Adding to Your Mailing List: Ask BEFORE You Add!

Your mailing list of e-mail addresses that you use to send mass e-mails has to be managed carefully, respectfully and with courtesy.

Because you communicate briefly with a new acquaintance on a forum doesn’t mean you automatically add them to your business promotional e-mail list. New contacts met at a business function are not to be automatically added to your e-mail blasts either. The only reason to add these new contact’s to your list is if you specifically discussed the topic of doing so and they showed interest.

Simply because you communicate with someone once or twice doesn’t mean they should be added to your group mailing list. That makes you a spammer! Then, add insult to injury by putting their address in the To: field with all the other folks you know but they don’t and you’ve just shown a complete lack of consideration for their privacy. You need to use the BCc: field when e-mailing a group of onliners so you don’t expose their addresses to strangers.

Never assume that someone you just met will automatically want to receive mass e-mails from you about your business or anything else for that matter. If a person doesn’t specifically give you permission to be added to your mailings, you should not add them — period.

When it comes to forming new relationships and long term business partnerships, sending mass e-mails to someone new can cause them to distance themselves from you moving forward. In business, adding new contacts to your e-mail blasts, newsletters or e-zines without their specific permission to do so can cause them to decide to not do business with you. You’ll know this to be the case when you receive their unsubscribe request shortly after they receive your mailing.

Ask before you add!

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