I obviously havent done an email campaign. I havent collected too many email addresses just yet and I am not inclined to buy addresses but I do have a snazzy template if and when I decide to do it!

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www.sageva.com
Shelley Halpain,

Hi all,

Thanks for all the useful info on this thread. It was just what I was looking for.

Especially thanks to Deb for the tip about not using your own email address.

Regards,

Jason

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Jae Alexander Linsey - 2SupportU.biz
Administrative Support | Marketing Support | Networking Events

Originally Posted by Five To Nine Office Solutions

Shelley, to avoid the appearance of spam, and risking your domain being blacklisted by email servers everywhere, it's a good idea to use an email marketing company like AWeber, ConstantContact, or one of the others mentioned. Then emails come from their servers, but with your return address. These companies are known and are unlikely to be blacklisted as spammers. I hope that helps clear the confusion. @Deb, I'm not trying to put words in your mouth, so correct me if this is not what you meant!

Yes, Cindy is correct. I work in Aweber and they boast a 99 percent through rate because they have arrangements with the larger ISPs to send the emails to those subscribers who opt-in to receive your emails. There is a spam count that you can run before sending the emails which helps to catch any keywords that might get an email into the bulk or spam box.

Janine

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WRITE FAB RFP PROPOSALS & land THE VA job. WinningRFP unveils soon! SignUp www.WinningRFP.com

Great info here! I didn't think I'd need to deal with email marketing for a while since I'm in the beginning stages of my business. But recently a missionary friend (and past client for some freelance work) learned about my business and wants to hire me to handle the monthly newsletter he'll be sending to his supporters in the next few months.

I know the problems involved in sending information blasts from our own email at my last job. I quickly headed to VAF to start learning about how to do it correctly. You guys haven't let me down! It looks like SimplyCast may be just what I'm looking for and since my niche is working with churches & ministries, it'll give me a great resource for all my clients. They offer a non-profit package which looks very promising.

Thanks!

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Ani Russo, V.A.
BAF Administrative Solutions

If I subscribe to any of these services (Constant Contact, iContact, Aweber, etc) will I be able to send different campaigns for different clients from one account?

I really don't want to have three different accounts for three different clients.

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Robin A. Holstein
Robin's Desktop Virtual Administrative Services
My Blog

Thanks Cindy, Deb and everyone else! this also helps me

Davina

Great question, Robin. I didn't even think about that. I'm going to need an answer to that too.

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Ani Russo, V.A.
BAF Administrative Solutions

Glad I saw this question. I use iContact and just received a call from them the other day because they recently implemented a program that will enable you to have multiple clients under one account. You might want to check into this option. I like iContact and have never had a problem using them.

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LaTosha Johnson
http://www.targetstars.com

I can attest that Simply Cast has a free email program for nonprofits. I never used their services but did inquire a while ago.

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Myrlene Hoyte
www.vpadmins.com

To answer your question, Robin: you really want to be working from within your client's account. You don't want to crowd your personal/business account with client stuff. It works kind of like a bank account, or mailing address. You want to use theirs, not have them use yours, right?

That means, as a VA, you might be working sometimes in Constant Contact, sometimes in MailChimp, or Aweber or whatever. After a short while, you see how they're different yet much the same, and it's not hard going back and forth between them.

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Mary H. Ruth/Virtual Writing & Communications
http://www.writingVA.com