Do Safelists work in building a list and email marketing/making sales

OfficerIM,

"Safelists" work 100% of the time... for the owner.

I've been on "Safelists" in the past..... I've seen no benefit.

Why?

My theory is... most "list members" have all the mail from the "Safelist" going to a Trash folder or they have an e-mail they use for "junk e-mail" and never read it.

Your mileage may vary...

All The Best,

Rich Beck BCIP, MCSD, MCIS

Hey there my friend,

I think one of the biggest problems with safelists and traffic exchanges is that each member that joins is mainly joining for one reason...

To get traffic to 'their own' offers and websites.

Each member is only viewing your offer so that they can get credit to get someone to see their offer. This means you have at most... What 15 to 20 seconds? And they're moving on to the next site. Even IF they opt in to your list I have found that it's extremely hard to ever get quality leads using these sites.

The reason is that most people using these types of sites set up a trash email, confirm that it's real solely for the purpose of getting all the spam that no one really ever cares to view in the first place.

I agree with Rich;
And as far as this question here -->> were you marketing Safelist specific products?

I've tried many different types of products. I'm guessing by "safelist specific" products you mean products that help other members use and benefit from safelist themselves. I myself have tried this as well and the result has never been worth it. These sites as stated mainly benefit the owner NOT the user.

In the end you will get traffic and even some optins but in my experience the quality is very poor. That's my rant, and I hope it helps
Joe Remington

Ok, I see what you're saying. Initially I thought you were referring to promoting safelist products or courses that show other members how to benefit from safelist themselves but instead you're just redirecting them to the next 'shiny object' (new safelist) and doing it before it has become saturated and doesn't work anymore.

This to me is short sighted and would not have any long term benefit to using such a strategy. Yes you will make a few small commissions. Yes you will build a small list of 'suckers' that keep falling for the next shiny object, silver bullet hype.

But this to me is very short lived and I don't see any scalability to this strategy and I still say that it's very poor quality and serves no one. To me it has been and always will be a total waste of time.

To answer your question specifically I don't believe that I have ever tried to promote other safelist to safelist members. (I did try a lot of things back when I just got started so there is a shadow of 'maybe' in there)

Mostly I promoted other list building and traffic generation generation products which are two huge reasons people use safelist to begin with. I did get a small % of conversions but never anything that added up to being worth the effort.

Make it a great day,
Joe Remington

i use to do safelists a couple years ago. promoting straight to a sales page. it converts. just got to check your own numbers to decide if its worth it for you

As the members above have pointed out the users of safelists are always marketers who are using them just to get traffic to their sites.....just like you!
There is no "buyer intent" by the people who view your ads or see your site. From my experience it is s total waste of time and you should move on.
Spend you time doing something constructive.

Over the years I've generate thousand of leads and thousands of dollar using both traffic exchanges and safelists. The main difficulty here is taking the time to create unique pages that are aimed at the type of person who uses this sort of site.

Most people here will use them for a month, promote the same affiliate offer as everyone else, get no results, blame the traffic source and move onto promoting the next offer.

If you spend 3 months learning who the best people are and learning what and how to promote properly you can get results. The best training you can probably get at the moment is via clicktrackprofit, it's been online for 3 years and is just shy of 100,000 members.

Don't expect immediate results, start off slowly and build up your list gradually and once you know that you have a funnel that works start investing in buying advertising and building your list and brand.

If you do want / need any help then please get in touch.

They work for the owner 100% of the time (like what was mentioned above). Most people don't join safelists to look for offers to join. It's a great business model for the safelist creator. That's about it.

lol you guys crack me up Don't go talking trash when you don't know how to use something. So tired of the drivel that comes out of some peoples mouths anymore.

With any traffic method you need to learn the right way to use it. When you use it correctly and target the audience good things happen.

Not all safelist, viral mailers or traffic exchanges are equal. Yes some are complete trash but others produce real results, real sales and real income for your business or affiliate links.

Without having previous experience working with safelists or traffic exchanges I could say that people participating in these programs need traffic (or are looking for it) or are interested in building a list. So you try selling list building and traffic generation info products to them.

not sure where to begin asking, I have a service website that advertises for dealers/brokers in a vertical market. suddenly I am getting over a thousand opt-in signups a day from all over the world, but all these people seem to be in internet marketing, not listing ads which is what the free membership is for. They put personal info including website details. I just wonder who told them to register with me - and is there some company out there that I can sell these fresh daily opt-in email leads to??
(I don't do affiliate marketing myself, although I know a little about it.)

I would prefer to avoid this route and try the TESTED options for driving traffic...

Safelists work they just take exactly that a little bit of work.

It also depends what type of product or service your marketing to these types of places because not every traffic source will convert whatever your trying to market.

