I can get 7,000 email in the Ames area

[Sematary]

The cost is $700 (approximate depending on final count)
Money is needed.
If anyone is interested in helping with this, let me know via pm
Gotta go to work. Email marketing is a very good tool.

[Lord Xar]

what is the demographic of the emails? How old are these people?

[specsaregood]

$700 bucks for 7000 emails that will most likely get caught in a spam filter or deleted in disgust. Do you like SPAM? most people don't.

[FreedomLover]

i wouldnt rely on emails, especially for 700$ unless it was coming from the campaign itself.

why is it 700 $ anyway ?

[nullvalu]

would be probably cheaper to use something like http://salesgenie.com unlimited "leads" for $75/month. however, i hate spam too.

[Sematary]

what is the demographic of the emails? How old are these people?

Registered voters in the Ames area. No idea on the ages, etc..
The most expensive email list was 2000 dollars but but contains emails for nearly half a million people in Iowa. I figured I'd concentrate on the Ames area though.

[Sematary]

i wouldnt rely on emails, especially for 700$ unless it was coming from the campaign itself.

why is it 700 $ anyway ?

It's for the list. I would do the emailing so if I send them out one at a time they won't be caught in a spam filter and email marketing WORKS! If it didn't, nobody would use it.

[Scribbler de Stebbing]

Are they giving you demograhics for the $700? Tell us more about this list -- where are you getting it and what are they telling you you're getting?

[jblosser]

Spam is theft. This is not like handing out flyers or calling, where you foot the bill. When you send email, the recipient pays for it. Unless this is a completely verified "these people asked to receive mail from random candidates' volunteers" list, don't do it. And even if they claim they are that, don't believe them.

[Electrostatic]

The money could be better spent on radio ads and signage... spam is NOT good.

[Dustancostine]

Spam is theft. This is not like handing out flyers or calling, where you foot the bill. When you send email, the recipient pays for it. Unless this is a completely verified "these people asked to receive mail from random candidates' volunteers" list, don't do it. And even if they claim they are that, don't believe them.

Can you please explain spam=theft.

[jblosser]

Can you please explain spam=theft.

Googling "spam is theft" to see if someone wrote it up already and to save myself some time, I find this:

http://www.dwheeler.com/essays/stopspam.html

The first part "why is spam a problem" explains it well; I didn't read beyond that to read his solution-of-the-week, so I won't say I agree with that (I probably don't). His numbers are years old; these days spam makes up a good 90+% of all mail received.

One of my professional hats is that of a senior email administrator, and I have been the one that had to spend hours and dollars producing a solution to keep unsolicitated mail away from my users. Doing so requires time, hardware, software, etc. These are all things my company has to pay for because spammers are making use of our resources to send us things we did not ask for. Not only do we have to pay for the delivery and storage, it costs companies like ours millions of dollars a year in lost productivity for users to delete the ones that get through, and in many places has made email almost unusable. Home users often have it even worse.

This doesn't even get into the issues of how spammers get these address lists (often illegally) or send their mails (often using systems they have broken into).

[Dustancostine]

Thanks

[Sematary]

Spam is theft. This is not like handing out flyers or calling, where you foot the bill. When you send email, the recipient pays for it. Unless this is a completely verified "these people asked to receive mail from random candidates' volunteers" list, don't do it. And even if they claim they are that, don't believe them.
You pay for email?

[Sematary]

The point of this is that we should take advantage of EVERY opportunity to contact people in the area. Out of seven THOUSAND people who are REGISTERED to vote, I would think that there would be a fair amount who would at least look at the email (conservatively - 20% - just a guess). I think if a youtube link is embedded with a short (5 minute) video, then their attention can be captured and they can be asked to click on other videos of longer duration. As for demographics - there is only one - registered voters. Who cares what else there is to know about them - they are registered voters in AMES.

[Birdlady]

I think this is a bad idea. People hate spam and we don't really know if the addresses were legitimately gathered.

This was listed on a spam email I got a few days ago. I have no idea if it's the truth or not.

This email is 100% CAN Spam Act 2004 Compliant.
You are receiving this because we have business communication in the past.
Either you fill-up my lead capture page or you have send me business related
emails in the past. We are anti-spam. Your name was received as a Business opt-in,
or smart-list. This message is sent in full compliance of the new U.S. Federal e-mail bill
S. 1616 Title III, Section 301, Paragraph (a)(2)(C) This message cannot be considered
SPAM as long as it includes:

1) Contact information, and
2) a way to be removed from future e-mailings.

