Self Employed Success

Last week, we had special guest Jamie Novak on our free monthly teleclass, giving us great tips to Get Organized Today!

Jamie helped us with:

• Time management
• Messy desks
• Piles of paper and filing
• Managing email

The audio recording of that teleclass is now available:

http://www.passionforbusiness.com/teleclass/jamie-novak.htm

I’ve noticed a trend lately: a lot of sign-ups to my mailing list from the same IP address. So I did a little research and lo-and-behold, it’s a “zombie” computer automatically signing up for ezines in order to steal the return address when you send the “thanks for signing up” autoresponder. (Those little stinkers!)

So, what do you do?

• First, check to see if your ezine software captures the IP (internet protocol) address of people when they sign up. I use Professional Cart Solutions (a variant of 1shoppingcart.com), and they DO capture IP addresses of each person who signs up.
• Next, check for repeat IP addresses. I notice that these sign-ups are always in the “waiting for optin” list under the Manage Clients tab, because they have no intention of opting-in. It’s easy to find them: look for email addresses that don’t match the name they signed up under. For instance, the name is “Mary Jones” but the email address says georgesmith@xxxxxx.com. The email addresses are almost always from hotmail.com, gmail.com, mail.com, or yahoo.com because these are free email services.
• When you find repeat IP addresses, type the IP address into Google and do some research. For example, this IP address comes up a lot on my wait-list: 203.113.13.3. When I type it into Google, I find that it’s a zombie computer and Wikipedia has blocked it
• Finally, I go back to my mailing system, and look for the place where I can block specific IP addresses from either ordering from me or from signing up for my mailing lists. In the case of Professional Cart Solutions/1shoppingcart, it’s under the Orders tab.

Voila! Now that zombie can’t sign up for my mailing list anymore!

It takes a little due diligence to keep your list clean, but it’s well worth it. And if your mailing list system won’t let you ban IP addresses, consider switching to a new one.

Recently, Angee Robertson did a great teleclass for us, full of tips on how to work more efficiently in your small business office.

Learn how to deal with:

• email overwhelm
• a great follow up system
• interruptions that drive you crazy

You can listen to the audio of this teleclass here:

http://www.passionforbusiness.com/teleclass/angee-robertson.htm