Yesterday I was doing so marketing for a membership site I own and logged into the site List Building Maximizer. Now granted I'm a upgraded member there so I can mail to a lot of people IF I have credits. Well I didn't have credits yesterday. So I earned some from looking at emails took me about 10-15 minutes. I didn't even have enough to mail to all 18k members the site has I mailed to 12,000 something.

Looked today at my membership site and saw this.



I blurred out the members name/email but you can see the upgraded member came from a safelist that I took 10-15 minutes to earn credits at. The sale was for $77.

Sure you will not get results every time you use a safelist but the point and goal is to use them each and every time you can because results like this do happen every few days and they add up over a month.

So this again for everyone out there that think safelists don't work this is proof they do you just have to invest a little bit of work into them like anything else in life.

Safelists work great if used correctly. Same goes for Facebook, PoF, 7search etc...

I agree with the previous posters... safelists can work if you learn how to use them correctly. You can test out most safelists for free, before you buy (Yes, you may miss the OTOs if you bypass them, but 80% of the time you will get another, random, OTO-like offer somewhere down the line... especially when the "launch" phase for that site has worn off or at certain times of the year, like Black Friday)...

As with any business, no you would not make a fortune from safelists over night... but if you spend a little time to set up your foundation and you upgrade in the right places, you can be mailing to half a million a day with nary a click (I know, because I can do that now) and if you take the time to fill in a couple of the downline builders and you promote the links for THOSE sites... you could be not only covering your initial costs, but earning some decent pocket change (on top of your main business) for years to come, from just months to a year (depends on initial investment and/or experience) of effort.

Just this past Saturday, I made $160 passively (I made more that day, but that's what others earned for me or was residual income)... all from safelists. I've made more than that passively, before, but that was just this past Saturday... and it keeps getting better every day.

I'm glad I put in the time to build that foundation... and all the while I was educating myself while watching and reading internet marketing ads, buying products that interested me and even collecting freebies along the way... now that, that is on auto-pilot I can focus on other things, like blogging, list building and SEO and I always know that on any given day I can easily reach a half a million or more people for FREE now (free because I put in a little extra effort to make sure the safelists paid for themselves and then some) ... with no effort on my part aside from copying and pasting ads into HTML editors and hitting send...that's a half a million people (guaranteed, every day) ON TOP of all of the other things you teach here to garner traffic... why would anyone throw that traffic away?

No one would say to bring traffic to your sites only with safelists, to the exclusion of all other methods... it's just another great tool that you can use... and works especially well if you learn how to use it properly.

Any good safelist has 2 email addresses for each person on the list. One email address is a junk email address and the other is an "admin" email address.

Almost all of them will allow you to send email to the "admin" email addresses for a small fee.

That's the list you want to send to. And in my experience it's always gotten me way more visitors than any solo ad, google ad, forum post or other so-called traffic method.

The key to getting visitors then sign ups then sales is dead simple.

1. Give away, completely free, a very highly perceived value product. Say in your subject and your email to the "admin" list that it's free and how much it's worth, as well as the benefits of owning it. That will get the visitors.

2. Make the visitors opt-in AND verify their email address in order to get the free product. That will get the sign ups. If you don't make them verify their email address you'll get way more sign ups but over 90% of them will give a bogus email address, so really you're getting way less sign ups.

3. The first 3 emails you send them, offer more free stuff or links to other people free stuff, along with good solid free advice.

4. The 4th email you send, sell them a product, in the same niche, worth half or less than the original free product you gave them. By the time they get your 4th email they're feeling guilty if they don't buy it, especially since you're asking such a small price.

Using this simple method you can add 3 or 4 thousand subscribers to your list every month, and 3 or 4 thousand dollars to your bank account every month.

Of course, your results may vary from mine.

I just want to add a few more words, as I read back on some of the early posts on this thread....

Someone had asked or mentioned "What would you promote on a safelist?" or be successful promoting there... and another person mentioned "Well, you only have 15-20 seconds before that person moves on to the next ad "because they aren't there to buy what you have, they are there to sell what they have to you... "

So, you need to ask yourself... if they are there to sell something to you, what does that mean? It means, that they are hoping to make money. I think most would agree, that many of the offers in this business (even outside of promoting safelist, specific offers) revolve around teaching others how to be successful, which helps them to make money...

So, if I were an internet marketer, who was not interested in taking part in the Safelist business, specifically, and who was only interested in using them... I would take the fact that I at least have some idea that those reading my ads are there to "make money" and I would couple that with the fact that I only have 10-20 seconds to grab their attention... and as a result, my ONLY goal, at that stage, would be to set up a lead capture page that gets that person, from that safelist, to become a member of MY list... I would not be there to sell them some huge expensive system in 15-20... my main goal would be to get them in my orbit. Which brings us back to what we said before... if you just use your intelligence and think it through... you can use safelists to greatly benefit yourself...without actually having to be in the safelist business.

