Harsh Lesson Learned

There were a lot that sent emails thanking me, but an equal amount that thought the gift was a ploy to overthrow the government.

I take full responsibility for not being more clear and concise with my emails. What was designed to be a little tongue and cheek look at a successful sales page, was interpreted as a sales pitch.

E,

I, for one, appreciated it the gift. In fact, I tried to reply to the email but for some reason Gmail wouldn't do it. I think it shows that you care about your list and if people don't see that, well...maybe they're not the ones you want on your list. We all make mistakes but our character shows in how we handle those mistakes. You get two thumbs up from me!

Tina

I was very happy to receive the e-mail, I even printed it out for future reference.

Yes there were a lot of pop ups on exit which were slightly annoying, but that would be missing the point.

There were a lot of things to be learnt from your breakdown of the sales letter, and even though I knew some of it already there were some great reminders.

Unless it was a huge percentage which complained (like 25% or 50% which I seriously doubt), don't forget there is something called the "silent majority".

Okay maybe 10, 15, 20 people complained, but how many read your e-mail like me, and got some serious value from it?

I read all your e-mails, and to be honest this was probably the one which I got the MOST value from.

Apology?

Are we living in a world where someone like E. -- who is clearly as helpful as they come -- needs to apologise for including a link in an email to his opted-in subscribers?

Sometimes folks don't like the answers they're given, and sometimes they feel quote-unquote exploited. Nothing wrong with that, of course, except there's a point where you shouldn't feel responsible for them. After all, we all started from point zero.

Imagine bashing Marlon's door down demanding answers...would that work? Maybe, but only once. Folks owe it to themselves to do some learning before slagging other people off.

Steve

I'm glad that you brought that up. I need to change that. Originally, my site and list had a "don't be an IM loser" theme to it. I had several articles that pointed out loser tactics and how to avoid it. I used a comical approach to IM lessons. Most of my readers got the joke and responded with witty comments and emails. However, some were very offended that there was a website that spoke to people like this. These were the ones that made a point to make blog posts about the arrogance of EBR. One person posted that he lived nearby and made a silly threat because of my "highly offensive blog". (He actually lived in Ireland.)

I changed the theme and I try to be a bit more sensitive now.

It was clear enough to me.

I'm glad that you have posted your experience as it demonstrates how easy it is to offend some subscribers, even loyal subscribers. It must be particularly painful, as you were offering us business advice in the form of a clinical review of a sales page.

You may have lost some potential or real customers over this episode, but at least you and the thread readers will learn from this experience, me included. On the positive side, you may have a 'better' list as a result - time will tell.

I'm still subscribed by the way

Best Regards,

Jeff.

I don't know about your link, but I find that most times when there are four or more exit popups, they are the result of a series of affiliate offers.

IF your visitor leaves, you offer them a discount or two. If it fails, you send them to an affiliate site. Then, the affiliate site does the same thing. Then the third affiliate site does the same thing again, but in one case I ran into, it used the original site as an affiliate site creating an endless loop.

I created a thread warning about this months ago.

Some gurus teach how to take advantage of idiots being on their lists. If a person gets a free gift but never buys, they bombard them with affiliate offers until they either leave or buy something.

It seems to be generally accepted that any large list will have quite a list of idiots and it is a waste of time to deal with them as nothing you can do will satisfy them. Sometimes a member makes a mistake, and that doesn't make them an idiot, but some just don't get it and never will. The more idiots you get, the better you can feel about being in the 'big league'.

These days I subscribe to lists only when there is something to get in the direction that I am moving in my business. I unsubscribe very quickly. If someone bombards me with affiliate offers, I drop them. If they recommend something bad, I consider the source and often drop them. Again, some people, even great marketers, make mistakes. I have to allow for that. I make enough of my own, thank you.

I have been known to block access to sites with my hosts file when I get caught in a series of too many exit pops, especially when it is a popular product launch and everyone is promoting it with different descriptions and cloaked links.

One marketer said she started using affiliate links to products she recommends against buying because there are people who will buy from that link. So, why not get paid?

As for the OP, I have learned from other marketers that it is best to keep emails fairly short. If you need a long one, you should break it up into a series or post it on a website and link to it. Write a teaser in the email and refer the reader to the web page.

People like me scan through long articles or emails to see if there is something i am interested in. It is possible that people just scrolled down to the link and followed it without ever having read your email.

I can't tell you how many times I unsubscribed from an email list because the "one click unsubscribe link" was either at the top of the email or above the link to edit subscriptions.

Life goes on.

Hey Brian,

I've to admit that I only skimmed through the email and because I'm working on my launch I decided to check out the sales page - but I definitely thought that you were actually promoting that product.

I gotta read email more carefully, at least the ones from marketers like you that I respect.

Great how you handled the situation, even though I don't think that it's a big deal.

Cheers,
Mario

You dealt with this situation with class and showed incredible integrity. I wish many other list owners would treat their members the same way. You were trying to teach and help people to get better at making their sales page. The least they can do is to appreciate your effort, rather then complain and complain. Thank you for this post. Hope, we can all learn from it.

Evgueni
(aka iva)

Ha. The only list that every member of the Warrior Forum is on belongs to Allen.