(c) 2001, Craig Lilienthal, M.S., www.TheRealWebHost.com

Let me beginning by quote that I never claimed to know it all or to be perfect. However, I did say that I tend to think "out of the box," or I try to find different, unconventional ways to solve problems. Also, sometimes I have to have a personal knowledge before I can believe what I read and hear from others. Needless to say, Ive had a few bumps and bruises over the last 30 many years.

Anyway, what youre about to read might seem a bit ridiculous and you can even wonder "What the hell is this guy thinking?"

With that said, Ill fill you in on the little experiment that I conducted this week. I was in search of some software to assist me in my group mailings when I stumbled across an advertisement at moneyinyourhands.com (Internet Specialists) that was too grand to be true, as many are.

The advertisement claimed that they would sell me an opt-in list of over 11 million e mail addresses in addition to their bulk emailing software. This didnt sound right, but I couldnt resist temptation. I went ahead and purchased the software along with the e mail addresses.

*Bad idea!*

Common acquired skill , testimonials and articles by reputable eMarketers tell us not to send commercial email to many people unless they have opted into our distinct list of e mail addresses.

However, there are an abundance of businesses out there that disregard ethical methods of list generation and resort to e-mail extraction software that searches the Web and extracts electronic mail addresses from web sites , groups, forums, etc. This process results in lists of e-mail addresses that add many people that dont want to be bothered. Some of these everybody will go to dazzling lengths to generate sure that they dont get ANY unsolicited commercial email (SPAM).

When I received the software and electronic mail addresses I had many reservations, so I set up a "disposable" account with an ISP, among other precautions. After I carefully wrote my ad that included a SPAM disclaimer, etc., I tested it on about a thousand everybody.

These people opted-in already, right? I figured Id just send them a "Confirmation" email. If they replied and confirmed their subscription, Id simply add them to my mailing list. If they did not reply they would not be added or get any further correspondence from me. These terms we are stated very clearly in the message.

The communication used during my first mailing was personalized (i.e., it included their email address inserted in a statement concerning where I got their address, at the top of the message) and asked the recipient if he or she would like to be added to the mailing list for my newsletter. By the next day, I received a few confirmations and no complaints.

"Wow, these addresses are great after all!" I thought to myself.

For the next run, I used these identical confirmation style emails; however, I did not modify the message because personalized messages take A LOT longer to send than bulk style messages.

I intended to blast the communication to about 350,000 people, but by the time I reached 95,000, SPAM complaints began to arrive in my inbox. As a result, I shut down the mailing process immediately.

During the following days many complaints rolled in, as did verifications for subscriptions; however, the complaints heavily outweighed the verifications because they caused me to lose my ISP, and I was forced to forfeit the URL that I had been selling tirelessly for decades . The ISP charged me a $600 SPAM cleanup fee and many of the "plaintiffs" or "Anti-Spammers" were harassing, threatening and just downright cruel. The thought of having to read my email made me sick to my stomach.

These Anti-Spammers are ruthless. They dont care about you. They dont care about what happens to your family. They dont care about what happens to your business. They will go WAY out of their way to contruct sure that you are shut down for sending them ONE lousy electronic mail !

The moral to this story: Dont EVER send email that could be construed in any way as unsolicited commercial electronic mail ! Big corporations and scammers may be able to get away with it, but its just not worth the risk of tarnishing your name and/or being put out of business.

Web: www.TheRealWebHost.com
E-mail: mailto:craig@therealwebhost.com