.: The Reign of Spam Continues
By:Jim Pretin
Category:Home / Internet Marketing / Email
Spam has turned into an out-of-control monster. The amount of junk email being sent in cyberspace has spiraled out of control. Some people receive several hundred unsolicited messages per day! For the purposes of this article, we are going to examine the different methods employed by internet marketing geeks to steal your email address, and whether or not anything can be done to put an end to spam once and for all.
Most of the marketing messages I receive in my inbox are sexually explicit, but I still like to look at them because some of this junk is actually quite entertaining. My personal favorites are offers to purchase discounted Canadian Viagra, ads for pornographic websites, bogus work-from-home programs, or quotes for 50 year mortgages. A lot of spam usually goes straight into my bulk email folder, but quite a bit of it ends up in my inbox.
How do these idiots get your email address in the first place? One way they can get it is through opt-in email. When you order something online, as part of the subscription or service that you signed up for, you may have inadvertently or unknowingly agreed to receive offers via email from that company in the future. As a result, said company begins to send you offers via email. This is perfectly legal as long as the company provides you with a way to unsubscribe from their mailing list. If they do not provide you with a means to unsubscribe, then the emails they are sending you are considered spam.
To make matters worse, spammers will often sell your email address and any other information you submitted to them to hundreds of other companies who are looking for leads or mailing lists. Before you know it, your email address has been circulated far and wide to almost every online business imaginable. Once this happens, there is almost no way to protect your email address ever again.
Another common way senders of spam get their hands on your email address is by first purchasing a list of email addresses from someone else, and then sending a joke or an interesting cartoon to everyone on the list and ask that you forward it along to all your friends and relatives. Once you forward the message, the spammer actually has a program that can copy the list of addresses that the message has been forwarded to and send it back to him or her. So now, that person not only has your email address, but also has the email address of every one you forwarded the message to. Using this tactic, email marketers can grow their list of email addresses exponentially.
Another popular technique is known as harvesting. This is accomplished by writing a simple programming function that searches through every web site listed on a search engine for a certain keyword, and then quickly scanning each of those sites for any email addresses that are posted there, and subsequently sending them back to the spammer. An example of harvesting would be a program written to scan every website listed on Google for a certain keyword, such as real estate agents, and then recording every email address that is found on the web sites that come up in the search, and emailing the entire list of email addresses back to the harvester. Using this technology, it is possible to acquire thousands of email addresses in an hour or less.
Harvesting has become a legal dilemma, because the email marketing community feels that it should be allowed to harvest email addresses that are posted on public websites because, in their opinion, if someone has posted their email address for all to see, then other people have the right to contact that person and ask them questions or send them offers. However, web sites where email addresses are posted have threatened legal action against anyone that copies addresses and uses them to build mailing lists or send spam. Unfortunately, these web sites really have no way to prevent this email theft, and it will only get worse in the future.
Spam is here to stay, so I say, enjoy the ride. Spam will continue to reign supreme in your inbox, and it will only get worse in the future. If you want to avoid it, then you might want to consider prayer, because only the hand of God can put an end to spam at this point.
Article keywords: spam
Article Source: http://www.articles32.com
Jim Pretin is the owner of http://www.forms4free.com, a service that helps programmers make free HTML forms.
.: New Email Articles
1). Hot Subscribers For Your Opt In Email Marketing
Opt in email marketing is one of the most powerful affiliates internet programs promotion strategy. Email is still the easiest way to communicate globally. It is extremely cost-effective, because it is 100 % free. This makes the starting point of the opt in email marketing very promising.
2). Are You Keeping Your Online Business Profitable?
With spamming, email marketing becomes a disgraceful activity in the Internet. But with opt in list, online businesses can continue to boost their businesses through email marketing without having to worry about being accused of spamming
3). Got A Website? Leran How To Build And Manage An Opt List
Building and managing an opt in list is the ideal and simplest option to increase website traffic
4). 5 Benefits Of Making a Hyper Responsive Opt Work
Any business big or small must maximize marketing to get the message across
5). Five Top Methods To Leverage Channels Without Overspending!
Before revealing the secrets of the trades, here are myths and fallacies that need to be cleared before one indulges into building an opt-in list
6). Looking For The Ideal Business Partnership?
Opt in lists are not just ordinary mailing lists. It is the very core of an online business existence and survival
7). Do You Want To Utilize Uhe Secrets Of Opt In Lists?
Acquire an opt-in list now or generate one. Either way, you are reaching to people that can be your one of your treasured customers for a long period time.
.: Top Email Articles
1). Email Miscommunication is Too Easy!
We misinterpret, filter, or change 70% to 90% of what we hear. Communicating messages clearly, and in a format that the receiver will understand, is difficult. It’s easy to miscommunicate. By watching which words you choose, your message will be more clearly communicated.
Cause
Why does all this confusion occur? One of the many reasons is that people suffer from information overload.
2). Selling Yourself with Your Article Promotion
Selling Yourself with Your Article Promotion
3). How to Make a CSV file for your mailing list.
First lets look at WHAT it is, and Why would we want to make one?
CSV means Comma Separated Value, so that means; a ‘value’ that is separated by commas. It is usually made in XL or a txt file.
A ‘value’ is explained, in context below.
CSV files are the most common kind of format used by most software programs for importing data. This means that if we want to put several hundred names and addresses (values) into a “bulk mailing program” we can usually use a CSV file.
4). Navigate More Website Activity Through Email Newsletters To Visitors
When you own a business website, you may find if helpful to have a weekly or monthly newsletter full of useful information about your products. Newsletters can be a great way to navigate more website activity your way. Emailing weekly or monthly newsletters can be the best way to update or remind past visitors of your services or products. Extending special offers in those newsletters can generate more website traffic, purchases of services or products and possible referrals from the visitor’s friends and family.
5). Name Squeeze Pages – What Are They and Why Do You Need Them?
There are many terms that are used in the Internet marketing world. Some are confusing, and some are simple. Some are simple but made to sound confusing. Name squeeze is a relatively new term, but it’s a technique that has been around for quite some time.
6). Email Marketing: Affordable Internet Marketing Technique
Email marketing is labeled as a killer method when it comes to effective low-cost Internet marketing endeavors. This is because it is the most widely-used and has the best reputation in bringing targeted traffic to websites. It is used to stay in touch with your customers or prospective customers, send out invitations, or make special offers.
It's as easy as writing an e-mail that may be in a form of a newsletter or a plain announcement, and sending that to as many targeted recipients as possible.
7). A Good Letter Can Make You a Fortune in Direct Mail
Copyright 2006 Peter Woodhead
This is the seventh article in a series of ten.
Now we go back to Maxwell Sackheim. Sackheim is also well known for originating the "Book-of-the Month" club. So what can you learn from Sackheim's Book-of-the-Month club? More than you think. People are lazy. Getting people to take any sort of action is not easy. That's why much of advertising uses deadlines and limited time offers.