Getting Too Much Email These Days? This Will Help
Leon Brickey
"Send 10, 000 Spam Free Emails Every Day!" read the headline for the ad.
Sounds awesome doesn't it??.. NOT! In fact sending 10,000 of those type emails will do little more than get you 10,000 additional emails you didn't really ask for.
If you are gonna market online and have contact with lots of people; you might as well be ready to deal with lots of email. Because you are gonna get it! Sheesh! Lots of it!
In fact it CAN get to the point that it can take so much of your time daily downloading email and sorting through it that it affects you, your business, and YOUR PROFITS. Not to mention taking up space on your email programs, servers, hard drives, etc.
You have a couple options here?
1) You can get active in the anti-spam movement and spend all your time reporting spammers and tracking down senders of UCE. This is fine. But I just don't have the time or desire to report everybody. I'm here to make money; not enemies. However if I get multiple emails for the same offer and it's obvious they've harvested all my email addresses from my websites or ezine I always report those. (You know? the ones that say your autoresponders or ezine archives requested info or subscribed to a newsletter.) :-)
2) You can manipulate the factors involved and reduce your email by up to 90% or more.
I want to address the second option today.
There are a couple ways we can do this.
1) First thing to do is go to http://www.hotmail.com, http://www.yahoo.com, or any one of the hundreds of others which will give you a free internet email account. We are NOT going to send UCE with it or fake headers or anything like that. We're mainly going to only receive email here.
When submitting FFAs, classifeds, and message boards ALWAYS use this email address when you fill out the form. If you want to use an autoresponder or a "reply to" email address with your classified ad or message board post just list it in your ad or post; not in the registration form.
Let all your classified ad and FFA confirmations come here. You don't even need to read the email that comes here unless you just want to. Occasionally you will see one that requires a reply for your link or ad to be placed but VERY rarely. (Less than one in a thousand is my experience.)
Be sure and use this email address always when filling out the registration forms for classifieds, links, etc.
"But Leon, I thought I was suppose to have my own domain name?!!! And I thought that showed credibility?!!!"
You DO need your own domain name and it DOES lend credibility, but you don't need to use it for registration forms at FFAs and classifieds. Trust me.
If you are placing a FFA link WHY would they need your email address? Of course there are some administrative and tracking reasons for this, but even MORE importantly THEY ARE GONNA SEND YOU EMAIL! Of course the emails will come as confirmations, but they are really ads. Not that there is anything wrong with that. I think joining someones mailing list is AT LEAST a fair trade for free advertising. I just don't want to have to deal with their email if I'm busy at the time. And if I can keep it out of my business' email program?..that's even better!
OF COURSE you use your domain names, autoresponders, etc. inside your ads, on your web pages,etc. :-)
Here are the real advantages of doing this.
-You don't have to take the download time to download this email. It's there when you get there with Hotmail, etc.
-No space used on your computer.
-No threat of viruses from the email itself. The email is not on your system.
-If your web host has a maximum daily or monthly transfer rate this email will NOT count toward it.
You simply pop in once or twice a day and delete all of it.
This leaves your email program open for important business email. You may still get a little UCE at your main email addresses, but much, MUCH less than before.
If you try this you'll see a HUGE difference in just a few days.
There is a second way you can do this if you have a fairly sophisticated web host.
Create a "dump account."
Dump accounts are OK. I have no problem with them.
You use the dump account email address exactly as above.
However I would not recommend a "dump account" if the email still has to be downloaded from the server with your other email. Or if the "dump account" was set up inside your email program.
You are still downloading all that email and it is still tieing up YOUR computer.
Just the time it use to take to download my email was probably an hour or more a day. This has been a BIG help for me. I hope it helps you.
I looked closely at Hotmail and Yahoo and to the best of my understanding there is nothing prohibiting this at all. If the rules change at some point? Do as they say. :-)
Thanks,
Leon Brickey
webmaster@appalachianmarketing.com
Leon Brickey is webmaster and owner of Appalachian Online Marketing at http://www.appalachianmarketing.com At Appalachian Online Marketing you can find everything you need to turn your struggling business into an explosive moneymaker! Free subscription to Absolute Internet Marketing Resources Ezine containing the most current, up to date online marketing resources on the planet. Any email: mailto:ezine-subscribe@appalachianmarketing.com?subject=articlesubscribe
