| LED Digest 1503: The Pitfalls of Mass E-mail |
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================================================== The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" ================================================== List Moderator: Published by: Adam Audette LED Digest ................................................. January 24, 2003 Issue #1503 ................................................. .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ==== CONTINUING ================= -=Effective Marketing Tactics?=- ~ Peter Warnock "Article Announce...is a publisher of free articles that have some very good ideas..." ~ Mark Laing "...the pitfalls of using a mass e-mail list...more than offset any benefits." -=Subscription Management Software=- ~ Dave McClurem "Here are some solutions that use PayPal Subscriptions and Recurring Billing..." -=Search Engine Optimization (SEO)=- ~ Ivan J. Jimenez "...we're all online...to attract new customers and / or keep current ones." ===== GEEK TIPS ================== -=Email Web Page Code=- ~ Adam Bostock ~ John Smart ==== BILLBOARD =================== -=Understanding Internet Advertising Pricing=- ~ Partha Chatterjee ===== CONTINUING ================================= From: Peter Warnock Subject: Effective marketing > Because no business (these days) can survive on > word-of-mouth alone, what marketing tactics will > attract more customers to our website...? - Valerie Harris, LED 1502 Article Announce hosted at Yahoo! Groups is a publisher of free articles that have some very good ideas from a variety of writers. You can access it with a free Yahoo! ID at the following address: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/article_announce/ Peter Warnock webstruction.com ------- new post - same topic ------- From: Mark Laing Subject: Effective Marketing Question A word of advice to Valerie (and other readers) re: purchasing lists. Think long and hard before you do. There may be good ones out there, but the pitfalls of using a mass e-mail list (in my opinion) more than offset any benefits. Spam complaints and reduced credibility are real possibilities if you go this route. Purchased lists are a bit like a diet of chocolate bars and Jolt Cola ... you might get an initial rush, but it'll probably hurt you in the long term. And on a side note... you can't always rely on web marketing as a marketing end all (blasphemy, I know). Sometimes an old fashioned cold call is required, using the telephone or your two legs. It surprises me a bit how many web marketing companies are overlooking an important fact... many key prospects are not web-savvy (yet), and need to be sold through non-Internet marketing. I know some see a company without a web presence as a dinosaur, but I for one see such a business as an untouched prospect, waiting for us to convince them that their business should be online (and that we should be the ones taking them there). Of course, this takes a bit more work than sending out a mass e-mail, but the end result is often worth it. Mark Laing Graphicsandwords ------- new post - new topic ------- From: Dave McClure Subject: Subscription management > ... thinking about turning a website to a subscription > only basis for selected pages. Does anyone have > any good recommendations for a beginning > subscription management package. - Jeff Meister, LED 1502 Several companies provide membership management functionality that can be tied to a one-time or recurring billing solution for paid access. Here are some solutions that use PayPal Subscriptions & Recurring Billing for paid website access: MollyGuard Access mollyguard.com/access Wayne Lambright's Subscription Kit subscriptionkit.com DreamAccount dreamcost.com/?page=shop/dreamaccount A longer list of other membership management / subscription solutions: http://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=p/pdn/3p-solutions-membership-outside More info on PayPal Subscriptions & Recurring Billing: http://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=p/xcl/rec/subscr-intro-outside hope this helps, Dave McClurem, Director PayPal Developer Network http://www.paypal.com ------- new post - new topic ------- From: Ivan J. Jimenez Subject: SEO Joe Lachiana, While I agree that traditional off-line advertising may be more effective than most online advertising strategies for a wine seller, I don't agree that Internet marketing should be overlooked OR given little importance. Your online presence is an important aspect of your overall marketing plan. Savvy advertising and creative marketing can be a highly effective vehicle for ANY business model. Three years ago, I tried explaining to an importer / exporter the importance of a website and it's promotion. He refused my help because he only received orders via telephone and fax. He believed NO ONE would do business with his company over the Internet. Unfortunately for him, his closest competitor cut costs by setting up an intricate e-commerce enabled website and reduced his staff by 40% -- today, 58% of revenue comes from website sales. Where's my friend? Scrambling to catch up with a very 1995 looking site offering information only (no e-commerce capabilities). The point is, even if you can't convert most of your sales to the company website (to make each transaction as efficient as possible), you'll need to make your presence on the net known. Building yourself up as a major player by offering a quality site with the resources your customers need will ensure you're not playing "catch up" when it's too late. Of the 14 million "wine" responses, 1000 (at most) are relevant results. A quality site with in-demand content and resources shouldn't be too hard to get in the top ten -- with a little optimizing. In addition to everything mentioned, a quality website will positively affect your customer relationships. A good website will not only increase revenue, but it'll also enforce / build your customer relationships. > If we are to take Ms. Shari Thurow's advice, then > General Motors should not have separate sites > for employee information, Cadillac division, truck > and bus division, etc. - Sara Griffith, LED 1500 I think Shari's point was that a website should be content-rich with information reflecting its market's interests. Do I agree? Yes. Do I agree with the direction she was heading? No. Although very knowledgeable, it seems she missed the mark when overlooking the true nature of why we're all online... to attract new customers and / or keep current ones. That said, the very purpose of a website is to promote a branded product or service. It's an interactive brochure. The function of your "brochure" is to highlight your offering, not the brochure itself. It's a marketing piece. That's it. Some of the bigger sites can be quite intimidating and so full of information and resources that we lose sight of what we wanted in the first place therefore developing a microsite or landing page to walk us through the exact information we were looking for is actually a service to us. THIS is why these landing pages are looked upon by search engines in a more positive light. All the best, Ivan J. Jimenez, Business Development cosmicbreath.com ===== GEEK TIPS =================================== From: Adam Bostock Subject: Email page > As a means of site promotion, I would like to include > an "E-mail this page to a friend" link on my pages... - Tom Anson, LED 1500 Hello Tom, If you have access to a mail form script (e.g. mailform.pl) on your server then you can create the HTML for a standard Web form that will do what you want. Just put this HTML (form) anyway on the page. *Concise* example of the HTML for a Web form: [remove all preceding dots from the tags -adam] ------------------- <.form action="http://www.mydomain.com/cgi-bin/mailform.pl" method="POST"> <.input type="hidden" name="subject" value="Your friend thought you may like this"> <!-- OPTION 1: if mailform.pl use the following line --> <.input type="hidden" name="env_report" value="HTTP_REFERER"> <!-- OPTION 2: else if not mailform.pl type support use the following line --> <.input type="hidden" name="pageURL" value="http://www.mydomain.com/xyz.html"> Your name: <.input type="text" name="realname" size="25"> <.br> Your email: <.input type="text" name="email" size="25"> <.br> Your friend's email: <.input type="text" name="recipient" size="25"> <.br> The message to send to your friend: <.br> <.textarea name="message" rows="4" cols="40" wrap="virtual"><./textarea> <.br> <.input TYPE="Submit" VALUE="Send"> <./form> ------------------- (The formatting of the displayed form could be improved by using tables, etc.) In the form tag the action parameter must be modified to point to your mail handling script. To pass the name of the Web page to the recipient you have two options:- 1) If you use mailform.pl (or similar) as your mail script then this can be set automatically by using HTTP_REFERER. The recipients email will contain a line in the body of the message that says: HTTP_REFERER: http://www.mydomain.com/xyz.html 2) Alternatively you can manually embed the page URL in the HTML code. In the example a hidden field variable called pageURL has been used but you can call it something else if you wish. (Or, if you know JavaScript that could be automated (for browsers that support and enable JS)). Note you only need the OPTION 1 OR 2 code above. Hope this helps. I've tried to keep the reply concise; if this is too concise then I am happy to elaborate. regards, Adam Bostock Free Online Innovation Forum if++ www.acrologic.co.uk/if++/ ------- new post - same topic ------- From: John Smart Subject: Email page The "recommend this site" link needs to be broken down into two parts. First you need a very simple form. The form will input the recipients e-Mail address, and maybe the recipients name, plus the senders address and maybe the senders name. The form script then sends an e-Mail to the recipient e-mail, telling them that the sender e-mail thought they may want to see the page. Whilst it is quite a mouthful, it is not a hard script to write. Part 2 is to include the web address that the recommender wants to send. I would do this by having the recommend this page link open a new window, which tracks the referral page. Then the referral page would be embedded into the form, and included in the final e-Mail. This would be little work in PHP (my language of choice), and I am sure it would be the same for ASP, JSP, and all the other flavors. However, if you do not want to write code, or hire someone to write it for you, there are many free script sites. A good place to start looking would be: http://php.resourceindex.com/Complete_Scripts...Recommend_Site John Smart, Technical Director InternetDesign.com - A Human Touch in a Digital World (TM) http://www.internetdesign.com ==== BILLBOARD ==================================== From: Partha Chatterjee Subject: Understanding price quotes for Banner Ads I'm a novice in Web-based marketing. Can somebody explain the pricing model for Banner Ads. When I ask for rates, I get some figure like $XX CPM. What exactly am I getting for the $XX? What does CPM mean? Are there any hidden costs. Partha Chatterjee ------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 1995-2003 Adam Audette. All Rights Reserved. ----------------------------------------------------------------- "Few can foresee whither their road will lead them, till they come to its end." - Legolas Greenleaf |
