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How to Stop Getting E-Mail Marketing Messages

July 18th, 2007 by Bob Bly

Are you sick and tired of getting hype-filled e-mail marketing messages from the publishers of all those free e-zines you read?

Here’s an easy way to stop them: don’t accept free e-zine subscriptions.

“I write my own free e-newsletter and have to desensitive myself to comments from negative readers who think all of us are writing for their benefit with no underlying profit motive,” says DE. “I love what I do, but I do it for the money.”

“Perhaps some day the complainers will understand that the purpose of a business is to create a profit. But until then,” advises DE, “they should unsubscribe from all the free e-newsletters to eliminate their frustration.”

DE’s position is clear: the “price” for getting his “free” e-newsletter is not money — he doesn’t ask for a credit card number — but permission.

Specifically, permission to send you e-mail messages about products and services he thinks would be useful to you.

Do you think this permission is a reasonable “subscription fee” for the publisher of a free e-zine to charge you?

Or do you think DE and others should offer you the option of just getting the e-zine but not the e-mail marketing messages?

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 18th, 2007 at 3:08 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

55 responses about “How to Stop Getting E-Mail Marketing Messages”

  1. 27amDotCom said:

    >> the option of just getting the e-zine but not the e-mail marketing messages?

    Sure… make it an option, but then it would come with a price tag.

    That being said, it depends on the model. If the sole purpose of my business is to keep reminding you of my coaching program or my book series or [add your selection here], then free content without the advertising revenue (ie: affiliate programs) makes absolute sense.

    However, if your business model is to build your audience (subscriber list) *specifically* to be able to develop a stream of income from the advertising that you lace through the publication, then users should have a choice: 1) pay $197 per year for that info OR 2) know that THEY are in charge of all emails they receive and simply learn to filter/delete the ad content.

    I think even the consumer has to be respectful of the publishers time. Newspapers and magazines not only don’t give you free content (ie: you have to pay your $1 – $6.95 per issue) BUT they still load their publication full of advertising. It’s business. The only way it surives is through a WIN-WIN and putting time (and possibly money) into publishing high value content on a regular basis *without* monetization strategies is absolutely foolish.

    Rob Toth, http://www.27AM.com

  2. Vern said:

    Looking at it from the point of view of the recipient, I subscribe to newsletters for information. I know that, when I subscribe to anything, there is a price to pay, vis: permission to send information, with the proviso that “propositions” are a part of that info.
    IF I get the information I want, need, can utilize, I will continue giving my permission. IF I see something ‘else’ of interest in the newsletter, I will check it out, or leave it alone.
    IF I don’t find I am getting ‘fed’, I then have the option to discontinue the newsletter.
    P.S. One of the newsletters I subscribe to had a great incentive: it asked subscribers to “fill out a survey” to acquire information that ‘we’ would like to see in the publication. In other words, ‘we’ would, in essence, write our own newsletter through ‘our’ expectations of ‘news’.

  3. Michael A. Stelzner said:

    Bob;

    I think relevance is what matters.

    If I started getting ads for flowers or mortuary services from your newsletter, rather than writing and marketing knowledge, I’d be gone quick.

    Personally, on my list, I keep everything focused on writing white papers.

    This pretty much eliminates those nasty messages.

    Mike

  4. Tim King said:

    Sure, permission is a reasonable subscription fee. And I’ve even paid that fee, for valuable information.

    And if you set my expectations up front– Make it clear from the get-go that you’ll send me free information as well as offers you think I might like. If I expect that, I won’t even be surprised.

    Of course, I’ve also unsubscribed (sometimes pretty quickly) from lists that fail to provide valuable information.

    -TimK

  5. Riel Langlois, comic book writer said:

    Permission to send marketing messages is a reasonable “subscription fee” for the publisher of a free e-zine to charge me.

    I think that customers who like your e-zine and your type of products won’t block you. I believe that the subscribers who would block you are people who wouldn’t have ordered anyway, but I may be wrong about that.

    I have a message in my inbox almost every day from Mile High Comics. It doesn’t bother me and I haven’t blocked or unsubscribed because I’m certain that one day there will be a headline that I’ll act on.

    (Also, I make note of which headlines grabbed my attention, so it’s kind of free market research.)

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