n/a

If you scrape emails then send them stuff you are considered a spammer because the email owner has not given you permission to use their email.

I would avoid doing this.

100k

Makes no odds whether people consider it spam or not.
It simply won't work.

I know you'll try it anyway but really don't waste your time.

I know of a company who employed a list owner to send out (several times to the list over a few months) to over 2,000,000 addresses at quite a considerable cost.

The best response rate?

0.000001%

Don't bother working it out...it was 2 responses.

Don't buy email lists, don't send to non opted in email lists...you're just wasting your time.

.

I always knew the email numbers were low but glad to have the backing of just how low they are with real world examples.

I never understand why people put so much effort into things that have such low ROI.

I would try to correct myself - email marketing works only with highly targeted email lists; for us we used to get 2,5 - 3% open rate, 0.3-0.5% click-through rate, 0.0002 sales rate. And this is with targeted email lists.
Email lists scraped from YP or any search engines will bring zero to (almost)nothing response.

Don't waste your time
it won't work for long time

I would avoid doing this.

have had mixed results emailing. Still use it as a form of gaining clients. Not my main way, but it still works. Nothing wrong with adding it in your arsenal.

Still have 3 very good SEO clients that have been with me for almost a year now from emailing.

Actually Aaron, email numbers definitely ARE low, but the stats rattled off in this thread are not an accurate representation. Perhaps they bought a list that was generic but I have made a lot of money off email marketing. Conversions are ALWAYS low with email marketing but it is another aspect of marketing that should be used.

When someone tells me email marketing doesn't work... here are the reasons why

1. They aren't using the right strategy
2. Their copy sucks more than "Enter favorite porn stars name here"
3. Their Title just isn't compelling enough to get opens
4. Their email isn't actually being delivered (spam folders, deliverability issues, etc.)
5. There is no call to action
6. There is nothing to click for them to be tossed into a funnel
7. They don't understand the technical side of emailing
8. They don't track
9. They don't work the list
10. They don't scrape the RIGHT list

A list of 10,000 businesses should provide you with a sale each and every time you send out to that list. I like to send once a week, for 8-12 weeks then take a break from the list and do it again.

Reasons why people shouldn't do email marketing with a non opt in list include:

1. Your domain will get blacklisted if you don't know what you're doing
2. Your emails will ALL be marked as spam if you don't know what you're doing
3. Your personal IP address will be blacklisted if you don't know what you're doing
4. The email service you are using will end up banning you
5. If running it from your computer and not another server, your own ISP will ban you.

Email marketing is tough....


But..


Now lets talk about why it is a useful part of your marketing.


If you send 8-12 times, once each week, you are cleaning up your list and you are getting the best results from your list. You have unique emails for each week, you have statistics for each week. Once you take a break you can either run the same exact campaigns or you can test different titles, and content. If you separate your list based on the niches you target, then the process is already there and it is very time efficient and easy to scale.

The work is on the front end, the profit is on the backend. Once you invest the time, 6 months from now you have a part of your marketing that has a 100% automated strategy, and should add at least $10,000/mo in sales for your business.

Waste of time so don't bother doing it. You are far better concentrating on list building to get valid emails from people who are actually interested in your product/service.
It's honestly far better to go the quality rather than quantity route.