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Sales Executive at CopyAmerica
20 February 2008 20:52pm
Is it an acceptable business practice to E-mail prospective corporate clients regarding our business services in the hope of obtaining new clients?
E-Commerce Marketing Manager EMEA at Micron (www.crucial.com)
21 February 2008 09:04am
It all depends of where the email adresses you are using are coming from.
Your prospects should have opted in to receive the exact type of email sollicitation that you are goping to send them. If you are buying/renting these adresses from an external provider, the odds are high that they will be not targeted to your prospect audience. If you are extremely comfortable with your source, then you just want to make sure the propect has opted in to receive your information. Failing that, you should not send them anything, ever.
Sales Executive at CopyAmerica
21 February 2008 18:10pm
Thank you for input. The prospective clients are all hand picked by me and are all firms that regularly use the services that our business provides. Consequently, I felt that sending e-mails, perhaps after a direct mail package would be appropriate.
E-Commerce Marketing Manager EMEA at Micron (www.crucial.com)
21 February 2008 18:14pm
The problem is that, if these companies have not agreed to receive email contacts from you directly or through a third company, your email would be an unsollicited email. In that case I'm afraid that you should not contact them, it would be seen as SPAM.
On 18:10:04 21 February 2008 GordonSF wrote:
Internet Marketing Manager at Optimised Media
22 February 2008 11:25am
Surely email is better than cold calling though? Anyone have a better way of contacting prospects?
Kaya, Optimised Media
SEO London & PPC Bid Management
E-Commerce Marketing Manager EMEA at Micron (www.crucial.com)
22 February 2008 11:34am
I feel a bit like the party crasher here and I'm really sorry about that. However, to answer the original question : ''Is it an acceptable business practice to E-mail prospective corporate clients regarding our business services in the hope of obtaining new clients?'' If this email is unsollicited, it is not really acceptable.
There is an interesting article here:
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/itmanagement/0,1000000308,39151082,00.htm
"Unsolicited bulk commercial email is not a workable marketing tool whether directed at personal or business email addresses because of the ease with which the mechanism can be abused. Legitimate businesses in the UK cannot anyway send unsolicited bulk email as it is banned by all the major ISPs in this country under their terms of use," said Allan. "We should now extend the ban on spam to include business email addresses and explain to businesses that the effective way to conduct marketing over the Internet is to develop targeted permission-based strategies."
Cheers.
Director at LiaiseOnline Limited
24 February 2008 18:02pm
As far as I am aware it is perfectly legal to send emails to people in corporates from opt-in lists... but it is a complete waste of time.
The law applies to sole traders or individuals... you can't spam them.
If asked, I always recommended "smiling and dialing" but then I enjoy cold calling... most people would rather slit their wrists!
Reflect on how you yourself view emails that haven't been invited, landing in your inbox. It used to really push my buttons until I discovered Outlook Anywhere, they have reduced my 2000 email a day inbox down to 100 or so real ones.
Before sending emails to anyone you should always ask permission in person (or phone) as they are then expecting it. So they open it and you get on their "white list". You can then call them later to discuss or send them emails at a reasonable frequency that keep you in their mind for when the moment is right.
We all get hit by thousands of message every single day and are starting to view them all as white noise... this is not based on scientific research, just my instinct... and I was selling email marketing back in 2001 when most buyers were too scared to step forward and "gamble" on email, preferring postal mailshots at 10x the required email budget!!
Today is all about being in view when people are actually searching... when they have a need... when the pain is acute... what they gunna do... they're going to use their favourite search engine.... and you'd better be in the top 5 for a logical key word search.
Get out and network in real time... then phone people up after and talk for more than 30 seconds... support this with a newsletter but make sure you get opt-in... a conversation doesn't mean they have opted in... ask the question. Leave to simmer for months... they may call when they have pain...
Invest your money in search engine marketing... and pick someone who is actually achieving results... all that glitters is not gold!
(Sorry for going on a bit but hey, I'm in the zone!)