If this message was received in error, we apologize. Your information was obtained in good faith as someone who is interested in a home-based or Internet business.
We realize that mistakes are made occasionally and we may contact someone who does not welcome this information. This is not our intent and we certainly apologize. The spirit of our intention is to help you and not to intrude in any way. You are believed to be someone interested in making money online or we have exchanged emails in the past, or have been part of the same organization or downline.

I never signed up for this email. So who knows how they got my address. You should only be mailing out stuff if you have a squeeze page or if you have done business with them.

[jblosser]

You pay for email?

Of course I do. And so do you, unless you're reading it from a hotmail account at the library or something (and if the library is publically funded, even then).

Your ISP/DSL/Cable bill includes the cost of the infrastructure needed to deal with the hourly crapflood of junk email. I've been on the internet with the same address for long enough that I get around 3,000 spams an hour. In some form or another I have to pay the costs for that to traverse my line to me, then the storage until it gets flagged and deleted.


The point of this is that we should take advantage of EVERY opportunity to contact people in the area.

Sending unsolicited email is the moral equivalent of tying a message to a brick and throwing it through someone's window. If you don't believe that it's only because you haven't had to deal with the enormous amount of time (man-decades by now), effort, funding, research, and hardware it takes on this side of the IT line to keep email usable against the onslaught.

We certainly should not take advantage of every contact method we can think of. Some things are not moral.

[Sematary]

Of course I do. And so do you, unless you're reading it from a hotmail account at the library or something (and if the library is publically funded, even then).

Your ISP/DSL/Cable bill includes the cost of the infrastructure needed to deal with the hourly crapflood of junk email. I've been on the internet with the same address for long enough that I get around 3,000 spams an hour. In some form or another I have to pay the costs for that to traverse my line to me, then the storage until it gets flagged and deleted.



Sending unsolicited email is the moral equivalent of tying a message to a brick and throwing it through someone's window. If you don't believe that it's only because you haven't had to deal with the enormous amount of time (man-decades by now), effort, funding, research, and hardware it takes on this side of the IT line to keep email usable against the onslaught.

We certainly should not take advantage of every contact method we can think of. Some things are not moral.


So making unsolicited phone calls and sending unsolicited regular mail would be the same, right? So what is immoral about advertising by email? I haven't seen you answer this yet. It is a tool We should use it, and if I can find a way to pay for it, I will.

[jblosser]

By the way, every candidate I know of who has resorted to spamming has gotten a huge backlash. One example:

http://archive.salon.com/21st/feature/1999/02/19feature.html

[jblosser]

So making unsolicited phone calls and sending unsolicited regular mail would be the same, right? So what is immoral about advertising by email? I haven't seen you answer this yet. It is a tool We should use it, and if I can find a way to pay for it, I will.

You don't pay directly for junk postal mail to be delivered for you or for junk phone calls, the sender pays (of course, this changes when people get called on metered lines like cell phones, and they have the exact same complaints when that happens). They are also ways to reliably opt out of those, for the most part. This is why there are laws against *any* kind of unsoliciated email in several states, referring to trespass and the fraud that often accompanies it. Of course the feds in their infinite wisdom have managed to get lobbied by the DMA and exerted supremacy over those.

[Sematary]

You don't pay directly for junk postal mail to be delivered for you or for junk phone calls (of course, this changes when people get called on metered lines like cell phones, and they have the exact same complaints when that happens). They are also ways to reliably opt out of those, for the most part.

Whether you consider it to be "moral" or not isn't really important. What IS important is getting Ron Pauls name in front of as many people as humanly possible in as short a time as possible.

[jblosser]

Theft is not a subjective moral question. You do not have a right to use someone else's resources to deliver a message without their permission. There are laws against this. Have fun finding that out, I guess. If you manage to cause backlash for the campaign like every other campaign spammer has done, I hope someone else can manage to clean it up for you.

[Razmear]

I'd use the $700 to bulk mail postcard's stating Ron Paul's positions, you'll get a better return on investment that way.
Most email lists sold are going to contain a lot of bad email addresses, and I don't think it will be well received by those who do get one.
Good intentions, but I don't think it's the best plan for contacting the masses.

eb

[ghemminger]

Maybe I am naive...so many people on this sight are anti-email marketing.....

I often send 30-40 introductory emails to potential clients in my bussiness. I do this once and follow up with pone calls and appointments.

If Ron Paul sells himself, what would be wrong in sending a onetime email blast to IOWA??? What am I missing here.....

