Have You Ever Thought Of Bulk Email Marketing? Read this first...

Preface:
The opinions expressed here are mine and no one elses's. They are not legal opinions they are personal opinions. I'm posting this because I think a lot of people get fooled by ads stating "fortune and wealth through bulk emailing can be yours" , and "you won't get caught!" - False claims are rampant by web sites offering bulk email software and services. The following is a report I completed recently for my subscribers after 10 days of research to see if these spammers claims had any validity.

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Bulk email marketing is not illegal...

...what is illegal in many states (especially California) is the sending of bulk email that's unsolicted or UCE (sometimes called SPAM).

Is it really as bad as they say?

Is it legal?

Is it just plain wrong?

What's the argument in favor of bulk email marketing?

What's the REAL story?

If you're even thinking about it, you'd better know this first...

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For the past 10 days I have immersed my self in the underbelly of the Internet... that slimy, scum laden part that deals with SPAM.

It feels good to get out of that darkness and back to a 'normal' existence.

This SPECIAL REPORT is the results of what I found.

Also, this report is not very objective. In other words, these are my opinions only after exhaustive research, but still just my opinions.

First let me preface the rest of this report by saying that I have never engaged in bulk email to unsolicited recipients, UCE or spam and do not intend to, ever. I also do not advocate SPAM or UCE, however, I DO advocate freedom of speech (which is NOT a contradiction!).

You'll see why in a moment.

You have them in your email box almost every day.

Bulk email, totally unsolicited (you never asked for information on 'hot sex', right?) email is rampant on the Internet.

It really is an issue and a problem for many people. Or is it?

The arguments against it include:

1. It takes up important bandwidth for legitimate Internet uses.

2. It costs ISP's money for the extra bandwidth they deliver through their networks to email recipients. This causes them to raise rates to end users to pay for it.

3. It's just plain wrong to send something to someone who didn't request it.

There are other arguments but these pretty much summarize the argument from two different viewpoints:

1. Money
2. Ethics

The money issue, I understand. it drains bandwidth and costs everyone more to conduct business online.

The ethics issue is also something I understand, because there is a problem with the messages being sent. They are mostly 'sex' related and 'quick' money making schemes. And even though I personally object to them as an adult, even worse, is that many of the recipients of these messages are children.

After all, how does a spammer know that '[email protected]' belongs to an adult or a child?

He doesn't, and that's where it gets to be a real problem.

OK. So there are two very good arguments AGAINST the use of UCE. Money and ethics.

Both are valid no matter what your personal opinion is.

Are there any arguments in favor of the use of UCE?

Well the biggest one is 'freedom of speech'.

I'm not going to argue the US constitution here, even if I were qualified to do so (I'm not).

I believe everyone has the right to free speech... as a basic human right - no matter where in the world you live...BUT not an someone else's expense.

In other words, the BURDEN of delivering your 'speech' is squarely on your shoulders and if you're sending UCE YOU should pay for it's delivery.

In many cases people who receive UCE end up paying for it. How? Well if they have a dial-up connection they pay by the minute. If they are using a hand-held device they may pay by the message, etc.

They also pay by the amount of time that's wasted reading and deleting these messages.

Let's take a quick look at who's REALLY profiting from UCE or SPAM.

During my research into spam, I found a number of web sites that sell 'bulk email' software, 'email extraction' programs, etc.

Without getting into the technical details I used a number of resources including NSLookup, whois, whois view (which traces IP's back to the 'block' level and who owns them), etc.

What I found was that the SPAM business is incredibly incestuous.

Here's how they break down:

1. Software vendors

2. Service vendors

3. Hosting and domain registration companies

The bulk email software that many people claim protects you from being 'discovered' by your ISP is practically worthless.

I have tested almost all of them (by sending emails to myself! not anyone else, just for the record). In each case I was able to retrieve MY IP from the headers of each message and detect my ISP.

Software such as, Stealth Mailer, Floodgate, Desktop Server IV, BulkMate, Phasm3000, etc are pretty much useless for protecting yourself from getting caught if you're sending SPAM. Each one makes different claims, but NONE protected the detection of my IP or my Internet service provider.

[b]And that's where you really get in trouble when sending bulk emails. Almost anyone can track your IP address (the address you are assigned by your ISP when connected to the Internet).[b]

Once someone has your IP it's a simple matter to find out who your Internet service Provider is and have your account shut down.

