As most of you already know, I’m a full time merchant on the Internet for 6 years. I understand the value of getting my message out, but frankly I’m getting fed up with the amount un-targeted advertising that’s being forced on me.
We all pay for all this advertising one way or another in the cost of the products and services we buy. Advertising is not cheap; sometimes the costs of advertising a product are higher than the costs to produce the product itself. Heck, the packaging often costs more than the product itself.
Crossing the Line
Recently I began to notice ads suddenly appearing right in the middle of my computer screen on top of everything else when I wasn’t even running a Web browser. I have to stop my work in order to get rid of this advertising.
You might think it would be effective advertising, because unlike spam email which hardly any one reads anymore, putting an ad right in your face in the middle of the screen does get noticed. At the very least the user is required to close it to get it off the screen. This type of advertising crosses the line, and every product that is marketed to me in this way will be boycotted forever.
Exploiting Instant Message Technology
This new technology exploits a little known feature in Microsoft’s messenger program called “Net Send” and ONLY works in Windows 2000, NT, and Windows XP operating systems. To receive a message, the receiver doesn’t have to have any special software installed.
The Company Exploiting This Technology Advertises.
Annoy Everyone Equally
This technology delivers advertising to ranges of Internet IP addresses not to email addresses like conventional spam.
The company claims you can target advertising geographically in this manner. In reality you have little to no control of who actually receives your ads, they go to businesses, schools, and home computers with no real way to target them demographically to people who might actually be interested in receiving your ad or buying your product.
The company selling this spamware also sells the IP addresses, how convenient.
Microsoft isn’t even exploiting this feature with their own advertising yet, like Smart Tag Technology they wait to see what happens when others exploit it first. Most likely if we as users accept it and learn to live with it as we have spam email we will see more and more of it in the future.
Sooner or later some corporation with the ability to fund a lawsuit will eventually shut down this invasion to our privacy, but it may take awhile. It might become quite a problem for you and me in the meantime. People investing in the broadcast software will likely be without recourse once it’s shut down.
To Stop Net Send Services
I won’t tell you where you can buy the spamware but I will tell you how you can stop it from working on your computer. If you don’t have a NT based operating system yet you don’t have a problem.
In Windows 2000
In Windows XP
Summing Up
The only way to stop these various spamware and scumware scams is to NEVER purchase anything from any company using predatory advertising practices. So far the public is winning; most companies using predatory advertising have found it unprofitable and abandoned it, often only after putting themselves out of business.
There are legitimate ways to use targeted advertising to sell more of your product or service on the Internet. Permission Based Email Advertising, Autoresponders, Ezine Advertising, Targeted Content Development, testimonials, and Pay-Per-Click keyword advertising to name a few can be highly profitable.
For advertising to be cost effective you need to get your solution to people who are ALREADY in the market you are trying to reach, Potential customers are already looking for your offer.
Click here to sign up for FREE B2B newsletters from Murdok!
Robert Smith owns a full info site about investment clubs. Check Out his site at http://www.ez-investment-clubs.com