This group, should be savy enough to carry this ou as proffessionally as possible

[ghemminger]

Atomic Email Hunter has a free program that peels of emails from a series of sights at a time....I use it in targeted email campaigns

[scrosnoe]

i fail to see the difference between unsolicited phone calls, unsolicited email, unsolicited mail - if you raise the money and want to spend the time - you go guy!

people have the ability to block, filter, not read, trash, not answer all forms - but some of all get through - or people wouldn't do it!

and people are hungry for truth and good information and we provide that often with a smile :) and a little 'love inside the revolution' too!!

FWIW

[Sematary]

i fail to see the difference between unsolicited phone calls, unsolicited email, unsolicited mail - if you raise the money and want to spend the time - you go guy!

people have the ability to block, filter, not read, trash, not answer all forms - but some of all get through - or people wouldn't do it!

and people are hungry for truth and good information and we provide that often with a smile :) and a little 'love inside the revolution' too!!

FWIW

So the question remains. Would anyone like to contribute to this effort? I think it would be worthwhile, especially where it is targeted directly at Ames.

[Sematary]

Here is the website of the company that I contacted for the list:
http://www.smacomm.com/political.shtml

Some info:

Online Digital Media channels are influencing our politics. The World Wide Web is the most widely utilized medium for the public to access government information and evaluate the content of political campaigns when election time comes. Now voters can see online where candidates stand on issues, weigh the pro’s and con’s of each candidate, and make their decisions on how to vote, how to serve, and/or where to send their campaign contributions.

SMA Communications maintains nearly all the voter files in the U.S. complete with appended E-Mail addresses, and other demographic attributes where available, and we have the experience to help you reach the growing online “Interactive Cyber-Democracy” with your political message. We have helped our clients win many votes and can do the same for you. Through E-mail, Website Banners, Opt-in Registrations, Contextual Ad Delivery, Direct Mail, SMS to Mobile, and other solutions, we can help build your own “pro-active” voter base giving you the edge needed to help win at the polls.

Today’s largest corporations work diligently year after year branding their image and products and services, and they are always analyzing behavioral trends, collecting data, and developing creative marketing strategies to stay on the forefront of consumers minds. The same strategies are effective and necessary to succeed in today’s viscously competitive political environment.

SMA Communications has solutions designed to reach the voting public with online touch points to further brand a candidate and the issues they stand for, maximize voter turn out, and maximize the opportunity for more votes.

If we take Congressional District 4 – which Ames is located in – there are:

425,000 Registered Voters with 50,000 matched emails.



Kind regards,



Steven M Alembik

[Scribbler de Stebbing]

Theft is not a subjective moral question. You do not have a right to use someone else's resources to deliver a message without their permission. There are laws against this. Have fun finding that out, I guess. If you manage to cause backlash for the campaign like every other campaign spammer has done, I hope someone else can manage to clean it up for you.

Then we need to stop calling Iowans immediately!!!!

I'm not buying spam=theft unless there's a new pay-per-email received program that hasn't hit me yet. Individual spam doesn't bother me terribly, especially when it's a one-time message in which the sender says, "Forgive me if this email is unwanted. This is a one-time email sent out by a real person, me." Hitting delete is so much easier than hanging up on a telemarketer.

I'm just wondering what you're getting for $700 and whether it's worth the money. If it was targeted demographics, then perhaps. If it's just random Iowans, probably not.

Edit: I should read before posting. Hmmm. Can they break it out by Republicans? If not, hmmm, I'd say 5 cents per might be worth it, but not sure about 10 cents per email. Does that include bounced email?

[Razmear]

If you do go ahead with this plan, just make sure there is a clear disclaimer that it is not being sent by RPHQ and that you are no way affiliated with them.
There are probably easier way to scrape email addresses than paying $700, but I'm not going to discourage you if you think this could work out.

eb

[Sematary]

If you do go ahead with this plan, just make sure there is a clear disclaimer that it is not being sent by RPHQ and that you are no way affiliated with them.
There are probably easier way to scrape email addresses than paying $700, but I'm not going to discourage you if you think this could work out.

eb

If you know of a way that I can get the email addresses of people in the county within AMES resides without having to go through a company that already has them, I'm all ears.

[Sematary]

Theft is not a subjective moral question. You do not have a right to use someone else's resources to deliver a message without their permission. There are laws against this. Have fun finding that out, I guess. If you manage to cause backlash for the campaign like every other campaign spammer has done, I hope someone else can manage to clean it up for you.

