E-mail

Here’s the lowdown on the good, the bad and the ugly of e-mail.  E-mail has been maligned by a few cyber-cowboys who have given it a bad name by abusing this highly valuable tool.

Many reputable solicitors have a legitimate product to offer and use e-mail to broad scale mail to a population of potential customers that may have an interest in their product. Commercial E-mail is just like an unsolicited direct mail piece that you have the option to toss, if you should so desire. The problem today is that when people receive unsolicited e-mail, their first concern is does this carry a virus. Today, however there are a number of products available to check for known virus’s within your e-mail.

CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 (S. 877)

The Controlling of the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act requires unsolicited e-mail messages to be labeled (though not by a standard method) and to include opt-out instructions and the sender's physical address. It prohibits the use of deceptive subject lines and false headers in such messages. The FTC is authorized (but not required) to establish a "do-not-email" registry. State laws that require labels on unsolicited commercial e-mail or prohibit such messages entirely are pre-empted, although provisions merely addressing falsity and deception would remain in place. The CAN-SPAM Act was effective as of January 1, 2004.

The CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 was introduced by Senators Conrad R. Burns (R-MT)and Ron Wyden (D-OR)in April 2003, with minor changes from the previous year's version, S. 630 (2002). Two other bills (S. 1231and S. 1293) were subsequently merged into it. The final version was approved by the Senate in November 2003 and by the House of Representatives in December 2003, and was signed into law by President Bush on December 16, 2003.

The CAN-SPAM ACT of 2003 was updated in May of 2008:

CAN-SPAM ACT OF 2008

The stigma of unsolicited e-mail can be mitigated in other ways as well, for example, the sender must use an “opt out” mechanism within their e-mail message. The sender must also provide the email address from where the email is from.

The CAN Spam ACTstipulates that phantom or stealth emailing will now be a punishable offense. This procedure is placed either at the beginning of your advertisement or at the end. Basically this is a simple message which states: that if the recipient does not want to receive this or any other e-mail messages from the solicitor (you), to reply to the sender with a REMOVE statement in the subject field.

You, as the solicitor, will add this name as suppression to any future e-mail lists so that this individual will not be solicited. This accomplishes several things:

• A. The recipient does not feel as though he is being spammed and, therefore, has no control over e-mail into his or her e-box.
• B. You have exhibited professionalism and consideration of e-mail privacy.
• C. You save in the long run because you don’t waste your time and money on someone who has no interest in your offer.

E-mail can be a very effective tool in developing your Internet-based business. Several reputable companies can sell you lists of e-mail addresses that you can mail yourself or you can utilize these companies for managing the actual mailings for you.  

The simplest approach to utilizing email and being CAN SPAM compliant is to use a reputable autoresponder system.

Email Autoresponders:

Just about everyone, that has an email address, has come in contact with an autoresponder. Generally the most common usage of autoresponders are membership and purchase confirmations. A membership can be a number of things such as an email account, a free newsletter, etc. Autoresponders manage most of the email that any commercial site has. In recent years they have become an effective marketing tool as well. Just about any type of commercial website can employ autoresponders as they can help manage large quantities of customer email as well as alert members to special programs or program changes. 

Autoresponders can be a small websites most effective tool but it pays to have a top notch autoresponder. There are two that I would recommend as I have used them both. The first is AWeber a very popular and powerful autoresponder. Aweber has been around for many years and it 100% CAN SPAM compliant, which is where you must be if you are developing your own customer lists. You can test it for free for thirty days.

The second recommended autoresponder is Get Response also a free 30 day trial. Get Response has also been available for quite some time and has many benefits as well. I have used both of these programs and recommend them both for any level user. They are easily understandable and easy to implement. Get Response offers a simple system to obtain list customers as well as some innovative sourcing methods for recruiting your own list names.

If your are serious about making a living on the Internet selling any kind of product or service you must have an autoresponder system working for you. It’s the best employee you’ll ever have as it works 24/7 for pennies a day.

For more information on autoresponders check our Email Guide for detail information

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