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Is email business owners considered spamming?

by kymobilemedia
15 replies
Before I start emailing business owners that I find on various online resources, I was wondering what would be considered spamming?

Is it spam when I send out the same email to 100 businesses offering them a free website with $35 per month hosting?

I don't want to spam people, but I think I could get some more clients by emailing businesses for this service. I have gotten 3 clients so far with this technique.

Would I be better of sticking with a different client getting strategy?

What are your thoughts on this? Is it spamming, and is it violating ftc rules?

Thanks
Jason
#business #considered #email #owners #spamming
  • Profile picture of the author HypeText
    The Technical definition of SPAM is: An electronic message is "spam" if (A) the recipient's personal identity and context are irrelevant because the message is equally applicable to many other potential recipients; AND (B) the recipient has not verifiably granted deliberate, explicit, and still-revocable permission for it to be sent.

    Every ISP is going to have a slightly different definition but as a rule if you are manually sending emails to individual businesses to attempt to make contact and cleary identify yourself and your purpose it won't be considered spam.

    Now if you blast the same generic message out to a large volume of recipients that would be considered SPAM per SPAMHAUS

    A message is Spam only if it is both Unsolicited and Bulk.

    • Unsolicited Email is normal email
      (examples: first contact enquiries, job enquiries, sales enquiries)

    • Bulk Email is normal email
      (examples: subscriber newsletters, customer communications, discussion lists)
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  • Profile picture of the author Lmr1
    I would also be interested in anyone having experience with this as I am looking into this as well. I want to start emailing businesses, so let's hear of any experiences....whether good, bad or indifferent..Thanks!
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  • Profile picture of the author fuzzycorleone
    Wouldn't it be better to call businesses? You'll have a higher success rate. Personally I've tried emailing businesses but never get a response.
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    • Profile picture of the author HypeText
      Originally Posted by fuzzycorleone View Post

      Wouldn't it be better to call businesses? You'll have a higher success rate. Personally I've tried emailing businesses but never get a response.
      Email only has a 10% open rate and 1% to 3% response rate. Thats why Spammers send millions of messages....
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      • Profile picture of the author fuzzycorleone
        Originally Posted by HypeText View Post

        Email only has a 10% open rate and 1% to 3% response rate. Thats why Spammers send millions of messages....
        Yikes. I don't like those odds.
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      • Profile picture of the author Daniel LaRusso
        Originally Posted by HypeText View Post

        Email only has a 10% open rate and 1% to 3% response rate. Thats why Spammers send millions of messages....
        Couldn't about the same stats apply to cold calling?
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        • Profile picture of the author HypeText
          Originally Posted by Daniel LaRusso View Post

          Couldn't about the same stats apply to cold calling?
          Definitely not! Cold calling is more personal and interactive. If someone sits down and makes 100 phone calls and has a polished pitch they could well book appointments for the week.
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  • Profile picture of the author kokopelli
    I would also suggest using a third-party service to send out these emails, don't use your own website (in case it gets blacklisted).

    In addition, you can "test" your emails for "spammyness" (to make sure they do not get blocked) - try a service like one of these:

    Free Online Spam Test

    Free Email Security Check

    Is Not Spam - Online Spam checker for newsletters and email marketing

    Spam Check | Email Spam Tester
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  • Profile picture of the author kymobilemedia
    I am planning on doing cold calling as well.

    I think I will focus most of my time on cold calling, but will do some emailing as well.

    I will personalize each email with the owner name in the email to keep it from being the same every time.

    Thanks
    Jason
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  • Profile picture of the author kokopelli
    Originally Posted by HypeText

    So your message isnt "Don't SPAM"....its "Be a Sneaky SPAMMER"?
    No, I hate spam just as much as the next guy, but if you are going to be sending out unsolicited emails, it makes good sense to be smart about it. So using a third-party to send them out, and testing the content to make sure they will actually reach your target is just common sense (to me).
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  • Profile picture of the author AChung
    An Email is considered as SPAM when it is unsolicited.
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  • Profile picture of the author Awesomo
    I consider it as a spam if the email I get isn't relevant to my business.
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  • Profile picture of the author NYC SEO
    spam is unsollicited mail, end of story in my personal opinion.
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  • Profile picture of the author RentItNow
    This has always been a touchy subject. The problem is more in finding a provider to send so many emails. Hotmail will cut you off. I think aweber will not allow unsolicited so how the heck do you send them without ending up in a client's spam folder.

    The second part to this is it rarely works (for me at least).

    I would rather just talk to a business I frequent and send them an email or even postal letter with MORE information and refer to our conversation, then do a whack of unsolicited letters.

    For example, I was just in a woodworking place yesterday that I know needs a site done (actually much more but to start that would work). So I talked to the owner a bit and casually mentioned I did marketing. He asked a few questions and I told him I would send him some info and the next time I was in, we could go over more...almost always leads to some kind of sale, this method I mean.
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    I have no agenda but to help those in the same situation. This I feel will pay the bills.
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