You have yet to show that there is any theft. These email lists are available for sale and like any other medium, for use. It is advertising. How can you equate advertising to theft? Is it theft when I pay for cable television and people advertise? Is it theft when I pay for phone service and telemarketers call? Is it theft when I pay for internet service and I see ads on websites? After all, they are burning up MY bandwidth, are they not? If I receive email I don't want (ads) then I delete them. No biggie. So, where is the theft?

[Sematary]

Atomic Email Hunter has a free program that peels of emails from a series of sights at a time....I use it in targeted email campaigns

I was looking at this - does it work well? The price is only $80 but I have spent so much of my own money donating to Ron Pauls campaign and purchasing supplies to print out tri-folds, flyers, etc... that I am literally flat broke. It seems like a much more cost effective solution but I honestly do not have the cash.

[jblosser]

You have yet to show that there is any theft. These email lists are available for sale and like any other medium, for use. It is advertising. How can you equate advertising to theft? Is it theft when I pay for cable television and people advertise? Is it theft when I pay for phone service and telemarketers call? Is it theft when I pay for internet service and I see ads on websites? After all, they are burning up MY bandwidth, are they not? If I receive email I don't want (ads) then I delete them. No biggie. So, where is the theft?

It is theft because of who has to pay for the bulk of the message transmission, without consent. It's a little odd to me to be having this conversation in 2007, since the internet industry is so well-accustomed to this notion. Even wikipedia is mostly accurate on this. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-mail_spam#Overview

MIT has a yearly academic conference on dealing with this problem; it's not a new thing.

In the case of cable television, you pay to receive the television channels. As part of the agreement with the provider, they are able to show you advertisements. The providers of those advertisements directly pay the provider for the access to show advertisements. They pay to deliver the message, and you agreed to receive it.

In the case of phone service, you generally do not pay to receive calls (beyond paying to have a number), you pay to make calls. Consent to receive these calls is generally lacking, but that's why there are both industry and government "do not call lists" (a backwards solution, but a form of solution). Regardless, telemarketers bear the primary brunt of the cost of reaching you. They pay to deliver the message, and you have an option to disagree. Again, this is different in metered plans like cell phones/instant messages, and the same theft complaints apply there.

In the case of ads on websites, the site you are visiting is paying for a resource and paying to put ads on that resource. Your consent for your part of the transaction is in visting the site. They payto deliver the message, and you agree to receive it.

In the case of email, the sender does not pay any significant percentage of the cost. A mail to one address bears the same cost as a mail to a thousand addresses. But as soon as the message leaves the sender, the transmission splits among multiple mail transfer points, all of whom have to pay for their part of the transmission, storage, etc. of those messages, up to the end recipient. There is no consent beyond the fact the user has an email address, and there is no real way to be removed from any lists. You pay to receive the message, and you cannot effectively disagree (other that dropping your email subscription).

The sender doesn't pay for access like they do with TV ads or web ads, there is no explicit consent to a central provider or ability to be removed or implied consent via asking for a related resource, and the recipient does pay for the receipt. The closest other media thing (beyond the aforementioned metered mobile phones) is fax spam, which uses the recipients resources to display the message, but even there the sender is paying for the call. Another comparable thing that doesn't actually happen would be postal mail spam sent postage due.

The existence of lists that can be bought is no defense that it is legitimate. People don't ask to be on those lists, and can very rarely get removed from them. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-mail_spam#Gathering_of_addresses

Quite often the lists themselves exist because of direct theft; there are multiple incidents of low level employees of corporations stealing and selling internal contact lists to spammers. It has become profitable enough there is currently significant academic and industry research into the interest and role the Russian mafia is taking in the process.

By the way, even if sending these emails would be legal in your area, it is highly probable that doing so violates the terms of your contract with your internet service provider. Most do not allow sending bulk unsolicited mail. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-mail_spam#Legality

[ghemminger]

I was looking at this - does it work well? The price is only $80 but I have spent so much of my own money donating to Ron Pauls campaign and purchasing supplies to print out tri-folds, flyers, etc... that I am literally flat broke. It seems like a much more cost effective solution but I honestly do not have the cash.

Use the trial version....cut and paste...I have figured it out..I'll walk you through if you need help.

[ghemminger]

It is theft because of who has to pay for the bulk of the message transmission, without consent. It's a little odd to me to be having this conversation in 2007, since the internet industry is so well-accustomed to this notion. Even wikipedia is mostly accurate on this. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-mail_spam#Overview

MIT has a yearly academic conference on dealing with this problem; it's not a new thing.