I can't even imagine the harm this has done to thousands of unsuspecting 'bulk email' wannabees who have purchased this junk and been fooled by these claims.

Second in line are the service providers of junk email. These providers are slick. Really slick.

In some cases they will provide you with desktop software that 'demonstrates' that they really can send UCE from your desktop without revealing your IP addresss.

One of the most interesting of the bunch is a company called send^-^safe.com. Their software is, well, very good in a SPAM sort of way. In the emails that I sent to myself, as a test of their system, I could not trace a single one BACK to my IP.

The problem is that they use someone else's Internet connection and an 'open-relay' on their computer to connect and send the email. This means that when you use their software you are essentially 'hacking' another persons connection and using their bandwidth to send junk email.

And even though they constantly rotate the 'open relay' connections, if the person on the relaying end is monitoring the ports his computer they will see your IP trying to make the connections. (NOTE: ZoneAlarm and SyGate have logs that will show you where your outgoing and incoming port connections are coming from and going to in real time. You can set your options to save these logs to see if anyone is using your computer to relay email. You can also get several products that monitor your ports so you can actually see in real time what's happening on the ports on your computer).

Besides being ethically wrong, it's dangerous and possibly (probably?) illegal. But this method 'fools' a lot of people who want to take the easy way to Internet marketing.

Other companies that provide this kind of service is ghostsender.net and emailking.com.

Finally, there are the 'bulk email friendly' hosting companies and registrars.

Some of them include (for infomation purposes only):

1tips.net/bulkhosting.htm

bulletproofwebhosting.info/home1.html

iomegaone.com/index_copy.html

emailsending.com/home.htm

mybulkserver.com/

Some of these services allow you to send an unlimited amount of bulk email through their servers, but at a price.

The lowest cost hosting plan was $499 a month plus set-up fees. The highest was $3,000 up front and $500 per week.

Even if you did utilize their services, how are you going to profit from them? What email address will you use for responses (remember it can be tracked!)? What payment options can you use?- NONE! Believe me getting the email out is only ONE of the problems you'll be faced with. So don't even try.

What's interesting was that many of these 'services' had domain and/or nameservers that were the same as the companies who were selling the 'desktop software' mentioned above.

A coincidence?

I don't think so.

This is where it gets incestuous. I believe that these companies also have developed many of the other 'bulk email' solutions offered on the net. If they can't get you one way, they will another way. My belief is based on the fact that several sites selling the bulk email software displyed telephone numbers that were the SAME as the telphone numbers on other sites selling the bulk email hosting solutions. In addition, many of them are using the same domain regisrars and name servers.

Some of them can be traced back to one domain registration company, gandi.net. And many of them are hiding their true US roots by opening accounts with free email services through host.ru, inbox.ru (a host.ru company) and several other Eastern European companies.

Two companies, one based in Anguilla called "Guardster" (http://www.guardster.com/index.html) and the other, "Anonymizer" based in London (http://www.anonymize.net/) allow you complete privacy by connecting you to their "virtual private network" to hide your IP for web surfing and email. Although their Terms of Service state they strictly prohibit the use of their service for SPAM, they also say they do not keep records of their users email habits.

I hope I've stated the case clearly: Don't use bulk email! Not only is it ethically wrong, it's legally dangerous.

So if you ever thought you'd 'give it a try', please don't. You will be sorry.

One last point:

An ad claiming to 'tell all' about the bulk email business and how it's done is advertised here:

http://www.didj.lu/spam/9thejerk.htm

Don't let the first few lines fool you. Keep reading, it's actually an ad for a book called, "Guide To The Professional Bulk Email Business".

According to the ad, "the author has 8 years of Bulk Email Advertising experience".

If he's that good how come he got caught?

Yes, he got caught!

Here's the Action filed against the company promoting this book (it includes an exact duplicate of the ad above as evidence), PW Marketing, LLC, in the Superior Court of the County of Santa Clara, CA.

http://www.wealthbreakthroughs.com/sue_spammers.pdf

(Right click and select 'save target as")

Don't 'dabble', don't 'try it' don't even think about using unsolicted bulk email marketing. I guarantee you'll get caught, and it's wrong.

If you're interested in ways to market your online business the right way, take a look at Stephen Pierce's new book, UNDER OATH: The Whole Truth About Internet Marketing.

Just my opinion....

Be blessed.

-Dave

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UNDER OATH: The Truth and Nothing But The Truth About Internet Marketing