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October 31, 2005
Unsubscribes - a good or bad thing?
Today I sent out a promotion for one of my products to my ezine list. Got a handful of unsubscribes within the first hour.
It happens every time.
Is this good or bad if you publish an ezine? You may be surprised to learn that I look at it as a very good thing. You see, anyone with any common sense knows that an ezine has to be paid for some way - either through advertising or selling products. So if someone is sooooo offended when they receive a promotion that they unsubscribe, they are really telling me they would never be a qualified customer anyway.
Bottom line, I'd rather have 5,000 qualified subscribers than 50,000 "tire kickers".
One interesting point, though. Let's say you're a cheapskate who never wants to pay a cent for anything and only wants whatever you can get for free. If you were truly a student of direct marketing, you'd do yourself a greater favor by remaining on the ezine list and studying the promotions - often that's where the best lessons are to be found!
Your opinion?
Posted by Bob Serling at October 31, 2005 07:33 AM
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Comments
Bob, I totally agree with your point about having a small but qualified list. I once tried selling some information products on the web and built up a subscriber list of 500. Not one of them ever bought a damn thing.
Since switching my website to copywriting only I'm a lot fussier about who I let subscribe to my ezine. I've banned Yahoo and Hotmail accounts from subscribing because of the amount of bounce backs I get. I encourage potential subscribers to use their business email. I now get very few unsubscribes.
Posted by: David Coyne ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.directmarketinginsider.com/blog/nav-commenters.gif)
at November 1, 2005 09:42 AM
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