domains Outbound = Spamming (Really???)

[equity78]

It seems like some domain investors continue to see outbound marketing as spam. It's a complicated topic: Outbound marketing needs to be done properly, making sure it does not violate the […]

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[alcy]

u guys know that a good 50% of names domainers spam us with are not even regged yet...next time check...happened to me ton of times..

check for fun..do not reg of course. they are not even worth the regfee.. let alone the 100s they ask for lol

 

[LUP]

The number one thing a domain investor should avoid is marketing to other domain investors.

Even on NamePros, i got warning from Mods
i just sent pm to another member about my domain is for sale, and he report me.
even though I only do outbound, the knowledge I got from here

 

[equity78]

CASL is a new anti-spam law that will apply to all electronic messages (i.e. email, texts) organizations send in connection with a “commercial activity.” Its key feature requires Canadian and global organizations that send commercial electronic messages (CEMs) within, from or to Canada to receive consent from recipients before sending messages.

I have read about CASL I think I did an article awhile back on don't send anything to Canadians unsolicited. You need to know the rules. Look I never had the time to outbound. But I hear complaints from 100's of people a year about no sales and what can I do? Don't spam, but find 1 or 2 names and try to contact a few prospects that make sense. Do it the right way and you need a thick skin like @karmaco said most don't like to be contacted.

 

[equity78]

Yes people are sold to every day and 90 percent of it is ignored when its unsolicited. Commercials muted, ads blocked, emails marked as spam and never read, callers blocked.

Since we are “loathed” we need to be even more cautious in what we present. Look if it works for some good for them but I don’t see only outbounding domains as sustainable. It puts you in the weaker position automatically IF you get your foot in the door -and thats a big IF. You also risk being blacklisted for being a spammer.

The other domainers,I get and am sure most get daily emails from desperados trying to sell a similar name. But in reality, we all market to other domainers with larger wallets than us (whether we know it or not) so I don’t really agree with the statement entirely.

I agree only outbounding is not sustainable, I think to be honest for many domaining is not sustainable, a lot of people don't own good, sellable domain names.

As far as other domainers I am talking about emailing them, I don't think most do that. If you offer them here sure there are people looking or there are domainers that look at Sedo or Afternic. But I would not send emails to Andrew Rosener hey you own the .com would you like the .co?

 

[equity78]

I sent you the details plz keep privacy thanks

Thank you of course I never publish or discuss anything someone sends me in private, I am sitting on two $1million sales.

I re read what you wrote and I see that you just helped out, you did not try to sell them anything so yes I think that's cool. I have done that with people I know, and they have always been nice, no one sending $500 hahahaha.

 

[equity78]

Even on NamePros, i got warning from Mods
i just sent pm to another member about my domain is for sale, and he report me.
even though I only do outbound, the knowledge I got from here

Well that happens all the time like @karmaco said people don't want to be sold to, Namepros considers that spam.

 

[King]

More like unsolicited but still spam. Either way, inbounds are always better as you have more leverage.

 

[NickB]

Why is it that people have a problem with outbound? I have been doing it in other fields for years and very very rarely get an F off or any aggressive replies.....even when I dabbled at it with domains this was the case

Most people really must be sending out awful emails, crap domains and just hoping for the best......

If done right the worst you should get is being ignored or a reply saying remove me from your mailing list, maybe a polite no thanks and if your lucky a reply asking how much or the jackpot is them hitting the BIN on your lander........

If your getting really bad response you need to take at long hard look at how your going about things......

I get emails from people trying to sell me their domains and they are using a personal email address - I mean WTF - how is anyone going to take you seriously if you do this?

Also there is no social proof - no professional signature with a LinkedIn profile, no contact phone number, a lot of the time not even their full name.....

The more information you provide that is verifiable, the more trustworthy you come across - especially when you are not speaking to that person and building a relationship with them

 

[kite26]

Only a small percentage of people, around 1% or less, gives aggressive answers. The rest ignores, replies positively or negatively. So, I think that I am doing it well. I agree, outbound must be done properly. If not, can be dangerous.

 

[dirk]

The Definition of Spam
Associated Documents

Consumer Protection

Email Marketing FAQs

Mailers -v- Spammers

Glossary
The word "Spam" as applied to Email means "Unsolicited Bulk Email".

Unsolicited means that the Recipient has not granted verifiable permission for the message to be sent. Bulk means that the message is sent as part of a larger collection of messages, all having substantively identical content.
A message is Spam only if it is both Unsolicited and Bulk.

