spam | Internet Marketing Blog

AOL's Love.com breaks my heart, does it break the rules?

Awesome domain name? Check. A content guy at the helm? Check. A solid strategy? Very questionable.

That's AOL's new Love.com for you.

by Patricio Robles 27 April 2009 16:54pm 3 comments

Twitter has a really bad weekend

Twitter, the wildly-popular microblogging service that's the topic du jour amongst digital marketers these days, had a really bad weekend.

First, on Friday it came to light that a Twitter-oriented advertising network called Magpie was being used by affiliates to promote spammy affiliate links on Twitter. The affiliate links were presented as 'testimonial' tweets and the users who sent them did not directly disclose that their tweets were paid.

by Patricio Robles 14 April 2009 08:30am 9 comments

Is it time to wave the white flag in the war on spam?

Spam. It's the scourge of the internet yet we just can't seem to get rid of it. The more sophisticated our defenses get, the more sophisticated the spammers become. The war on spam is the quintessential cat and mouse game.

And right now, it looks like the mouse is staying one step ahead of the cat.

by Patricio Robles 09 April 2009 12:08pm 3 comments

Those websites Google does not like

While discussing the type of sites Google does not like some people may think of the (allegedly) leaked quality rating guidelines that (allegedly) came from the search engine. However, Google does publicly discuss the type of site it dislikes.

There is a document in circulation in the search industry which people claim to be a copy of Google’s 2007 guidelines to their quality testers. Google does use humans to rate the quality of the search results. Google argue they do not use humans to change the search results.

by Andrew Girdwood 03 April 2009 09:59am 3 comments

Google does no evil, except when there's lots of money involved

One of Google's biggest goals seems to have little to do with dollars and cents. It's a simple one: 'do no evil' and it has been widely promoted for the simple fact that few billion-dollar corporations set such a goal.

Obviously, aiming to do no evil and actually doing no evil are two different things and Google has been criticized over a number of issues.

by Patricio Robles 25 March 2009 15:35pm 3 comments

Making the unsubscribe process as painless as possible

If recipients decide that they want to unsubscribe from your emails, it's best to make it as easy as possible as the alternative is having hit the spam button, which can of course be harmful for your sender reputation.

I've been taking a look at some best and worst practice examples from UK retailers...

by Graham Charlton 19 March 2009 12:30pm 8 comments

How many links are too many?

What's the maximum number of links you should include on a single page? 3, 10, 100?

Let's say you want to build a comprehensive list of the UK charities using Twitter, for instance. There are a lot of links and as the list grows, you just might find yourself with more than 100.

by Patricio Robles 11 March 2009 09:22am 6 comments

Should you increase email frequency?

It is a temptation for email marketers to begin to send out more offers to customers if current campaigns are working well in the hope that increased frequency will yield greater returns.

This can be a risky strategy though; while more emails may produce better results, there is a point at which customers will tire of too many emails and start to unsubscribe, ignore, or mark emails as spam.

by Graham Charlton 05 March 2009 11:03am 3 comments

When is a paid link not a paid link?

Google has a major problem relating the identification of paid links, but I believe it has an even bigger problem relating to the definition of 'paid links', and the very term itself.

Econsultancy’s Patricio Robles wrote about this earlier today so I don’t want to cover too much old ground, but I do want to comment on the difference – or similarity – between paid and commercial links.

by Chris Lake 03 March 2009 18:15pm 11 comments

Why affiliate management is so important

Many online businesses thrive because of their strong affiliate programs. But affiliate programs are also vulnerable to abuse and bad affiliates can hurt the brands of the businesses they promote.

Since last Friday, one of my email accounts has received more than a dozen spam emails promoting FTD.com and I thought this would serve as the perfect example of why affiliate management is so important.

by Patricio Robles 09 February 2009 09:39am 2 comments