In the case of cable television, you pay to receive the television channels. As part of the agreement with the provider, they are able to show you advertisements. The providers of those advertisements directly pay the provider for the access to show advertisements. They pay to deliver the message, and you agreed to receive it.

In the case of phone service, you generally do not pay to receive calls (beyond paying to have a number), you pay to make calls. Consent to receive these calls is generally lacking, but that's why there are both industry and government "do not call lists" (a backwards solution, but a form of solution). Regardless, telemarketers bear the primary brunt of the cost of reaching you. They pay to deliver the message, and you have an option to disagree. Again, this is different in metered plans like cell phones/instant messages, and the same theft complaints apply there.

In the case of ads on websites, the site you are visiting is paying for a resource and paying to put ads on that resource. Your consent for your part of the transaction is in visting the site. They payto deliver the message, and you agree to receive it.

In the case of email, the sender does not pay any significant percentage of the cost. A mail to one address bears the same cost as a mail to a thousand addresses. But as soon as the message leaves the sender, the transmission splits among multiple mail transfer points, all of whom have to pay for their part of the transmission, storage, etc. of those messages, up to the end recipient. There is no consent beyond the fact the user has an email address, and there is no real way to be removed from any lists. You pay to receive the message, and you cannot effectively disagree (other that dropping your email subscription).

The sender doesn't pay for access like they do with TV ads or web ads, there is no explicit consent to a central provider or ability to be removed or implied consent via asking for a related resource, and the recipient does pay for the receipt. The closest other media thing (beyond the aforementioned metered mobile phones) is fax spam, which uses the recipients resources to display the message, but even there the sender is paying for the call. Another comparable thing that doesn't actually happen would be postal mail spam sent postage due.

The existence of lists that can be bought is no defense that it is legitimate. People don't ask to be on those lists, and can very rarely get removed from them. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-mail_spam#Gathering_of_addresses

Quite often the lists themselves exist because of direct theft; there are multiple incidents of low level employees of corporations stealing and selling internal contact lists to spammers. It has become profitable enough there is currently significant academic and industry research into the interest and role the Russian mafia is taking in the process.

By the way, even if sending these emails would be legal in your area, it is highly probable that doing so violates the terms of your contract with your internet service provider. Most do not allow sending bulk unsolicited mail. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-mail_spam#Legality

j...you are much more knowledgable on this then I am...although you sound alot like my IT guys at my company...and if it was up to them I wouldn't bring in any new customers....I suggest instead of stauchly objecting to email marketing, why don't you provide a step by step process we can professionally email new contacts in Iowa about Ron Paul.....Thanks

[Sematary]

j...you are much more knowledgable on this then I am...although you sound alot like my IT guys at my company...and if it was up to them I wouldn't bring in any new customers....I suggest instead of stauchly objecting to email marketing, why don't you provide a step by step process we can professionally email new contacts in Iowa about Ron Paul.....Thanks

That would be good.

[RPatTheBeach]

It's for the list. I would do the emailing so if I send them out one at a time they won't be caught in a spam filter and email marketing WORKS! If it didn't, nobody would use it.

Email marketing is a numbers game. They send out millions and millions of emails and hope for less than a 1% return. Email marketing is definitely _not_ the way to go.

I have an email list of 25,000 people that SIGNED UP for a newsletter on a website I maintain. When I send out emails, less than 20% of those email are read.

[goldenequity]

Please feel free to use any or all of this in your emails or letters.:)







"Protecting the rights of even the least individual among us is basically the only excuse the government has for even existing."

Is our government protecting our individual rights and the traditional values of the Constitution? The answer is most clearly "no."

What are Constitutional traditional values?

Looking across history, they are most certainly not aggressive bloated government, a collapsing monetary system, weak borders, wire-tapping, or preemptive wars. America desperately needs leadership to reverse the size of government, lower taxes, encourage free trade, and get out of foreign entanglements, our bank accounts and our bedrooms.

Who can begin reversing decades of bloated and corrosive legislation from the administrations and parties who have lost sight of our Constitution and traditional core values?

We must elect a candidate, who will pursue a humble defensive foreign policy and who will bring our soldiers home and I mean all. That means saving almost five hundred billion dollars a year. A half-trillion saved and not spent. Compound that annually.

Saved for entitlements, federal pork and earmarking? Don’t even think about it!

In his 20 years in Congress, Ron Paul has not once voted to raise taxes or congressional pay. Professional lobbyists do not even darken this Congressman’s door. He is known amongst his colleagues as “Doctor No” for refusing any legislation that spends tax money on anything not endorsed specifically by the Constitution.