• Unsolicited Email is normal email
  (examples: first contact enquiries, job enquiries, sales enquiries)
  
  
• Bulk Email is normal email
  (examples: subscriber newsletters, customer communications, discussion lists)

Technical Definition of Spam

An electronic message is "spam" if (A) the recipient's personal identity and context are irrelevant because the message is equally applicable to many other potential recipients; AND (B) the recipient has not verifiably granted deliberate, explicit, and still-revocable permission for it to be sent.


Understanding the Spam Issue

Spam is an issue about consent, not content. Whether the Unsolicited Bulk Email ("UBE") message is an advert, a scam, porn, a begging letter or an offer of a free lunch, the content is irrelevant - if the message was sent unsolicited and in bulk then the message is spam.

Spam is not a sub-set of UBE, it is not "UBE that is also a scam or that doesn't contain an unsubscribe link". All email sent unsolicited and in bulk is Spam.

This distinction is important because legislators spend inordinate amounts of time attempting to regulate the content of spam messages, and in doing so come up against free speech issues, without realizing that the spam issue is solely about consent.

Various jurisdictions have implemented legislation to control what they call "spam". One particular example is US S.877 (CAN-SPAM Act 2004). Each law addresses "spam" in different ways, and as a consequence, often has different definitions of what they cover, whether they call it "spam" or not. Spamhaus uses the industry standard definition "Unsolicited Bulk Email" which underlines that "it's not about content, it's about consent". As such, arguments as to whether Unsolicited Bulk Email messages are covered under CAN-SPAM or are compliant with CAN-SPAM, are entirely irrelevant.

Important facts about Unsolicited Bulk Email:

(1) The sending of Unsolicited Bulk Email ("UBE") is banned by all Internet service providers worldwide.

(2) Spamhaus's anti-spam blocklist, the SBL, used by more than 3 Billion Internet users, is based on the internationally-accepted definition of Spam as "Unsolicited Bulk Email". Therefore anyone sending UBE on the Internet, regardless of whether the content is commercial or not, illegal or not, is a sender of spam - and thus a spammer. All senders of UBE need to be fully aware that (A) they are breaking their ISP's Terms of Business contracts and they will lose their Internet accounts and access if they send UBE and (B) they will be placed on the Spamhaus Block List (SBL) if they send UBE.

https://www.spamhaus.org/consumer/definition/

So yeah. That puts 99,99% of domainers involved in outbound in the spammmer category.

Good writeup on your site though. One thing you didn't cover is regarding this:

Unsolicited means that the Recipient has not granted verifiable permission for the message to be sent.

How to overcome this? It's hardly ( n )ever being discussed. There are ways. Ways to make it work and follow the definition of solicited email.

It's doable to do outbound following the rules/law. It's easier neglecting the quote mentioned, way easier actually. You will sell. You will be fine 99% of the time. But... You will still be spamming.

 

[equity78]

So yeah. That puts 99,99% of domainers involved in outbound in the spammmer category.

Good writeup on your site though. One thing you didn't cover is regarding this:



How to overcome this? It's hardly ( n )ever being discussed. There are ways. Ways to make it work and follow the definition of solicited email.

It's doable to do outbound following the rules/law. It's easier neglecting the quote mentioned, way easier actually. You will sell. You will be fine 99% of the time. But... You will still be spamming.

Thanks for the reply, I think with the SpamHaus definition it says it also must be bulk.

So if you owned and operated on NameDeck.net and I acquired the .com. I would only send an email to you if I did outbound (I don't).

It would meet all the CAN-Spam requirements, and you may say screw off but I would not have spammed you. The law is what matters imo. People saying I did not want an email so it's spam is not true in the eyes of the law.

 

[dirk]

Thanks for the reply, I think with the SpamHaus definition it says it also must be bulk.

So if you owned and operated on NameDeck.net and I acquired the .com. I would only send an email to you if I did outbound (I don't).

It would meet all the CAN-Spam requirements, and you may say screw off but I would not have spammed you. The law is what matters imo. People saying I did not want an email so it's spam is not true in the eyes of the law.

