Extracting LinkedIn Friends' Emails and Sending Bulk Gmail Messages
Hi Good People,
I'm now like a month or two here at WA and liking it. Recently, I was wondering if there was anyway I could extract my LinkedIn friends' emails and send them a bulk message through Gmail. So I researched and came up with a lot of good information.
There are guys I've met at LinkedIn and would have liked to send them emails but of course needed their addresses. For quite sometime I couldn't get that because of knowledge gap :) but not anymore. So I have explained all this using step-by-step screenshots, etc.
Now that I've never before blogged here at WA, and I do not quite at the moment know what I should write or not write, if any of you wonderful people would be interested to read what I found out and to apply it as far as it's ethical (that is, do not use the techniques learnt to send spam messages, etc), then you could inbox me and I'll send you the information. Thanks a lot!
Recent Comments
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I've been educated by some of the savvy folks at WA that this may be considered spamming. It may not enhance your online reputation. The best way to assemble a business e-mail list is to use an opt-in form, by which people who sign up know ahead of time that you may be contacting them with business messages. Perhaps others can chime in on this because I have had this as a question myself.
Hi Marco and JT,
I personally have been thinking that sending bulk e-mail to my LinkedIn 'network' guys could be spamming. So I un-published my e-book from Amazon, pending further asking around. Both your thoughts are good for me but are contrasting. JT says it's not spamming; Marco says it is spamming. I do not know what to think now. Contribute more in the debate please. I do not want to publish a book that will teach people how to extract LinkedIn emails only to send spam :)
I have asked several of the Ambassadors here about this via private messages. The responses I received indicate that if you assemble an email list for the purpose of soliciting business on your site(s), you should assemble it from willing joiners, hence the opt-in form. If people start receiving periodic solicitations from you, and they know they didn't ask for it, many will get annoyed and consider it spam. Then your online business reputation can suffer.
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I don't have any professional experience in this, but I would guess that it is not spamming. Because you know these people and you'll be like, "hey guys, I have a new website. I'd appreciate it if you'd check it out." If you create an email list without their permission and keep sending them stuff, that's different... but just once to tell your online friends that they can see your website and get on that list if they want to shouldn't be a problem. The reason that I guess that this is not spamming is because Facebook allows you to ask all of your friends to like your page. Then, if they do, it is their choice.
Hi JT and Marco (below),
I personally have been thinking that sending bulk e-mail to my LinkedIn 'network' guys could be spamming. So I un-published my e-book from Amazon, pending further asking around. Both your thoughts are good for me but are contrasting. JT says it's not spamming; Marco says it is spamming. I do not know what to think now. Contribute more in the debate please. I do not want to publish a book that will teach people how to extract LinkedIn emails only to send spam :)