Lately it seems like everyone that I exchange business cards with immediately puts me on their e-mail list. Let’s clarify. None of the following actions constitutes my (or anyone’s) opting in to your email newsletter: Shaking my hand, exchanging business cards, visiting my website, reading this BLOG, listening to my Podcasts or the fact that you’ve opted into mine. 

Email marketing is an extremely effective tool that can yield great rewards if used properly. Email marketing to people that have not opted in is SPAMMING pure and simple. This tells me that your winning email marketing strategy is to grow your list. What a great strategy! Build a giant list of people whose first impression of your company is annoyance, interruption and disrespect. Great job! You’re a genius. Size doesn’t matter, it’s how you use the tool (that’s my story and I’m sticking to it). I’ll take a small list of people that want my message over a giant list of the non-interested any day. Marketing (online or off) is about making a connection with someone who has interest – again – someone that has interest. Great marketers know how to use email marketing to make the right connections. Sending your email newsletter to everyone you’ve exchanged business cards with does not make you a great marketer it just makes you an ass. 

Anyway – that’s my rant.  

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 16th, 2007 at 5:37 pm and is filed under Email Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.