People should take note of this. This is how it should be done. That's professional, following CAN-spam and industry regulation of whats concidered to be spam. Great addition!

byw, thanks for reminding me I missed out on the .com when it dropped

 

[biggie]

Hi

to me, using the term outbound, is like "putting lipstick on a pig" in effort to "legitimize" the sending of unsolicited emails.

the practice has gotten out of hand
and it seems every newbie that joins, asks the same question and gets the same answer

how do i contact end-users?
send them an email.

now, in between those two lines, should be all the intricate details, including what to do and what not, to do.

but, how many are really interested in details?
1. they go check appraisal value,
2. then go register,
3 then start sending emails.....majority of which are for domains that are still under 60 day lock.

meanwhile, those who give advice on how to send solicitations, rarely, if ever, ask ...
"what domain are you trying to sell and who are your prospects"?

simple questions like that, can at least, reduce the crap that goes out to these unsuspecting victims who are about to receive an email from someone, who prolly can't even write a complete thought that is grammatically correct.

just saying,

if you take examples of how some write their questions or replies here, sometimes you can barely understand wtf they are trying to say.....
and in that case, what makes you think the emails they send, will be understood as intended?

why should we care?
because it's reflection of who domainers are.
bad enough domain holders have to get over the "domain squatters" label, hump,
and now ya'll spamming too!

hopefully though, all that doesn't sound cruel, but i read what you write, and if you got to spam, at least learn the fundamentals, first.
then, even if the recipients don't buy your name, they still may be impressed with the correspondence.
and maybe, if all the spammers followed suit, then at least the outside world would see that, hey, some of these spammers can write nice solicitations.

puff, puff...ahh

imo...

 

[bmugford]

It depends. There is certainly a point where outbound crosses over into blatant spamming.

When people are pitching endless garbage domains, in an indiscriminate manner, often sending many unsolicited follow-up emails to the same potential buyer, often with fake contact information from a disposable email address....At some point it crosses from something reasonable to blatant spam.

Brad

 

[kite26]

It depends. There is certainly a point where outbound crosses over into blatant spamming.

When people are pitching endless garbage domains, in an indiscriminate manner, often sending many unsolicited follow-up emails to the same potential buyer....At some point it crosses from something reasonable to blatant spam.

Brad

+1 It's a grey zone. Sometimes black, sometimes white. It's up to you to keep it white.

 

[oldtimer]

The less than one percent or so of the recipients who might end up buying a domain that was presented to them through outbound might actually be happy that they received an email that let them know a domain that they could use was available for sale, but this could be a big turn off to the other 99% of the recipients who received such emails and so there could be a Collective Effect that outbound emails can have on the recipients who are no longer going to evaluate each individual email that they have received for domains for sale, but rather are going to look at the whole Domain Industry in a negative light because of this.

Now it might be a different story when it comes to premium domain names that are marketed to a handful of potential end users who could benefit greatly by owning such domains, but other than that it's probably safe to say that:

99% of outbound email is going to be considered as a nuisance by 99% of the recipients.

IMO

 

[kite26]

The tiny 1% can turn your business to a positive sign. Try to be honest, simple, polite and professional. Doing that immediately you avoid spam zone. Be careful about trademarks too.

 

[equity78]

It depends. There is certainly a point where outbound crosses over into blatant spamming.

When people are pitching endless garbage domains, in an indiscriminate manner, often sending many unsolicited follow-up emails to the same potential buyer, often with fake contact information from a disposable email address....At some point it crosses from something reasonable to blatant spam.

Brad

Agree and hopefully all those doing things wrong will wise up. Here is the one thing that someone who worked for a spam blacklist agency told me a few years back.

"Spam is never going away, the reason being it works. People make money and they are not going to stop making money."

Hopefully those in domaining can do things the right way and are only offering truly quality names. I suspect currently many are not meeting the quality quota.

 

[oldtimer]

Hopefully those in domaining can do things the right way and are only offering truly quality names. I suspect currently many are not meeting the quality quota.

I think that the best solution would be instead of thousands of domainers sending outbound everyday to have a few domain marketing companies that would contact potential end users on behalf of the domainers for a modest fee, at least this way there could be some standards as to the quality and usefulness of the domains that are going to be marketed and the domain marketing companies are probably going to have much better luck reaching the decision makers and are probably going to be taken a lot more seriously.

I know that you can hire a broker to do this for you, but most brokers only accept high value premium domains, but a domain marketing company can help domainers with a much wider range of quality and uses.

IMO

 

[Wesley S]

wow, i didnt know outbound was canned ham. hmmmm.

ive heard its good fried. Never have tried it. hmmm something to do. cool.