He wants the money to stay with you, to be spent locally, to prosper your own State and local community. It’s your money. Improve and use it to take personal responsibility for your own lives and local communities. In your prosperity, give to community charities instead of demanding the Federal government help the poor and unfortunate amoung you.

This was the strict and liberating intention of our founding fathers and the Constitution.
There was no income tax…none. It worked so well for so long, that our country’s prosperity exploded exponentially and was the envy of all other nations of the world.

Stop being a good Republican. Stop being a good Democrat. Start being a good American.

As the only Republican candidate who solitarily opposed the war in Iraq and loudly protested the corrosive effects of the Homeland Security Act upon our Civil Liberties, let's give Ron Paul a chance, to lead us out of this mess. Our country is literally going broke trying to sustain a policy of policing the world and a bloated Federalized system of government.

Please go this weekend to the Ames Iowa Poll and cast your straw vote for Ron Paul.

Thank you so much.

[ghemminger]

Email marketing is a numbers game. They send out millions and millions of emails and hope for less than a 1% return. Email marketing is definitely _not_ the way to go.

I have an email list of 25,000 people that SIGNED UP for a newsletter on a website I maintain. When I send out emails, less than 20% of those email are read.

That is still 4000+ Contacts..thats huge...I'm in the wilderness I think...but my thoughts are like we have this huge resource og technical talent here that we are'nt using to the maximum....It's like you guys have this "power up" button you are afraid to use?

It's like what happened to Advokit and Spooner....Just help us do this in the most professional way possible.

[Sematary]

Email marketing is a numbers game. They send out millions and millions of emails and hope for less than a 1% return. Email marketing is definitely _not_ the way to go.

I have an email list of 25,000 people that SIGNED UP for a newsletter on a website I maintain. When I send out emails, less than 20% of those email are read.

I understand the numbers but if you reach a certain percentage of a large number of people then that helps.

[ghemminger]

Please feel free to use any or all of this in your emails or letters.:)







"Protecting the rights of even the least individual among us is basically the only excuse the government has for even existing."

Is our government protecting our individual rights and the traditional values of the Constitution? The answer is most clearly "no."

What are Constitutional traditional values?

Looking across history, they are most certainly not aggressive bloated government, a collapsing monetary system, weak borders, wire-tapping, or preemptive wars. America desperately needs leadership to reverse the size of government, lower taxes, encourage free trade, and get out of foreign entanglements, our bank accounts and our bedrooms.

Who can begin reversing decades of bloated and corrosive legislation from the administrations and parties who have lost sight of our Constitution and traditional core values?

We must elect a candidate, who will pursue a humble defensive foreign policy and who will bring our soldiers home and I mean all. That means saving almost five hundred billion dollars a year. A half-trillion saved and not spent. Compound that annually.

Saved for entitlements, federal pork and earmarking? Don’t even think about it!

In his 20 years in Congress, Ron Paul has not once voted to raise taxes or congressional pay. Professional lobbyists do not even darken this Congressman’s door. He is known amongst his colleagues as “Doctor No” for refusing any legislation that spends tax money on anything not endorsed specifically by the Constitution.

He wants the money to stay with you, to be spent locally, to prosper your own State and local community. It’s your money. Improve and use it to take personal responsibility for your own lives and local communities. In your prosperity, give to community charities instead of demanding the Federal government help the poor and unfortunate amoung you.

This was the strict and liberating intention of our founding fathers and the Constitution.
There was no income tax…none. It worked so well for so long, that our country’s prosperity exploded exponentially and was the envy of all other nations of the world.

Stop being a good Republican. Stop being a good Democrat. Start being a good American.

As the only Republican candidate who solitarily opposed the war in Iraq and loudly protested the corrosive effects of the Homeland Security Act upon our Civil Liberties, let's give Ron Paul a chance, to lead us out of this mess. Our country is literally going broke trying to sustain a policy of policing the world and a bloated Federalized system of government.

Please go this weekend to the Ames Iowa Poll and cast your straw vote for Ron Paul.

Thank you so much.

I think you should also have some refernce video in this email blast

[Sematary]

I think you should also have some refernce video in this email blast

I would but if no one wants to support the idea it's not going to happen anyway.

[ghemminger]

Thes IT guys might know something we don't know

[ghemminger]

Mess around with that Atomic program...you can direct to specific web sites and it will peel off 1000,s of emails...if you want to work on somethine...private message me tommorrow.....I could get a large amount of email in Iowa within a few days with some help

[Scribbler de Stebbing]

The question comes down to cost per contact. You'd be paying 10 cents per addy. Assume 1/4 at least of those are defunct and that at least another quarter will get deleted immediately. So you're paying AT LEAST 20 cents per contact, probably more, almost enough to snail mail them a postcard.

