Whatzzup With Those Safelists?
| Category: E-mail Marketing | Date: 2003-03-11 |
I had a very interesting conversation yesterday with someone who is trying to establish a meaningful safelist. Not an easy thing to do. I wonder if you can figure out why. Give up?
It's because nobody really knows if anyone is reading them!
It seems maybe a year or so ago it was impossible to find more than a few safelists at a time. Now, the field is crowded to capacity. This one boasts 500 members; another 3500 members and yet another one yells, "WE'VE GOT OVER 10,000 MEMBERS!"
Swell. Here's my question. What earthly difference does all that number-waving mean if nobody's paying attention? And, if that's the case, why are we wasting our time?
I am of two minds regarding Safelists. One, I wonder if they mean anything at all and should just die a natural death. Two, without them we might just be missing an awful lot of potential partners.
Here's my real bottom line: we cannot have it both ways. For the most part, we are all here for the same reason. To try to generate interest in what we do and, hopefully, some income. It's the reason we post and we post and we post some more.
It's the reason when our attention is grabbed by a headline that says there are 9,000+ members of a safelist we scramble over to find out what it's all about, Alfie. Let's face it, that's way too many heads to be ignoring.
We're not even hoping to capture anywhere near that 9,000 number, but a small percentage wouldn't be so bad. You are perplexed, then, if your offer is any good, where are the responses?
Where? No where. They have been filtered out. A typical excuse for this is: "I don't want any spammers". Neither do I. Neither does anyone else. We aren't even spamming. Too bad we aren't getting our message across either.
I will bet any amount of money the one's who are filtering out the emails are the first one's checking to see how many people have taken a look at what they advertised, though.
Doesn't work that way. And shouldn't work that way. It's as bad as anyone talking about how their time is so eaten up they haven't a chance to ever read your newsletter (or anyone else's) but want to know if you caught that great article in their's today. Can you spell R-E-C-I-P-R-O-C-A-L?
If Safelists are not giving us the satisfaction we think we deserve then look homeward, angel. Are YOU guilty of not reading your emails from a safelist you belong to? Are YOU just checking in to make sure your ad is running and that's the end of it?
Sure, there are emails we know we won't have any interest in and that's perfectly okay. Not every opportunity is for every single person. But, WE are the Safelists. WE make them happen - or not happen.
WE are responsible for making them good, reliable sources of information. It logically follows, then, that WE need to take the responsibility for whether or not they have any substance or are as useless as junk stations.
As I finished up my conversation I sat back and realized how excited this woman was to be taking over the helm of the Safelist (WomenInTouch@yahoogroups.com, by the way). I was impressed at how she was so willing to jump in and do her best to make it something of note.
Ladies, in particular, this is the Internet. We have much more opportunity to decide our fates here than in any boardroom. Gentlemen, we all know there are only so many "positions" to be filled in the corporate arena - and they don't always get filled according to the most qualified.
So I say to all if we are to try to "make it happen" here on the Internet, let's see what we can do to make these Safelists more reliable, more responsive, more of what they are supposed to be about in the first place.
There is enough to go around for everyone. Trying to hog it is silly and counterproductive. Being overly competitive will cause you to trip up. We are supposed to be helping each other out, not filtering each other out. Am I right?
Sam Knight © 2002
About the Author
Author, Sam Knight heads an Affordable Ad Writing service, "The Write Place", is editor/publisher of "BOOMER BRIGADE!" Newsletter boomer4ever.com, and partners with a company that offers low-cost Quality Computer Systemscomplete with a no credit check or interest accrual Lay-a-way Plan! http://www.profitwebservices.com/smk.html
sam@boomer4ever.com
http://www.boomer4ever.com
It's because nobody really knows if anyone is reading them!
It seems maybe a year or so ago it was impossible to find more than a few safelists at a time. Now, the field is crowded to capacity. This one boasts 500 members; another 3500 members and yet another one yells, "WE'VE GOT OVER 10,000 MEMBERS!"
Swell. Here's my question. What earthly difference does all that number-waving mean if nobody's paying attention? And, if that's the case, why are we wasting our time?
I am of two minds regarding Safelists. One, I wonder if they mean anything at all and should just die a natural death. Two, without them we might just be missing an awful lot of potential partners.
Here's my real bottom line: we cannot have it both ways. For the most part, we are all here for the same reason. To try to generate interest in what we do and, hopefully, some income. It's the reason we post and we post and we post some more.
It's the reason when our attention is grabbed by a headline that says there are 9,000+ members of a safelist we scramble over to find out what it's all about, Alfie. Let's face it, that's way too many heads to be ignoring.
We're not even hoping to capture anywhere near that 9,000 number, but a small percentage wouldn't be so bad. You are perplexed, then, if your offer is any good, where are the responses?
Where? No where. They have been filtered out. A typical excuse for this is: "I don't want any spammers". Neither do I. Neither does anyone else. We aren't even spamming. Too bad we aren't getting our message across either.
I will bet any amount of money the one's who are filtering out the emails are the first one's checking to see how many people have taken a look at what they advertised, though.
Doesn't work that way. And shouldn't work that way. It's as bad as anyone talking about how their time is so eaten up they haven't a chance to ever read your newsletter (or anyone else's) but want to know if you caught that great article in their's today. Can you spell R-E-C-I-P-R-O-C-A-L?
If Safelists are not giving us the satisfaction we think we deserve then look homeward, angel. Are YOU guilty of not reading your emails from a safelist you belong to? Are YOU just checking in to make sure your ad is running and that's the end of it?
Sure, there are emails we know we won't have any interest in and that's perfectly okay. Not every opportunity is for every single person. But, WE are the Safelists. WE make them happen - or not happen.
WE are responsible for making them good, reliable sources of information. It logically follows, then, that WE need to take the responsibility for whether or not they have any substance or are as useless as junk stations.
As I finished up my conversation I sat back and realized how excited this woman was to be taking over the helm of the Safelist (WomenInTouch@yahoogroups.com, by the way). I was impressed at how she was so willing to jump in and do her best to make it something of note.
Ladies, in particular, this is the Internet. We have much more opportunity to decide our fates here than in any boardroom. Gentlemen, we all know there are only so many "positions" to be filled in the corporate arena - and they don't always get filled according to the most qualified.
So I say to all if we are to try to "make it happen" here on the Internet, let's see what we can do to make these Safelists more reliable, more responsive, more of what they are supposed to be about in the first place.
There is enough to go around for everyone. Trying to hog it is silly and counterproductive. Being overly competitive will cause you to trip up. We are supposed to be helping each other out, not filtering each other out. Am I right?
Sam Knight © 2002
About the Author
Author, Sam Knight heads an Affordable Ad Writing service, "The Write Place", is editor/publisher of "BOOMER BRIGADE!" Newsletter boomer4ever.com, and partners with a company that offers low-cost Quality Computer Systemscomplete with a no credit check or interest accrual Lay-a-way Plan! http://www.profitwebservices.com/smk.html
sam@boomer4ever.com
http://www.boomer4ever.com
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