You can use them to build your list and that's really the only reason you should be using them, but don't expect to create any significant income from that if it's all you're going to do.

That's how I started back in 2005. Added thousands of subscribers to my list between safelists and viral list builders.

Not sure how effective they are now as I engage in marketing that is a much better use of my time and money, but I'm sure you can get something out of them

Safelist as with anything you have to do your research to find the reliable ones.
Safelist can be a good way to build your list if done properly.

Never made it work for me... so i swapped it for article marketing.

That didnt work well for me either. So i started a blog... and i'm getting good results from it.

You know even highly experienced marketers fall for that some times. We get in a low and want out. We try them again only to find out the same thing, they never have worked for me. But if you open a site and market it well you will have a huge list.

Thank you - I'll try to remember that!

I have a hard time believing people are having success with Safe-lists and other forms of low quality traffic. In fact I see a lot of people say they often have success with something yet they never post any results to back them up. So as far as I am concerned until they submit proof that safe-lists are a great method for list building and they are converting into purchases, I cannot recommend using safe-lists. That is of course, til I see the people having success post results for people to look at and list what proven methods work.

You'll get the hang of it! It was confusing to me in the beginning as well.. and it's confusing to most people in the beginning. The way that products and ideas are "sold" in this industry, does oftentimes make people doubt themselves because you hear over and over again that you can get rich, seemingly overnight, and I have yet to meet anyone doing very well in this industry or working from home who didn't work very hard for at least a year or two to get there... It's why the IRS almost never audits anyone within the first two years of them opening a business... because you are expected to operate at a loss for a year or two...

There is a fairly steep learning curve... if you have a day job, plan on holding onto it for a while so that you can take the time to really learn how all the pieces fit together. As far as using Safelists, yes... I would plan on using them to only build your own list... I'm not sure why some people don't do well with Safelists... it could be because they are trying to sell a $497 upsell in 10 seconds, so they aren't using them correctly or it just may not be for them... just like blogging is something I've had trouble with, but it comes easily to others.

But I think if your focus is on learning how to build your funnel and you use safelists to introduce others to and capture them in the opening of your funnel - that gives you time, then, to really allow them to get to know you and what you are all about. And while you are doing that you could be working on optimizing your site and learning SEO to garner more organic, pinpoint traffic.

One common, great method that works is giving something away for free on your lead capture page... you can gift it to your signups after they sign up. You can rebrand an ebook, you can come up with your own gift... the sky is the limit.

Safelists are also a great inexpensive way to brand yourself. Have you signed up for Gravatar yet? I'm guessing if you have a blog (wordpress) you may have already signed up... well, many safelists will grab your Gravatar image and name and users will see your photo, when your ads appear while they are surfing.

Matthew, what I fail to understand is why on earth you are acting as if I have a product to sell to you and I am REQUIRED to prove it's worthiness... I could care less what you think! Ok, safelists are bigfoot... you win. We can all move on now. Good luck to you, man.

I am doing very well with using safelists... and I know others are as well. I share that information because I know it to be true... I don't owe that information to you and I give it to help you... if you don't want to take it... that's ok with me... because there are others out there who see/know the benefit (especially when you are new and don't yet have an online presence yet) of using safelists to get immediate traffic to your leads.

Are the conversions worth it? My answer is yes Most definitely. But it's your job to find that out for yourself, not anyone elses.

Hi OfficerIM

We have a facebook you can join where you'll get some good discussion, drop me or Maria a link if you want to join. You should also be using a real name so that we know who you are as that's part of the branding curve that helps with your safelist results.

Which autoresponder are you using, and if you have tracking I would be expecting at least a 2% average opt-in rate. That's assuming your freebie is worth having and the page is clear and concise.

Give it 3 months of an hour a day and you should be generating income and hopefully being able to buy advertising and make a positive return on investment.

Safelists do work.

Like any form of free traffic it requires a lot of work and consistency.

I have used them for years before using paid traffic methods. I still use them from time to time because they do work. You will not likely make a fortune using them but you will grow your list and make sales once you use them in the right way.

Its all about the offer that you promote and how well it converts. These days there are more tools available to make safelist marketing much easier. So if you are on a limited budget, they are definitely worth using.

~ Phil Davis

In 99.9% of cases safelists are a complete waste of time.

Regarding the funnel question, safelist users usually have a problem with getting traffic.
But they are also cheapos unwilling to buy the traffic...

Again pretty much useless.

I have seen no benefit with using safelists I am certain 99% of the time that nobody will even read your email or ad!

If you haven't seen a benefit from using them, then you don't know what you are doing.. plain and simple. Because my income (90% of which is from Safelists and spent on Safelists 8K, so far, this year... are you sure we are all cheap?) tell me that Safelists work.

