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Internet Marketing Gurus... Do As I Say, Not As I Do
10/30/2007 1:10:33 PM
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Do As I Say, Not As I Do...
What
happened to ethics?
Trina L.C. Sonnenberg
I know I've written on this subject before, but it
has got to be written about again. Especially since some gurus have written
about it in the past, and don't seem to remember it. The subject...
misleading subject lines in email.
I've read scads of free reports and ebooks on the dos and
don'ts of email marketing, written by gurus of the day, and in those reports,
they cover the use of misleading subject lines. You know the ones I'm talking
about: Notification of Payment Received, and the like. The subject lines that
are geared to get you to open the message, leading you to believe you've made
some money, or won some great prize...
If you go to the following FTC
web site, regarding The CAN-SPAM Act: Requirements for Commercial Emailers, you
will find in bold letters, "It prohibits deceptive subject lines. The subject
line cannot mislead the recipient about the contents or subject matter of the
message."
http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/buspubs/canspam.shtm
Recently though, I have been getting a flood of emails from gurus, with
this subject line: NOTIFICATION OF PAYMENT. Now, when I read these emails all I
was seeing was a sales pitch for a new product/service based affiliate program.
Here is one I received today:
From: Justin Blake
Hello Trina,
I suspect that
subject line got your attention...
In fact, I know it got your
attention!!
Because it gets mine AND puts a smile on my face each &
every day when I receive them!
I'll show you how you can get those same
notifications on a daily basis (it's VERY easy).
My good friend John
Denton is opening up the doorway to the exact same, pr0ven marketing system that
we are using to receive hundreds of those $10.00 notifications each month.
Go N0w: -> http://www.3loa.com/ij.htm
I am looking to help
100 people (one-on-one), explode their home based income through the roof!
If you're not generating at least $10k/month online already in this day
and age, then you really have no reason not to read John's special report.
My goal is to have YOU generating a 'healthy residual inc0me' within the
next 30days.
Go N0w: -> http://www.3loa.com/ij.htm
Best
wishes, Justin Blake - CEO
P.S. I already have 64 of 100 of the
positions filled..
Yes, they're going fast.
So I highly recommend that you
take a serious look at this right now..
Go N0w: ->
http://www.3loa.com/ij.htm
. . . . . . -- My Contact Info
--
It doesn't matter if you are on a list, the law
clearly states that you cannot use deceptive subject lines for the purpose of
commercial email. And, by his own admission, Justin Blake used this subject line
to get me to open this message. That's a BIG NO-NO!
So, how are people
who are new to Internet marketing to protect themselves from becoming law
breakers, when the very gurus they follow are doing this sort of thing? And
Justin Blake is not the only one who is doing it either. His email is the only
one I saved, for reference in this article.
Now, I don't believe in
hitting the SPAM button for every email I didn't want to get, but gurus who use
this deceptive and illegal practice to get attention should be reported for
spam. Don't you think?
These are the same people who are getting filthy
rich, selling you products on how to make money online. They're breaking the law
as their raking in your cash. Are these the people you really want to learn
from?
In my opinion, with very few exceptions, Internet marketing gurus
are some of the biggest scammers out there. How many people have gotten filthy
rich after buying and promoting their products, seminars, or what have you? I
want to hear from those folks. If you've been able to quit your day job after
buying their stuff and following their guidance, tell me about it! Because, I
know a lot of people, and I have yet to meet one who has made a fortune online
as the result of some guru's tutelage. Oh yeah, you see a bunch of testimonials
all over the place, for this guru or that one, but I'll bet my last dollar that
all of those people are joint venture partners who never paid for the product,
probably never used it, but got their name and/or link on the guru's high
traffic web site.
I'm not saying that every online guru is less than
ethical. I've got a hard drive full of guru information myself. I will say that
in all of that stuff, from all those different gurus, I have found only a small
handful that I can honestly say I respect.
Here is a little story about
the guru who couldn't be bothered to edit his own web site copy. I went to RB's
web site, to check out his latest info product, and noticed several grammatical
and spelling errors. Being that he is considered a guru, I wrote to him to let
him know that his sales copy was in need of editing. First of all, I was
ignored. After a week of not getting a response, I went back to the helpdesk and
saw that my ticket had been closed. So, I wrote again, and asked why it was
closed without response. When I was contacted, I was told that RB was too busy
to edit his copy, and they couldn't justify the expense of hiring an
editor/proof reader. WHAT?
This guy claims to be making millions of
dollars, but he can't justify the expense of hiring a proof reader? This is a
guy who is telling people how to make money online? I have to laugh. LOUDLY!
I do not make millions of dollars, but at least I do my best to make
sure my web site content isn't sloppy, and if I miss an error, and someone
brings it to my attention, I fix it. I certainly don't tell my subscribers that
I can't be bothered with it.
It has also become evident to me that gurus
do not take the time to be bothered with cleaning their email lists. A couple of
years ago, I logged into a whole slew of affiliate programs I'd signed up for
and changed my email address, and my surname, and I still get email to the old
address and in my maiden name. Sloppy... that's all I can say. It's as if they
don't delete the old information, they just add the new.
The thing that
really gets my dander up is the fact that these guys are making buckets of
money, selling you information on how and what to do, and they don't do business
properly, or ethically themselves.
Be careful as to whom you follow.
Copyright © 2007
The Trii-Zine Ezine
www.ezines1.com
About the
Author:
Trina L.C.
Sonnenberg
Publisher - The Trii-Zine Ezine - Your Trusted Source for
Internet Business and Marketing Information. Serving online professionals since
2001. ISSN# 1555-2276
http://www.ezines1.com/triizine
http://www.ads-on-q.com/intro
Author of: My Journey A Lifetime of Verse http://stores.lulu.com/triizine
Internet Marketing
Mavens
http://internetmarketing-mavens.com
Keywords: internet
marketing, gurus, ethics, spam
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