How many listeners would we reach in the #1 time slot on WHO radio for $300? I don't know if it is any better or not. I would give radio a slight edge as it somehow lends credibility to the candidate, it means someone paid for the ad.

If you can email Ames for 5 cents or less per, it might make more sense.

[Sematary]

The question comes down to cost per contact. You'd be paying 10 cents per addy. Assume 1/4 at least of those are defunct and that at least another quarter will get deleted immediately. So you're paying AT LEAST 20 cents per contact, probably more, almost enough to snail mail them a postcard.

How many listeners would we reach in the #1 time slot on WHO radio for $300? I don't know if it is any better or not. I would give radio a slight edge as it somehow lends credibility to the candidate, it means someone paid for the ad.

If you can email Ames for 5 cents or less per, it might make more sense.

That's the price you get when you get into higher numbers. The entire county that ames resides in would bring .05 per but you're looking at thousands of dollars because there are like 50,000 email addresses.

[jblosser]

j...you are much more knowledgable on this then I am...although you sound alot like my IT guys at my company...and if it was up to them I wouldn't bring in any new customers....I suggest instead of stauchly objecting to email marketing, why don't you provide a step by step process we can professionally email new contacts in Iowa about Ron Paul.....Thanks

1. Establish a prior relationship with someone, via phone calls or meeting them at an event of mutual interest, etc.
2. Ask if you can email them information on Ron Paul
3. If they agree, email them

I'm sure that's not what you wanted to hear but that's the only way to do it without trespassing on their resources. To get it equal in legitimacy to phone calls or tv ads you have to either pay them for your use of their resources or get their permission first.

This isn't the place to be spending the time anyway. The national campaign has asked for help on at least 3 different types of contact methods. They are not saturated with volunteers (one report is that there only hundreds actually making phone calls). I know you guys want to maximize the return on time spent, but if you want to spam, spam forum people to pick up the phone and call Iowans. Join meetups in other areas and bug them to do it too.

I don't know about the rest of you but we're already getting a horrible return on emailing our *meetup members* vs. calling them about our own events. Supporters meeting each other initially online makes sense but so far the real campaign work is still out there on the ground, with phone calls, and people talking to each other in real time.

[Sematary]

1. Establish a prior relationship with someone, via phone calls or meeting them at an event of mutual interest, etc.
2. Ask if you can email them information on Ron Paul
3. If they agree, email them

I'm sure that's not what you wanted to hear but that's the only way to do it without trespassing on their resources. To get it equal in legitimacy to phone calls or tv ads you have to either pay them for your use of their resources or get their permission first.

This isn't the place to be spending the time anyway. The national campaign has asked for help on at least 3 different types of contact methods. They are not saturated with volunteers (one report is that there only hundreds actually making phone calls). I know you guys want to maximize the return on time spent, but if you want to spam, spam forum people to pick up the phone and call Iowans. Join meetups in other areas and bug them to do it too.

I don't know about the rest of you but we're already getting a horrible return on emailing our *meetup members* vs. calling them about our own events. Supporters meeting each other initially online makes sense but so far the real campaign work is still out there on the ground, with phone calls, and people talking to each other in real time.


It just seems that we should be taking advantage of every possibility to get the word out. I sent out my first batch of letters yesterday and will be sending out more by this weekend and, time and money permitting, I'll ask for more addresses next week. Unfortunately, it is extremely time consuming and the costs of printing various campaign literature plus stamps, etc... is getting rather expensive for me and I need another way to contact people that won't make me broke.

[jblosser]

It just seems that we should be taking advantage of every possibility to get the word out. I sent out my first batch of letters yesterday and will be sending out more by this weekend and, time and money permitting, I'll ask for more addresses next week. Unfortunately, it is extremely time consuming and the costs of printing various campaign literature plus stamps, etc... is getting rather expensive for me and I need another way to contact people that won't make me broke.

Man I totally respect that but all I'm saying is that whether you see the problem or not, using spam to get a message out cheaply just moves the cost onto the recipients, without their permission. Those of us that have to make sure the email gets delivered end up spending *years* of our lives figuring out how to make sure the unrequested stuff gets dropped so our users can still do their business, and it costs us tons of money to do so. There's a reason candidates that resort to spam get such a backlash beyond what they get with postal mail or even phone calls (not that phone calls are hugely popular; at least people in Iowa somewhat expect them).

