Many online companies are wary of using email as a marketing tool, because they believe that it's too hard to avoid being labeled as spam. In fact, there has been a recent backlash against email marketing. Detractors point to stronger filters, safe lists, and other ISP-created tools as their evidence for denouncing email marketing campaigns.

For this reason, many companies shy away from email marketing, opting instead to solely focus on SEO and PPC methods. While these methods are very effective, newer technologies, it is a mistake to ignore email marketing, because it can be a very powerful tool.

In fact, there are a few very successful companies that use email marketing as the bulwark of their Internet marketing campaigns. By earning customers? trust and marketing in voluntary email lists, these companies have a powerful advantage over their competitors, because they can directly communicate with their customers.

The Email/RSS Controversy

While RSS technology has advanced by leaps and bounds, the technology suffers from a few limitations that prevent it from completely replacing email as a marketing tool. First of all, email is nearly ubiquitous in today's world, whereas RSS feeds are limited to a narrow group of people who are searching for specific, pigeonholed information. Next, email has a simpler and more personally customizable format, while RSS requires that the user spend time customizing his or her feed requests. In this way, email is more user-friendly, simply because people have been using it for longer.

If you really think about it, email will always be a recognizable part of the Internet, whereas RSS occupies a fringe market. This is especially true on the global scale. Therefore, email trumps RSS when it comes to Internet marketing.

Blogs are More Fashionable, but Email is more Reliable

In the mid 1990s, the Internet world suffered its own Influenza epidemic. This is known as the Spam War. During the spam war, sleazy, get-rich-quick scammers overloaded people's inboxes with spam, or junk email. In response, many ISP's designed strong filters to resist spam. Additionally, many people took protective measures to defend themselves against spam. Many businesses abandoned email marketing altogether, instead opting to use blogs as a marketing tool.

However, the facts tell the same story. Email marketing is an effective , proven way to increase your Internet marketing campaign.

An Online Marketing Dream: The Opt-In Email List

Opt-In email lists are composed of a group of people who want to be included in a certain company's email list. While many companies mistakenly believe that no one wants to receive their email, the businesses who choose to employ opt-in email lists receive great benefits from this well known method of Internet marketing. However, instead of trying to sell something through their opt-in email listservs, these marketers choose to send highly relevant information or developments about the company so that they may boost web traffic to their site. It's very simple and very effective.

Safe Lists: A Safe Way to Ensure Web Visibility

Email safe lists are comprised of subscribers who visit a web site and then voluntarily choose to receive email from a corporation or company. It's similar to an opt-in list, but slightly different because the user initiates the action of joining. Many reputable companies have earned huge amounts of money by utilizing email safe lists, simply because when these lists grow to a certain size, it becomes inevitable that a huge amount of people visit the site. It's good to practice and hone your skills when writing emails to a safe list, because you want to provide useful information to the recipients of your safe list.

Therefore?

Email marketing can drive a huge amount of web traffic to your website. Do not neglect this extremely strong marketing tool when you are drafting your Internet marketing campaign. It's always good to communicate directly with consumers, especially if they are choosing to receive email from your company. As long as you follow the basic rules of SEO and you use common sense, email marketing will increase your web visibility and provide you with a wealth of new customers.