Back in the day internet marketers or email marketers used to send out email by the thousands, millions.

They used bulk email servers, heavy duty email programs capable of sending thousands, tens of thousands of emails. They also used robot harvester programs to collect email addresses from web sites. It was the wild west of marketing.

How do I know?

Easy, I was one of them until I saw the light.

Problem was that it got out of control leading to the CAN-SPAM Act. Even then, marketers were starting to realize that marketing by spamming people was getting less and less effective. No one was seeing or reading the email because of spam filters and other controls. It was really annoying to customers and email readers, at the least.

Email marketing has clearly been evolving over the the last 8 years. We have double opt-in lists, safe lists, social marketing sites, you name it.

I have finished writing a series of articles on Writing Effective Emails and will post the first one once I clean up the copy a bit. Until next time.

Glen

Please keep posts on topic, which means related to email marketing. I will delete off topic replies/postings.

Thanks.

Glen

Hi Glen,

Over the years I have been involved in many MLM's and other projects (Some VERY successfully) BUT, despite advice and books I NEVER MASTERED controlling email marketing. I really tried to master autoresponders etc but to date no joy. Months ago I won free membership to loads of Social networks but was too scared to log into them all because I already get a hundred emails a day.

I have decided instead to go the route of blogging instead BUT I secretly would love to master email marketing.

This is a strange world. Brains and common sense are not always best. I have proved myself reasonably intelligent and with reasonable common-sense but still have never mastered vehicle engines or indeed marketing systems and web-site promotion. Now I'm OLD it's even more difficult.

How do you manage it?

Hi Roger,

I am not sure I would ever consider myself as having mastered email marketing. I just have lots of experience; lots of trial and error over the years.

I probably get close to 10,000 emails a day from a number of subscription lists that I have joined. Plus, I get email from the safelists, list builders and mailer programs I have joined. I use many different email accounts (20+), mostly gmail to keep them organized. I typically just scan the subject lines and occasionally read emails. I do this for several reasons. One being to get advertising ideas and the other to see what new products/services are being promoted.

The one thing that really stands out by seeing so many emails is that most are "canned" or generic emails that marketers just copy from the back offices of the programs they are promoting. There just is not very much original email.

I belong to over 70 safelists etc. so I have to keep it all organized. I have been using a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet to keep track of numbers, subject lines, clicks etc. But I have switched to tracking my emails by using Viral Mail Profits. In order to track so many emailers, I had to upgrade in order to track an unlimited number of emailers. Not to plug VMP, but it is handy because I am able to save emails, subjects, and track results. I am able to see which emailers are more responsive as well as see what subject lines and/or emails get good results. It is all about the numbers. ViralinBox is a good program because it allows members to set up many different email inboxes.

Like you, I belong to a number of social marketing sites like Adlandpro. But I really don't spend much time there or at least not enough time. I occasionally get "involved" in a forum or two like the one discussing economics and financial systems and make a number of posts.

I am approaching 62 years of age. I may be considered old by some, but at least I do not feel old.

I also wanted to comment about blogging. I see both blogging and email marketing as opposite sides of the same coin. I have several blogs and make posts that are very much like the autoresponder emails I send to subscribers.

I do this because many subscribers just do not open each email they receive. They can go to my blog and get caught up by reading the older posts. The one thing I do is email subscribers first before I post anything on a blog. This gives them a heads up to something new.