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Are Tell-a-Friend Scripts Worth It?

by Joshua Uebergang
14 replies
Firstly, I haven't used a tell-a-friend script before.

Here's the benefits I see:
- Potentially more traffic, customers, and sales
- Little offline groups. I'm in a niche where I think friends would refer friends and talk about my products face-to-face

Here's the costs I see:
- Tools like Viral Inviter tout their automatic import feature of email clients. This seems to be such a sketchy feature. TOS of breaching, potential complaints and legal problems with your responsibility at handling login details.
- Need to update. Some scripts seem to be updated frequently (several times a month). I hate frequently updating scripts just so they function.
- Spam. Black listed domain. Ew.
- Untargeted traffic.

Is it all worth it considering you get untargeted traffic? I doubt it.

From your experiences and knowledge, I'm wondering if the benefits of such scripts outweigh the non-financial costs.
#scripts #tellafriend #worth
  • Profile picture of the author KimW
    You forgot to list the negatives.
    These type of scripts are ready made for abuse by others and can lead to getting your sites/IPs banned for spamming.
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    • Profile picture of the author Joshua Uebergang
      No, I didn't. They're listed as costs.
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      • Profile picture of the author KimW
        Originally Posted by Joshua Uebergang View Post

        No, I didn't. They're listed as costs.

        Sorry, thats what I get for skimming.
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        • Profile picture of the author Sean Phillips
          I wish I could provide a thoroughly-tested opinion on the subject, but unfortunately the one project that I've used a tell-a-friend script on was kind of a flop No fault of the tell-a-friend script obviously, just a result of me throwing stuff up and seeing what sticks. They can't all be winners

          I think that the prospect of having your traffic become (at last partially) self-perpetuating is a great concept, and not to be discounted. That being said, I think that in order for this kind of thing to work, your product/service needs to be in a niche where there is some kind of general appeal, rather than something extremely "long-tail". There's no reason for a visitor to email your web address to their entire friend list if your site is about monkey training or something. But if your site is about health, making money, or some other topic with similarly broad appeal, it seems like this kind of viral system has a lot of potential.

          I'd be curious to hear feedback about this from someone with a non-failed website
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  • Profile picture of the author entry
    Originally Posted by Joshua Uebergang View Post

    Firstly, I haven't used a tell-a-friend script before.

    Here's the benefits I see:
    - Potentially more traffic, customers, and sales
    - Little offline groups. I'm in a niche where I think friends would refer friends and talk about my products face-to-face

    Here's the costs I see:
    - Tools like Viral Inviter tout their automatic import feature of email clients. This seems to be such a sketchy feature. TOS of breaching, potential complaints and legal problems with your responsibility at handling login details.
    - Need to update. Some scripts seem to be updated frequently (several times a month). I hate frequently updating scripts just so they function.
    - Spam. Black listed domain. Ew.
    - Untargeted traffic.

    Is it all worth it considering you get untargeted traffic? I doubt it.

    From your experiences and knowledge, I'm wondering if the benefits of such scripts outweigh the non-financial costs.
    Are you including Mile Filsaimes Viral friend adder?
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  • Profile picture of the author JennSpencerIM
    I've toyed with this idea but have a feeling the costs far outweigh the benefits...I really don't want to risk getting blacklisted or denied service by Icontact so I think I'm going to stay away from it. We say in most emails that they can forward to a friend...that way it just comes from them and we have nothing to do with it. I wouldn't want to be sending out messages to people who haven't requested them. Although I've noticed a lot of large sites (like realtor.com) have this feature and they are still around...
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    • Profile picture of the author Jeff Henshaw
      As Kim stated, be careful.

      If a competitor, or an enemy starts putting false names and email addresses into those 'tell a friend' boxes, you could find that you have a heck of a lot of explaining to do, when your IP starts getting spam complaints.

      You are right to have carried out due diligence on this topic.

      One can start to be cavalier or blasé about such things when one is earning a lot of money and has a battery of lawyers to protect ones self.


      Until then ... well it's up to one's own judgment.

      Just my thoughts,


      Jeff.
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      • Profile picture of the author Jeff Henshaw
        Joshua,

        If you are thinking of using the 'tell a friend' in the non IM niche, then I would imagine that you would have far less problems with malicious sign ups than you would get in the IM niche.

        Just my opinion though, as I only operate in two non IM niches.

        Jeff.
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  • Profile picture of the author ArticlePlayground
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    • Profile picture of the author Nonny
      Originally Posted by ArticlePlayground View Post

      tell a friend scripts are pretty good to use, because then, people share your content on social networks like MySpace,YouTube,Facebook, Vimeo and so man more networks. They also can bookmark to social bookmarking services and Google reader too, which helps you to get more backlinks, and more free traffic =)
      But you don't need a tell-a-friend script that requires an email address input to do this. You can use simple social networking button scripts (AddThis, Share (Enthropia)) or social network specific code (Facebook Connect , MySpace Open Platform , Add StumbleUpon Discovery to Your Site , etc.)

      My sense is that people are more likely to use such sharing methods because they aren't required to give any personal information to the web page they are sharing. I'd be interested in hearing whether anyone has done side-by-side testing against tell-a-friend forms and seen a significant difference.
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      • Profile picture of the author Joshua Uebergang
        Great point Nonny. I'd also love to hear any test results.

        I use ShareThis, yet it gets very little activity for quality content. I also ask subscribers to forward my emails and provide a sign-up link. I wonder if the refer-a-friend script with a bonus would be beneficial.
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  • Profile picture of the author globalpro
    There was someone else who posted a thread here about getting their web hosting suspended for using one of these scripts.

    May need to have some deep pockets to use them. To me, more problems than they are worth.

    Thanks,

    John
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    • Profile picture of the author Joshua Uebergang
      Yeah, it's a non-internet marketing niche.

      I don't know what Viral friend adder is. If Filsaime sells it, I'm not interested.

      It seems for now, John, these scripts are more problems than they are worth. That solves this project I've been procrastinating on for months. Avoidance... the best productivity tool
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  • Profile picture of the author Rich Struck
    I've been using a free one for a couple years and it works great. It doesn't send a ton of traffic but I'll take it anyway because I believe it to be very high quality traffic. One IP address can't send more than a few a day before it blocks the sender so I don't worry about spam problems, it has never been an issue.
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  • Profile picture of the author petelta
    I think they have their place, but not in many cases for me. They are just one more possible source of a visitor.
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