A fantastic marketing idea!!

[freecybermag]

OK so just came up with a great idea. Should be fool proof (says I).

Heres what we do.

I will write a general e-mail to 10 of my friends and put a 2-3 line sentence in there mentioning your site and you must reciprocate. To make sure you have sent to 10 friends you must add me in your BCC field and I will do likewise.

Now hopfully I will start a list of interested people below. You must reply to this post and then if someone else is interested they can PM you (but they must have posted their names as interested people so we can get a list going).

Sounds like a good idea???

Let me know what you think?

Chris

[freecybermag]

Here's mine.

I'm interested in writing to 10 friends.


Chris

[TechFox]

Sounds interesting

[Jayne]

Is it like chain mail type of thing?

Would it be classed as spam?

Jayne :D

[fridayteam]

I always delete these kinds of emails, even when they are from close friends.

It's not that I don't have 10 friends :-) but I am always too busy to choose which 10, reformat the email from all the >>>>> that appear, add my name to the list or whatever is requested.

I think it would be spam, myself. Unless it was a one off thing, say between UKBF members.

[freecybermag]

It's not really spam but more of a personal recommendation.

for example my e-amil would be written something like this:

"Hi guys

Sorry not written for so long but have been very busy at the moment. I have been out christmas shopping and spent a bloody fortune. Dave I have got your present and will send it first class on monday and Sue I will get your tomorrow. What did you want again?? You know I have a memeory like a seive. For everyone else I will try and buy something small over the weekend. Hope everyone is ok anyway.

Just to let you all know that I came across a site called www.yoursite.com and thought they offered some great present. I bought a few things from there already and received them all in tact. Was well impressed with the service.

Anyway people I will speak to you all soon.

Take care

Chris"

There you go that's the sort of thing that I was aiming for. Obviously you would have to do it your way and send the link to friends that are open minded about these sort of things and might be interested. If you can't find 10 then maybe you can come to some arrangement with the person that you are swapping with.

If 10 people on here said they are up for it that makes potentailly 100 personal recommendations for your site and as you know personal recommendations are the best form of advertising.

Also I am not saying you have to send 10 mails to the same friends. Mix em up a bit and also if a person contacts you asking to swap and you don't like their product then you don't have to do it. Just tell the politely NO.

Hope this clarifies things up a wee little. :D

Chris

[freecybermag]

Damn

There is an actual site called yoursite.com

Didn't realise that lol. They just got free advertising lol :lol:

Chris

[bci]

I wouldn't like to do that to my friends - would you accept 10 people I met down the pub/people who spammed me?

[freecybermag]

No

Beside I honestly don't see how personal recommendation is spamming.

I think many people don't fully understand what Spamming is. Now-a-days and mention of a web site is classed as Spam and people treat it like a disease.

I class spam like the e-mails you get from Pharmaceutical companies, Natwest asking to verify your details, someone saying they are a millionaire and need help with transfering money, not when a friends says to me I bought something from a site and found it good. I don't think that is spamming.

Cheers

Chris

[bci]

<<<<<
Natwest asking to verify your details
<<<<<
You know that these emails are not from NatWest?
I'm sure you do but just in case ..... don't click on them!

[bci]

<<<<
Beside I honestly don't see how personal recommendation is spamming.
<<<<<
... but it isn't honest personal recommendation, is it? You have a "you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" hidden agenda!

[Whistle Ink]

Unless I absolutley believed in the other persons product / service and it was relevant to the friend that I'm sending it to (really relevant - like sending a website about rubber bands to a rubber band fanatic) - I wouldn't really send them anthing about a business.

When even friends send me spam and 'send this to a million ppl things before it rains' I just delete it.

Wouldnt it be better to send an actual ad and let your friend hate the company rather than them hate you for sending it?

[freecybermag]

I think this has gone the complete wrong way of what I was aiming for :D

There are a few companies on here that I like and out of my 80 or so friends list I am sure I can nominate 10 people that I feel would also like to be told about the business. But if I am recommending your site why can't you recommend mine.
I'm not saying that out of the list I tried to create that you had to promote everyone to your friends. You can pick and choose. For example if I saw a web developer wishing to recommend friends I wouldn't ask them to exchange with me as my friends are not into creating web sites etc but if I saw a games company on here I would ask to exchange with them as my friends are into that sort of thing.
I get sent links by my friends all the time and I have never got in a strop with them or even resulted in not talking to them. Friendship is stronger than getting upset about a link and beside I wrote an example of what sort of e-mail to be sent earlier and you can see that I wrote a 2 line recommendation about you at the bottom of an e-mail. You're friends shouldn't really get upset about that should they?

Chris

[Whistle Ink]

Maybe hate was too strong a word. If my friend said I am thinking of getting an ipod and someone on here had a mp3 shop, I would them mention the business to the them. And even then only if I liked that business person and thought that they would offer a good service, looked professional. If someone had a run down site that didn't give me any confidence in them - I wouldn't even bother.

The quality of the site you are reccomending / promoting is just as important - not just the fact that they do a relevant product. :D :D

[freecybermag]

I totally agree and that's why you should pick and choose.

Again I am not saying you must send e-mails to your friends of sites that are not worth the mention but some sites on here are.

I have just exchanged with somebody that sent me a PM saying they are up for it. The person in question has a good site and so out of my address list I chose 10 people who might be interested. I wrote them an e-mail about what I am up to now. When is said Bye all, Chris I then wrote a P.S. Saying "I came across this site that some of you might be interested in www."person in question site".com

That's all I wrote

It might not get any results for the person in question but then again it might.

:D

Chris

[bci]

<<<
There are a few companies on here that I like and out of my 80 or so friends list I am sure I can nominate 10 people that I feel would also like to be told about the business. But if I am recommending your site why can't you recommend mine.
I'm not saying that out of the list I tried to create that you had to promote everyone to your friends. You can pick and choose. For example if I saw a web developer wishing to recommend friends I wouldn't ask them to exchange with me as my friends are not into creating web sites etc but if I saw a games company on here I would ask to exchange with them as my friends are into that sort of thing.

<<<
I think this is all very "old world" marketing - it takes too much time to deliver any significant ROI. And at too small a scale to make any difference.

Personally, I would rather set up a workable Adword campaign. It takes less time, is scalable and therefore cheaper overall.

[JustOneUK]

If i am not mistaken this method is known as Viral Advertising, and is frowned upon.
Spam is spam, no matter what recipe you use it with :shock:

[freecybermag]

OK so lets Scrap this idea.