I feel I'm about to make some enemies, but it's gotta be said.

Certain people here are claiming "Yes, safelists work like gangbusters!" and yet there's no mention of how they're making their money from safelists. If these folks are safelist owners or have massive downlines then they'll obviously have more success than the rest of us who have tried out safelists as new members.

Please, folks, there's no need to be so cryptic while promoting something like safelists. Especially since most of us have enough experience with them to know that unless you're an owner or you've got a massive downline, you're not going to get eyes on your emails.

I'm getting tired of reading "They work, you're using it wrong!" when there's nothing to backup your claim.

Also, I understand 90% of this forum is hype with nothing to backup the claim but we can do our part to lessen that and make this a more valuable place to exchange ideas.

Keep in mind, folks, safelists require a "downline" to be viable.

A downline is simply a fancy way of saying "recruiting other people".

Anyone actively using safelists has a vested interest in building their downline.

Connect the dots.

You made my point, though. The downline is your ticket to sending more emails in the form of ad credits, and getting referral fees etc. Therefore, as I stated, anyone actively using safelists has a vested interest in building their downline.

Okay, here's my .75 worth...

I have been using several forms of list building over the years and in the last 9 months or so, I have been actively using Safelists DAILY to generate leads and build a list. I have a good converting funnel with a free offer on the front. I use Safelist Genie to manage my accounts and submit my ads. I have several Lifetime memberships with the better-responding safelists. Having the upgrades is a crucial step in making the lists work for you.

On a daily basis, I am able to reach about 700k plus safelist subscribers across all the lists. It is a numbers game and on the average, I see 20 - 25 new leads per day that begin to go through my funnel. The conversion rate for action takers once they are in my funnel is about 1 in 20 that do something. My CTR for my lists when I broadcast to this specific audience is about 12% right now.

Overall, I find safelists to be very useful for some daily lead flow but they do take some effort and tools to keep them flowing.

As I said a long time ago in this thread, if it's not for you, it's not for you. I would never push something that works for me on others or try to make them feel bad for using or trying other forms of traffic generation.

But, I think for you to come here and put an entire method down (that works very well for many) and to dispense bad, blanket advice about something that you don't seem to have a lot of experience with is irresponsible.

Do safelists take a lot work?

Sure they do, but it's been my experience that the benefits I receive from them are worth it and it takes less and less time to generate more traffic, over time. It's not easy to start any new, small-business... (I know because I've started a few) and this is no different. The cost is always much higher than the reward, in the beginning.

I also want to point out something that I find very interesting... you asked for proof that safelists work... and accused us/me of generalizations... and within minutes I was willing to compare results with you... but you never responded. So, I wondered why and I followed your Twitter button to your Twitter page and found your blog that is loaded up with content... and I checked your Alexa ranking... low & behold... you don't have a rating because your ranking is below their low threshold to rank your site.

Alternately, I just started working on the design of my own blog, 4 days ago, I haven't promoted it on safelists yet and I've only told a few friends about it (to see if I'm going in the right direction with design, not for them to read content) and my blog is already being ranked by Alexa... no content, hasn't even launched. (If you want to verify this, you can find it very easily on a dot NET domain with my name) Safelists have helped me to brand myself so well, that people just look to see if I have a blog.. so it's been generating traffic since I purchased the domain in March... with no content.

Are you sure you don't want to re-think using safelists? I'll understand if it's not for you... but I really don't think you have any place giving others advice on this subject (because you don't seem to have a lot of luck with generating traffic through ANY method)... just my opinion.

P.S. Another interesting thing to note... way back in the beginning of this thread, I said I've had trouble with blogging, it doesn't come easily to me, but I know others have had success with it (I just haven't, yet)... as you can see, I'm not giving up just because I didn't take to it the first or the third time... I'm reaching beyond my own comfort zone to try to get the hang of something that so many others have told me "works". I'm glad I am not wasting my time telling others that blogs don't work... because, really... that would be beyond my own scope of expertise.

I love Traffic exchanges and Safelists. They have some of the best owners in the industry and provide a platform for folks to make money online. Use them effectively and your advertising runs on auto-pilot.

With a twist I've discovered in a course called Breakfast Embed..

Yes. It works.

Because you can take the horrible, cheap traffic from safelists and send them to a blog or YouTube video (from your autoresponder) so that it ranks Page 1 quickly.

The blog is monetized with banners and affiliate links, and finding content is super easy using this method.

Literally copy and paste.

The kicker is that I have an opt in box in the side bar to grab newcomers that come through search engines, which builds my list more, which ranks more and more posts....

You get the idea.

Safelists are usually good for the most part.

Never safelists.. it's all spam folders and trash for your marketing messages!