Posts Tagged ‘Spam’

What is Spam?

If you do a Google search on spam, you will get 217,000,000 results.  Wow.  Do you think it’s a popular subject?  Wikipedia has two definitions:  Spam-food and spam-electronic.  Most people are quite familiar with both but I think it’s important to restate the latter definition:

Spam (electronic) is the abuse of electronic messaging systems (including most broadcast media, digital delivery systems) to send unsolicited bulk messages indiscriminately. While the most widely recognized form of spam is e-mail spam, the term is applied to similar abuses in other media: instant messaging spam, Usenet newsgroup spam, Web search engine spam, spam in blogs, wiki spam, online classified ads spam, mobile phone messaging spam, Internet forum spam, junk fax transmissions, social networking spam, and file sharing network spam.

I did read the definition of Spam-food.  Based on the definition it is NOT artificial meat.  But spam-electronic IS an artificial way to “meat” people and it is mostly used by spammers to sell something that the person they are spamming doesn’t necessarily want or need.

Use of Spam from a Consumer Perspective

It is easy to understand why consumers get so ticked off when they are spammed.  It is a waste of the consumer’s time and money (some internet service providers charge by usage).  Personally, I get more ticked off when my time is wasted.  Time IS our most valuable asset.  I was on a website last night.  I thought it was a “reliable” website; one of integrity.  Of course, there were ads all over it.  No problem.  This is to be expected.  Advertising is how “free” websites make money, especially if it is a news related website.  So I clicked on the following ad:

$13 Palm Desert Car Ins?
6/17: Obama backs new insurance regulation. See if you qualify for new 2010 rates starting at $13/mo  Learn more

I responded to the above ad thinking I might possibly qualify for car insurance for $13 a month under some new Obama regulation.  Immediately after I entered my information, before my next blink, the calls and e-mail responses started flooding in.  The one and only person I spoke to informed me that the advertising was some kind of mass advertising to solicit people’s information and he didn’t know anything about insurance for $13 a month.  When I told him that the advertisement was “spammy”, he agreed and said “everyone’s doing it.”   I was so ticked off I sent an e-mail to the editor of the website.  Not only was it spammy, it may fall under false advertising.  I’ll have to research it and write a follow up article.

If “Everyone’s Doing It”…DON’T DO IT!!!

Think about every time you’ve heard that phrase in your life: “everyone’s doing it.”  Every time I’ve heard this phrase, or used it myself, it meant that “everyone” was doing something questionable.  The other thing I’ve learned about this phrase, from financial leaders like Robert Kiyosaki and Warren Buffet, is if everyone is doing it, DON’T DO IT!

Attraction Marketing is NOT Spam

Let me repeat…attraction marketing is NOT spam.  Attraction marketing is about relationship building.  It’s about offering value and establishing yourself as an expert and a leader in your field.  It’s about reaching people who want to be reached.  The next time you are sending a bulk message, just ask yourself “is my message solicited? Is it discriminate?” Are you reaching people who want to be reached?  Are you offering something they want, something they’ve asked for?  There is a movement in the network marketing industry to clean up the nasty reputation that’s been created by a few bad apples…okay, maybe more than a few.  I hate, yes, I said hate, the thought of attraction marketers shifting the annoying off-line stereotypical network marketer habits to the internet.

Sales professionals teach that you must have a call to action at the end of every meeting, conference call, webinar, article, etc.  My call to action is this:  Do not use spam to promote your MLM business.