Forum Moderators: martinibuster
Jon
I cant see this should be a problem as long as your providers only issue is with commercial and unsolicited emails rather than a server/bandwidth.
Hosts are so concerned with being reported for spam nowadays. You only have to have spam cop receive a complaint that then reports it on to your host. They don't want their servers blocked so they seem to send you a threatening email.
I had a host get iffy when a customer reported me for spamming them. I only sent them an email asking them what they wanted me to do with their company data file they sent me that was stored on my hard drive.
Jon
I know I get so many hundreds of link requests, especially from the scum programs link zeus and link-builder and other junk, that I have set up rules to just permanently delete them.
We explained to our web host what we were doing. They simply suggested to us that next time, we should put a disclaimer in the email that this is a one-time mailing only and that they are not placed in any mailing list.
But that incident surely killed our enthusiasm for link exchange. You never know what nuthead would receive your email. Now, given that our sites are pretty much established (6-8 years old), we simply wait for others to contact us and don't bother sending out link requests anymore. We also have an Add URL form that can be used by those who wish to exchange links with us.
There is always risk that people will complain however a clearly manually written letter with some specific details about company in question (so that its clear email was not generated automatically) should work okay and no reasonable host would ban you if they get just one complaint. Most spammers never leave real return addresses anyway.
If your host minds that then take your business elsewhere - its not like hosting is something unique.
if that was the case then no legitimate business contacts would occur
That's where the "pre-existing business relationship" part comes in.
p.s. They put their email address on their sites to serve customers and future customers.
p.s. They put their email address on their sites to serve customers and future customers
Pre-existing generally applies to customers only, if that was the requirement for new business contact then business would have stopped. If I come across some company that sell Widgets A and I happen to be manufacturer of Widgets B that are a lot better and cheapr then what they sell, then its perfectly legitimate to give them a call and discuss it.
Note that there is a thin line between cold calling and normal business call - personally I draw the distinction from the amount of calls that are being made with the same proposal - anything above reasonable level of X calls and/or Y emails is cold calling and/or spam.
X and Y are certainly greater than 2 or 3, or even 5.
If I come across some company that sell Widgets A and I happen to be manufacturer of Widgets B that are a lot better and cheapr then what they sell, then its perfectly legitimate to give them a call and discuss it.
Call, yes. Email, no.
Note that there is a thin line between cold calling and normal business call - personally I draw the distinction from the amount of calls that are being made with the same proposal - anything above reasonable level of X calls and/or Y emails is cold calling and/or spam.
How about 100 calls/day from 100 different people? Would that be acceptable?
How about 100 calls/day from 100 different people? Would that be acceptable?
Well if they all made me money, or even 50% of them to make it worthwhile - then hell, yeah! People ignored banners, but they are okay with PPC not because its text but because its relevant to what they look for.
There is spam, and there is legit communication - call or email. Personally I prefer to receive emails rather than calls as its in writing and I have time to think my reply over.
Sending an odd email to business site that had this email on "contact us" page, which is likely to be sales@company.com, is perfectly fine in my book.
You might only send three emails in a month, but if your messages happen to be too similar to 300 emails that the recipients have already trashed this week, your emails might well feel like spam to the receivers. They might trigger complaints for that reason even though your own campaign is a textbook-perfect example of best practices by any reasonable definition.
Be careful out there.
There is spam, and there is legit communication - call or email. Personally I prefer to receive emails rather than calls as its in writing and I have time to think my reply over.
Yes, but the problem is that people are sending link request emails that are nothing more than spam. A salesperson calling you at your business thinks he has a legitimate reason to do so. 99 others do, too. The net effect is 100 sales calls.
Sending an odd email to business site that had this email on "contact us" page, which is likely to be sales@company.com, is perfectly fine in my book.
The question was about hosts, not your personal opinion.
They got a notice from spamcop.net saying I was sending spam email. The emails I sent said, "Have a look at [link to website]. It has some neat projects for homeschoolers." The site really does have neat stuff for kids to make and it doesn't even sell anything. The emails were sent to homeschool organizations around the country.
I explained this to my hosting company. Their response was ...
What you did was an unsolicited e-mail advertisement, the very definition of spam. It might not have been about Viagra or sent in massive amounts, but it was still spam. Please don't send messages like that, people will complain and we'll have to yell at you about it, even if your intentions were innocent. Its just a very sensitive subject for folks anymore.
