Aside from a related LinkedIn lawsuit, the #1 apprehension I hear to uploading contacts into LinkedIn is the fear that their colleagues will get spammed by other members. I squash that concern by showing them the mechanisms that prevent mass blasting. I further explain that we’re all spammed everyday; we only choose to work with those we click with: That’s the real benefit of LinkedIn.
An irony often happens soon after someone uploads contacts in LinkedIn: They peruse their colleagues’ profiles & then stumble into those “2nd degree” contacts. They then ask, “How can I email ALL those contacts?” I remind them of their original apprehension & how LinkedIn prevents mass blasting!
To be clear, you can upgrade & purchase the right to send multiple “inMail.” You can also send messages to your own contacts, 50 at a time. Aside from beating inbox clutter, LinkedIn isn’t well-suited for this. I suggest using an anti-spam compliant newsletter service like Constant Contact.
Wheel of Dharma, rel: Karma
This irony is also a metaphor for all such marketing tactics & an opportunity to be reminded of the Golden Rule of Marketing: He who has the Gold, makes the Rules. NO, NO… I mean: Market Unto Others As You Would Have Them Market Unto You.
Nobody likes those “drive-by networkers,” who simply go around passing out business cards as if they’re hocking lunch specials on a city corner. Junk mail is just someone else’s direct mail. And what do those direct mailers do to the junk mail they get? That’s why the response rate is so low.
To be fair, phoneBlogger.net may contribute to what email marketers refer to as bacn, which Wikipedia defines as, “email that has been subscribed to and is therefore not unsolicited (like email spam is), but is often not read by the recipient for a long period of time, if at all.” Our service can only be as strong as the relationships of our clients. If you’re sending someone your email newsletter, would you want that person sending you one? In similar fashion, I remind our clients how we read email, articles & social media posts: We skim & skip around.
Knowing this, does all your marketing follow the golden thumb-rule? I cover 365 more marketing thumb-rules in my aptly named book: Skip around its excerpt via marketingthumbrules.com. Can you think of any marketing tactic that should not follow the Golden Rule? Have you been the victim of “tin foil” marketing? Funnier anecdotes, the better.
~ Vikram Rajan
vik@phoneBlogger.net
Leave A Comment