How to choose a safelist and how to use them for email marketing

The other day I read an article by Philippe Moisan about his experience with safelists. Well, I just wanted to add a small comment to his article, but what came out was a short guide about how to use safelists.

Now I guess, some other people might like to get some info on how to use safelists. So I decided to copy my comment and publish it over here.

Before I go on, let me tell you what this article is not about: All safelist have a referral program. Some have crosslinks with other safelists or traffic exchanges. Most have some sort of bonus program. I'm not going to talk about those. In this article I will stick to email marketing.

Like most Internet Marketers I use safelists. I personaly use them mainly for promotion of new programs I joined. First because I can't expect all members of my list to join with me each and every program and second It helps me in building a larger list.

I think it doesn't matter so much which safelist you join. But before joining a safelist you should consider a few point and do some research.

First find out how many members this safelist has. Personally my best experiences were with safelist having between 5'000 to 15'000 members. I guess this has to do with the fact, that the more members a safelist has, the more emails you will get. And nobody will go through a few hundred emails from one safelist alone. So there is a big chance your email will not be read before being deleted.

Nexr you should check out on Alexa what the safelists ranking is  One with a worldwide ranking below 50000 I would say is good. one below 20000 is excellent.

Also check what you can do with your credits. Can you just email the members with it or can you e.g. convert them to banner ads or text ads? Don't forget to check how many members can you reach with a Credit mail. And how often can you mail.

Now every safelist will offer you some kind of Solo ad. Here the price vary.Some safelists will offer you Solo ads for a few dollars,. Others will ask for up or even over $100 for just one ad. Personally I set the limit at $25.

If you want to use credit mails only or purchase some Solo ads is up to you. In both cases you have to make your email stand out, if you want it to be read. So spend some time finding a catchy subject line. If you are promoting some program, never use the subject line they provide you!  Create you own one. Let all the others use the same subject line.

Don't spend time writing long emails where people have to scroll down for ever to find the link to click. Make it short! 

Just as important as a catchy subject line is your splash or landing page. If you have the possibility to get or create your own splash page, don't think twice! Use it! Make your product stand out! It's not so important how good your landing page is looking. Important is that it's unique. More people will stop and check it out and your convertion will definately increase. Try it out. Use the same email ones with the landing page supplied by the product you promote and ones with a landing page created by you. When using the later one your conversion will increase at least 10 fold!

This are the points I'm taking care when joining a new safelist and when mailing to the members.

What is your experience with email marketing through safelists? Would be pleased to hear from you.

Or you want to share your experience with others? How about joining the Safelists and Mailers Group?