Low Cost Fresh Responsive Leads: Oh Please!!
As many of you are very well aware, I firmly believe that the backbone of any good online marketing business is a solid opt in email list. Without this, making an online income will always be difficult, in fact, I would go so far to say that if you don’t have a list, you don’t have an online business. That’s just how strongly I believe in email list building.
Now, the question remains, how do we build a large and profitable email list that actually converts? No, that’s not strictly correct! I think we can take the ‘large’ out of that last sentence. Sure it’s great to have a ‘large’ email opt in list, but unless those prospects are targeted and have a specific keen interest in the niche you are promoting then they simply will not convert so well.
On the other hand, a smaller list with targeted opt ins of prospects who have a great interest in your niche will almost certainly have greater conversion rates.
Now you may be wondering why I’ve chosen to talk about this today. I actually had no intention of commenting on this but only earlier this evening I was hit with a couple of emails with 2 different companies ‘bragging’ about how they could supply me with thousands of ‘responsive’ leads. Now I know you’ve heard that before.
So lets analize this a little further. Each of these companies on average we’re charging around 1 cent per lead. That’s right 1 cent. And get this! They promise that your leads are fresh, unique and never shared with anybody else. Now that’s up to you if you choose to trust that info but at 1 cent per lead I certainly have my reservations.
So OK, you buy the leads, now what? What are you going to do with them?
Bingo! “I’ll just take those 10,000 new leads and import them into my auto responder. I’m sure to make a killing here”.
Wrong, No you won’t!
You go try doing that with Get Response and they’ll stop you in your tracks right there and then. All of those cheap leads you just purchased will require double opt in and that means contacting your prospects and getting them to opt in yet again to your auto responder.
I wonder how may of your ‘cheapo’ leads will do this?
In fact, I’m fairly confident that even Aweber and Email Aces will require a re opt in so that you can add those prospects to your auto responder. The reason for this is quite simply that the larger auto responder services are just not prepared to screw up their relationships with ISP’s and fall victim to spam laws. They will have built good relationships with these ISP’S that allow help with their delivery rates.
So all things considered, have you really got a great deal with your 1 cent leads?
The only way around this as I see is to use a third party mail client and then ask each prospect to opt in to your list with a welcoming and beneficial email. You may get some opt ins but then again you may not. I mean let’s face it, these prospects do not know you from Adam.
If on the other hand, you already have a large list and are perhaps moving auto responder to an alternative provider, then prospects on your list will be more inclined to opt in again because they have already developed a personal relationship with you or at least should have if you have been doing your homework.
So stop and think before buying what may very well turn out to be a bundle of useless leads.
You can build your list with many other methods such as giving away free bonuses, a newsletter, or even virally. Your initial task is to get the traffic to your opt in page. One of the best and cheapest methods to do this is article writing. PPC is an alternative but has a price.
Get Response has it’s own co-reg leads that are automatically added to your auto responder when you purchase them and there is no need for confirmation as they are already double opt in.
http://www.kirksmiths.com/recommends/GetResponse
This may be another way of building your list faster.
Keepin’ It Real
Kirk
Posted: September 28th, 2007 under Latest News.
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