I won't be emailing people about my worthwhile sites anymore.
If so, how do you manage to send out reciprocal link email requests and not get banned?
Get a reasonable hosting company. You know, one that gives their customer the benefit of the doubt instead of a bunch of raving loonies?
The question was about hosts, not your personal opinion.
I said that above - get host that does not freak out at odd email send by hand to relevant people. There is no shortage of hosting companies around and there should be enough of those whose opinion in regards to what is and what is not spam is inline with mine - before signing up to new hosting just ask that question and if given positive answer in writing (don't call them!) keep it for future reference.
Go ahead and email requests and if you get a warning you can then stop and change hosts if you want. My host has been great in every other way so I'll be staying with them. I've finished emailing for links anyway. Glad to be done with it.
get host that does not freak out at odd email send by hand to relevant people
I think you're not understanding what I'm saying.
You think it's OK for you to send one link request. What if 100 peopleor 1,000 people think it's OK to send a link request? That's what I'm getting at.
I explained this to my hosting company. Their response was ...What you did was an unsolicited e-mail advertisement, the very definition of spam. It might not have been about Viagra or sent in massive amounts, but it was still spam. Please don't send messages like that, people will complain and we'll have to yell at you about it, even if your intentions were innocent. Its just a very sensitive subject for folks anymore.
I won't be emailing people about my worthwhile sites anymore.
They are correct. This is spam.
What if 100 peopleor 1,000 people think it's OK to send a link request? That's what I'm getting at.
If 100 or 1000 people each sent one well written, well targeted link suggestion, that would be a significant improvement over the random bombardment that most of us presently endure!
You think it's OK for you to send one link request.
I think its okay for a business to contact other business by email or phone shown on "contact us" page with a legitimate proposal that is highly likely to be of interest to both parties. It is also perfectly legal thing to do in the UK (explicitly mentioned in recent Electronic Communications directive). Running automated process to send identical emails to or hire cold calling company to do all that en masse is not okay as these tend to be too generic and thus smelling of spam.
What if everyone started handwriting personalised and relevant emails about mutually beneficial things for both businesses? Well, perhaps the world would become a better place if people started talking to each other. Its bad enough spammers can do what they want regardless of what anti-spam people think, but cracking down on legitimate people who just want to establish business relationship without massmailing is totally wrong IMO.
Personally I'd never email to ask for link exchange but I am totally going to mail relevant business that might present mutually beneficial opportunities by (say) bundling my software that complements theirs. If my hosts minds about that then I will tell them where to go.
Or, what if you had your own dedicated server hosting several of your own accounts? You make the rules then, right?
The only problem I see is if you then want to move your site back to your regular hosting company after the recip linking campaign...
I've read about nightmares people experienced when moving their sites, mentioning that Google and Yahoo suck at updating DNS records for websites. So essentially your rankings would plummet for a month or so, or in the case of Yahoo (I read somewhere) they might be gone forever.
I'm almost ready to start the recip campaign myself so anybody else have some good advice/experience on this issue?
Or, do they block your IP address?
Just for a day, 2 at the most
I debated with them in a furious exchange of email going back and forth up to 3 am as to why business communication is spam. One example I cited -- if a company such as Microsoft emails you offering a legitimate business proposition such as asking if you are interested in selling your site to them -- SpamCop would still consider that a spam if you are not expecting the company to email you in the first place. So how much more for link exchange requests! These people have blinders on.
But can spamcop put you in a blacklist somewhere?
Spam cop is not the easiest group to reason with.
No ****.
We occasionally wind up on SpamCop's email BL because we host a lot of local bands for free that tend to get email signups at shows then email show reminders out. Some idiot will inevitably sign their name to a guest list (I have copies of them) and then forget that they did, and report the band's announcements newsletters as spam.
Then, two days later, we'll try to send a client mail. They won't get it, and we'll track it back to a SpamCop installation that some over-zealous network engineer(1) decided to enable.
Usually, after I explain to the CMO or CEO how the SpamCop system works, it's removed within days and the IT person that thought it was a good idea is usually reprimanded.
(1) I can say things like this because I am a reformed over-zealous network engineer.