Unsolicited email is not an honest business, and a healthy court system not pandering to the marketing interests would have made this clear a long time ago.

[Scribbler de Stebbing]

1. Establish a prior relationship with someone, via phone calls or meeting them at an event of mutual interest, etc.
2. Ask if you can email them information on Ron Paul
3. If they agree, email them

:eek: I never expect the email question before a third date at a minimum.

A phone call is more intrusive -- more theftive -- than an email. So how would you establish contact via phone to request permission to email?

"Theftive." That's a good one.

[jblosser]

Go back to the prior post about the differences between the different contact methods. It may be rude to cold call people, and as a consumer I hate cold calls too (yay caller ID) but the operative difference is *I don't have to pay my money to receive them*, I can theoretically opt out, etc.

You don't have those options as a user with email. The only option you have is to never read your email or deal with everything you're sent, in one form or another. This is the difference. It is a difference fundamental to the technology behind the different communication forms, and it's not something that is going to change anytime soon.

Those of you who only receive a few spams a day and think deleting isn't that big of a deal -- well, I hope you stay that way forever, I really do. A lot of us get hundreds or thousands a day, which is why when the economists do the math, they find just deleting spam costs this country billions of dollars a year in productivity alone, let alone the infrastructure costs to get the spam to them so they can delete it.

[Sematary]

Go back to the prior post about the differences between the different contact methods. It may be rude to cold call people, and as a consumer I hate cold calls too (yay caller ID) but the operative difference is *I don't have to pay my money to receive them*, I can theoretically opt out, etc.

You don't have those options as a user with email. The only option you have is to never read your email or deal with everything you're sent, in one form or another. This is the difference. It is a difference fundamental to the technology behind the different communication forms, and it's not something that is going to change anytime soon.

Those of you who only receive a few spams a day and think deleting isn't that big of a deal -- well, I hope you stay that way forever, I really do. A lot of us get hundreds or thousands a day, which is why when the economists do the math, they find just deleting spam costs this country billions of dollars a year in productivity alone, let alone the infrastructure costs to get the spam to them so they can delete it.

You don't consider the time you spend looking at your caller id as having to deal with the phone call? Personally, I find phone calls FAR more intrusive than email, which I can simply delete if I'm not interested.

[jblosser]

We're pretty much just going in a circle at this point. No offense.

Intrusiveness is not what I'm talking about. They're all intrusive. Who pays for the communication is what I'm talking about.

With phone calls, the sender pays the money.
With email, the recipient pays the money.

You won't necessarily see email delivery itemized this way on your monthly bills, but you can either take my word or go look it all up yourself: every email you get comes "postage due". No one covers the end delivery cost but you (and your company, etc.).

[Sematary]

We're pretty much just going in a circle at this point. No offense.

Intrusiveness is not what I'm talking about. They're all intrusive. Who pays for the communication is what I'm talking about.

With phone calls, the sender pays the money.
With email, the recipient pays the money.

You won't necessarily see email delivery itemized this way on your monthly bills, but you can either take my word or go look it all up yourself: every email you get comes "postage due". No one covers the end delivery cost but you (and your company, etc.).

I pay $4.95 mo. for my email. I pay something like $30 a month for my phone and I have to tell you - I'd rather have to delete an email than either wait to see what my caller ID shows or to have to simply hang up on a telemarketer.
I dare say, however, that for the majority, their email comes packaged with their internet or they have some sort of free account like Hotmail, etc...
I personally don't understand your point. We pay for all of our communications mediums and I don't see the difference between advertising on one from the other except in the level of intrusiveness.

T.v. / radio - pretty much background noise at this point
email - delete button, or read, depending on my mood
Phone - I HATE when people call to sell me shit
website - background noise
Other types - t-shirts, billboards, etc... etc... etc... - background noise.
If someone CALLED me to bother me about a political candidate I'd never heard of - I'd probably get pissed.
If I received a letter in the mail - I'd probably start reading then chuck it as soon as I realized what I was looking at
Email - perhaps the same thing but if a video were attached, I might look at it since I'm already there anyway and wouldn't require any active participation
Phone - I'm hanging up on them.

[spiteface]

Wait, if every spam email costs like a fraction of a penny, how can that be theft? I mean, isn't that more like when you're at the check out counter at the convenience store and the "penny tray" is there for you to take a penny for every transaction. And that's a WHOLE penny. We're just talking about taking FRACTIONS of a penny with each spam email.