Hi folks,

I've been meaning to write this article for a while.

Thanks go to a wonderful and supportive member of this community, Arthur Webster - aka - the Old Coot for giving me the idea to do this.

Lead sales are big business in the online world. Some companies do a stellar job, while others (a lot of others) are just plain unethical.

What happens with a legitimate lead wholesaler, is they post lead capture pages attached to various high traffic sites around the internet. Someone fills out a small survey asking for more information on a variety of topics (they chose their interest) and the lead company then sells those leads to lead retailers.

Next, a business buys those leads and begins to use them. If they're phone leads, they'll call them. If they're email only leads, they'll send them an email asking you to confirm your email address. The email should clearly spell out why they're sending you the email, who they are, and how to contact them by phone, email and snail mail (that's the law in the US)

Now here's what usually happens in reality:

1.) A business goes and buys some really cheap leads from a somewhat shady lead company. The leads have probably already been sold several times before. Then the business sticks them straight into their autoresponder series without asking if the person they're sending to really wants to get the information.

2.) A lead company harvests email addresses from all over the internet and sells them as "optin" leads. No one ever asked for anything, but businesses buy the leads because they're really cheap. Your email is on the list, so you get a ton of email like the ones that constantly clog your inbox, because the same leads are sold over and over.

3.) A totally unethical marketer buys some software that can be used to harvest email addresses from all over the internet. He takes them, tosses them into his mailing program with a letter saying that he's moving his list and needs to have you reconfirm your address or some other tall tale, and presto! He has a whole new list of optin suckers to market to.

4.) An even more unethical marketer (is that possible?) buys or creates software (called a blaster by some) that creates random email addresses based on the information he feeds into it and blasts his message out to any email that happens to be attached to a real box. In some cases (it has happened to me), he will also use someone else's legitimate email address as his return address.
They need to lock this kind of spammer up and throw away the key!

So, while there are a few good lead companies (I am an affiliate of one) and some businesses who do an excellent and ethical job of using email properly, there are far more who do not. No matter how much you'd like to be able to stop them, the world is far too big and it's just not possible.

Just be sure if you're using leads and autoresponders that you're not part of the problem! Once again, make sure to do your due diligence before buying and using leads.

God bless,

Dave

Good qualified leads are hard to find these days for a reasonable price too! What are the ones that you found that work the best? Thanks!

Hi Tom,

I haven't bought leads for a Loooooonnnngggg time!  I develop my own.

The best ones I found over the years (for purchase) were the ones I advertise on PaylessLeads .  These are leads that have been properly and legitimately collected.  After that, they are only as good as the person using them.  By far, the best kind of leads are phone surveyed ones and, of course, they are the highest priced.

You're always better off to work with small numbers of high quality leads and concentrate your efforts on connecting with them on the phone.

If you do not like to use the phone, or if your schedule makes it too difficult to use the phone (for example, if most people are asleep when you are up), then it's far better to develop your own leads.  They are more easy to develop an email relationship with than email leads run through an autoresponder.

When I used email leads that I purchased, I ran thousands of quality leads through autoresponders to connect with the very few who actually respond.  (the weeding process)  When someone responded to my message, I phoned the person and in many cases, signed them up immediately.

I don't put a lot of effort into marketing leads.  I own a good domain name for the purpose, and do get asked where to go to buy leads, so have kept the site going for that purpose, as it took me a while to find a good company that I trusted and I knew others would be going through the same struggle.

Personally, I find it much better to put more effort into smaller numbers of personal contacts.

God bless,

Dave

Hi Dave ~

thanks for giving us a clear and concise rundown on leads... every few months i get so i want to use them (purchased leads) but don't you need the ability to contact them with autoresponders and have that all set up?

that's the part I'm not sure about !! I've used lead systems where you pay and they send out the info letter to the leads... who say they never requested any info about eBusinesses andthat they don't even use that email anymore... that's when i called several of them as well!

that's the unethical leads...they get all the info :: enter it for you so you have access to it and then it's all bogus! So i've been working straight network marketing by personal online contact or using the safelists....

so... i need to get some rest.... it's been a long couple of days!

see you in about 24 hrs!

Beth   

 

 

Hi Dave!

You know, I have never bought a lead that was worth a hoot. Developing your own leads is the way to go. The last time I bought leads, not only were every last one of them bad, but the company that sold them to me, disappeared. I can't remember the name of the company, but at that time, they'd been around for a while, and they'd been recommended to me by my upline. My credit card company couldn't even find them to do a chargeback.

Here's a good one for you.

Being that I am a saavy Internet user, my teenager, Jerimiah, is too. He knows not to fill out forms online. Well, I keep getting phone calls, while he's in school, from people trying to sell Jerimiah on a business opportunity. The last one was comical. A man asked for Jeremy, a nickname my son DOES NOT go by. I replied that he was in school, and could I take a message. The man asked me how old Jeri was, and I told him that he is 17. Then he proceeded to tell me that I should pay more attention to my kid's activity on the Internet, because he signed up for more information on a biz opp. LOL! He tried to tell me that he had my son's personal information, like his social security number and IP address, but when I asked him to tell me what they were, he said he couldn't disclose that information. I'm his mother! I'm the one who has that information memorized, but he, a perfect stranger couldn't give me the information he claimed to have.

Here's the best part... Once he gave up on telling me how to raise my child, he tried to sell me on his biz opp! I just laughed and hung up. What a joke!

Be careful buying leads. More often than not, they're junk. I can't even begin to tell you how many times I've called numbers on a lead list, just to find out that the names belonged to minors, even dead people. That can get you into serious trouble, if the parent you deal with gets angry about it.

I have never signed anyone up to anything from a paid lead.

Talk about reused leads... I made the mistake, eight years ago, of looking for information on refinancing my home. I still get calls daily, from mortgage brokers who think that I requested information yesterday. Eight years later, and the national no call list registry, I am getting calls from people trying to refinance my home! They get really bummed out when I tell them that my house is for sale, and I don't need financing of any kind, now or ever. LOL

In my humble opinion, buying leads is a waste of money, and calling them, an even bigger waste of time. Generate your own leads. Get yourself some business cards and leave them in every public place you visit. That works. Who says that all your leads have to come from family, friends, or the Internet?

My Two Cents, Dave.

Have an awesome day!
Trina