Today I received the following email from one of my autoresponder services. It was sent to their customers on September 14 but due to a misspelling in my email address, I didnt get a copy until they responded to a service request I sent yesterday.
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Dear DemandMail Customer,
I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your patronage of the DemandMail system. We have been providing the best quality autoresponder marketing system for over three years and I hope it has been a benefit to you.
As I am sure you are aware the email marketing environment has become very challenging recently because of the mis-use by some and the continuing new laws regarding the transmission of email.
First we had the enactment by the US Government of the Can-Spam act and most recently the enactment of laws by Utah and Michigan called the child protection laws. These later laws allow anyone to bring suit against someone who sent an email to a child in their state that contains prohibited material. The problem is that the there is no definition of what prohibited material is.
Additionally, they do not freely publish dont email list. You can wash lists through their system but at a cost per email that in our opinion is prohibitive.
Because of these developments we have determined it is too risky to provide the DemandMail service and take the risk of multiple lawsuits, fines, and imprisonment that this legislation provides.
So it is with great sadness that I must inform you that DemandMail will be closing it doors on October 1, 2005. It has been our great pleasure to serve you over these many years and I personally want to thank you for your business.
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I am sharing this message with you because I used this service for more than 3 years and had more than 4/5 of my subscribers located there.
Now even though I have backups of my subscriber lists and can import those names into a new autoresponder the impact of losing a fundamental business service is not inconsequential.
I know this from experience.
You see, a little over 3 years ago, I had this same thing happened to me with a different autoresponder service.
Because spam was becoming such a big issue and the service I was using had received enough complaints about various customers they decided to close down early and avoid the rush.
Since double opt-in was a way to avoid most spam complaints, I chose that route when I imported my list to a different service. Unfortunately, unexpected confirmation requests are usually deleted so I experienced a 96% loss of my subscribers. Because I again wont be able to tell my subscribers to expect a confirmation request, I expect the same type of loss.
With all the new legislation and legal threats it looks like double opt-in autoresponder service providers are running scared and I dont think their fears are unjustified. I do think that many legitimate service providers and users will suffer more than those who are causing the problem.
But this tip is not an editorial about spam and its impact on online business. Its about determination.
You see, if I wasnt determined, now would be a great time to give up.
But I am not giving up. Instead, Ill salvage what I can, try to implement a plan to avoid going through this a third time and go on.
Remember, if you are going to succeed online you must be determined. You must be able to recover from things like your website being down or hacked, losing your hosting or autoresponder service, receiving not nice email, being accused of spam and a host of other things that can and do happen everyday to legitimate online business people.
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Susan Carroll is the owner of and has formed a global community of online business people through her weekly newsletter.
Susan recently opened a free membership area where she offers her subscribers both a way to be recognized for working their business plus free and discounted tools to assist them.
You have permission to publish this article electronically or in print, free of charge, as long as the bylines are included. A courtesy copy of your publication would be appreciated.
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Susan Carroll is the founder of the and provides a helping hand to those starting an online business. Although designed to assist those just getting started, her community of friends include both newbies and experienced internet marketers.
Youve heard it before and youll hear it again. The best money making product today is an information product. Makes sense though. Information sells in the information age.
So how do you find people who are willing to pay for information What is that hungry niche market
Thats actually two questions. But you cant get the answer to the first without knowing the second. According to Wikapedia niche marketing is: the process of finding small but potentially profitable market segments and designing custom-made products for them.
Niche marketing is a process. You find small but potentially profitable segments. Then you design products for them.
A process is not immediate. Its not overnight. It doesnt come on the wings of a dove. It is work, it takes time and it is profitable. It is NOT an idea that you have first. It is research first, idea second.
Had I understood that concept when I first started I would not have written one of my e-books. It took me 3 months to write it. I developed a web page and never sold a thing. Do not make that mistake. Learn from mine!
Research for the beginner is a painstaking process. It doesnt take hours but it does take confidence. You will find your market. There are plenty out there. Dont get discouraged by a disappointment. It is only a disappointment and not the end of your e-book career.
First you research. Make a list of all of the things that interest you or that is a problem for you or a problem for your Aunt Jane, Uncle Charles or best friend/neighbor. Make a list of all of the things youd love to know more about. Make that list at least 30 items.
A good rule of thumb is that people will pay for information that will help them make more money (or get out of debt), look/feel better (from a problem they already have) or help to solve any other problem they already have. The trend here is that the person already has a problem and they need to solve it.
People are not likely to pay for information that will prevent a problem. I heard one Internet Marketer say that only 20% of people will pay to prevent a problem. Go after the other 80% - its much more profitable.
There are great search tools on the Internet to find a target market and determine if people are paying. Start at Amazon and click under books. Search the NY Times Best Seller lists for topics that may interest you. These topics already interest John. Q. Public.
Then take your list of 30 or so topics you develop and go to http://www.inventory.overture.com. Input search words about those topics. This tool will tell you how many people used that keyword in the past month on Yahoo! You can then multiply that number by 2.5 to 3 to get the actual search number across Yahoo! and Google (the two biggest engines).
Once you have a topic that is returning numbers between 750-1000 on the Overture tool you will look down the list of other keywords that Overture returns. If some of the top topics include the word fr*e such as fr*e crochet patterns then people are most likely not paying for this information. Move on.
Narrow your field to three topics that you can either write about with a bit of research or about which you want to learn more. Then head off to Google and search for those topics. Check out your competition. What are they selling Are they selling or giving away the information
You can also check out the number of products people are paying for at PayPal. Go to the bottom of the page and click on shops. Search for similar products to the e-book you want to produce. The number sign after the name of the product is the number sold through PayPal since the owner of that product started taking Paypal.
Can you produce a product that is better, answers more questions and gives a different solution That is your niche!
Very important: Know what questions your market is asking.
Go to Yahoo! and search in the Groups category for people who need your information. Find out what questions they are asking. Visit forums in your target market or use a flycatcher page.
Produce a product that answers those questions and you wont be selling they will be buying what they asked for!
Gail Morris is an e-book author and owner of YourEZBooks where she teaches others to write e-books. Her free newsletters provides guidelines and valuable information about research, writing, publishing and marketing e-books. Visit her website to receive a free report and jump start your business today!