have never had any contact with them, but I cannot when I have ? Or have I got the above all wrong ? I myself cannot stand being spammed and get a lot of it that I cannot seem to do anything about, most of it coming from the likes of Russia or Nigeria asking my about my "usps parcel" and asking me to click on the link. I have never found a way to stop this so have top have software which does this for me which I have to pay a subscription for. Therefore, I would never hassle anyone in that way and would only contact them once, and if I did not get a reply, that would be the end of it, and I would never contact them again.
If I am understanding your post correctly they are offering to email people from your address book to ask if they would like to opt-in. If a person is in your address book then you have had contact in some way before so then it becomes okay to ask them for the opt-in once. As for companies and how they do this, different companies have different internal policies that may exceed the requirements of Federal Anti-Spam laws in order to stay on the safest side. To be honest though I would go buy whatever guidelines that they have in place let them do the mailing and you will stay on the safe side.
if you want to send newsletters use professional services......are many websites that offer free services
I have received e-mails with updates from sellers i bought from on eBay, and i had no problem with that, but i guess some will have a problem since they have not subscribed , so yes, it could be considered spam. What you could do is email them asking if it`s okay so send updates via e-mail, and let them know you have a website.