Hi Linda,

Most often I open the email notifications from classifieds, traffic exchange or banner impressions telling me people clicked on my ad.  That's so I can see which headlines grabbed them and make changes or keep the headline that's pulling consistently.

To reply to our friend Lawton, posting in forums IS part of doing business, if our signature file leads to our business or gives us more credibility as a businessperson.  Socializing is an important part of putting forth our character, people need to see us on a regular basis, find out something to like about us, and if they know where we are and that we're making efforts every day, then they feel more comfortable joining a business with us.

Actually, this is a good forum.  All of you have made some important contributions to making this place better.  When I first started here at Adland, I made my mistakes in posting.  I came here to make some new friends who were excited and passionate about a business or hobby or just life.  Oh how I have found them!  I have to thank God that they have been forgiving for the mistakes of etiquette and bad posts that I have made.  Certain ones, privately sent me a message suggestion that I not do this or that and even made suggestions of what I should do.  (Thank you)  It would be terrible to never have an email with a nice comment or thank you or HELP!  I don't mind a few of the ad blasters, I simply reply to them and let them know that I do not do business with anyone that has not taken the time to get to know me first.  I find the emails quite amusing at times.  I read as many as I can that are pertinent to what I am doing. 

Hi Bill,

I am pretty sure that it doesn't cost you a credit when you use Direct Contact and
have people in your friends list that have opted out of receiving messages.

You can check this for yourself the next time you use Direct Contact.

The amount of friends you have will most likely not match the amount
of credits it took you to send your message out, which means you only
"pay" for the persons receiving your message.

This is true for me.

Hi Bill! Just wanted to make a brief response to some of your posts. "Is not the pourpose of being a member of Adland to network and build your business through relationships that you build here in Adland?" Most Definitely! Just to add to that, I don't think it's necessary for "all" of those Adlanders to be part of your business either. Much can be learned from how others build their business. There are people here at Adland that have very successful businesses who will never be part of any other members business, but who have very valuable business information they are willing to share. "Is the friends list not a way to build those relationships?" Possibly. I don't use my friends list to build my business but, sadly, a lot of the scammers do. I'm not implying that you fall into that category, just that there are a lot of them here as is the case with most other forums. "Is the Direct Contact not one of the CORRECT methods of communicating about your product /service with the people on your friends list?" That would most definitely be an appropriate place to do so. However, as I mentioned in an earlier post, to be a receiver of that message is an option. "Yet another confirmation that there is no value in paying to be and Adlander." I don't know if I can agree with that as I'm sure there are others out there like yourself that will receive messages from others and read them. If that's the case then you are definitely getting your moneys worth as you now have a very targeted audience who are receiving the information you send them. That's money that's better spent than on another form of advertising such as say Goolges Adwords where anyone could click on an ad regardless of their interest. My apologies, so much for being brief! LOL

Just an after thought. When I mention people promoting their business you could also replace that with products or service etc. I'm not specifically talking about business opportunities.