Tag: email

May 18, 2016

Email Marketing – Professional or Spam?

You can buy millions of email addresses for a few hundred dollars and you would likely find that most of them are rubbish or out of date and useless.

But there are reputable Marketing agencies that strive to use email Marketing in a more considered and professional manner.

We received an email from a professional online Marketing company in Manchester offering to use their contacts database and create an email campaign for us.

It says an average campaign of 10,000 emails costs £415 including design of the emails, follow-up emails and website data.

This is not something we would ever use but you can see why so many companies do go down this route and try email marketing.

The key point really is use a professional business to do the work for you and pay a sensible price.

Don’t go cheap rate – you’ll only get rubbish.

May 9, 2016

The Miss Ayesha Gadaffi Scam

This email shows the level of stupidity of many scammers.

It reads

“I am Miss. Ayesha Gaddafi, one of the daughters of the embattled president of Libya, I am currently residing in one of the African Countries, unfortunately as a refugee. At the meantime, my family is the target of Western nations led by NATO who wants to destroy my father at all costs. Our investments and bank accounts in several countries are their targets to freeze.

I have been commissioned to contact an interested foreign investor/partner who will be able to take absolute control of part of the vast cash available (£35 million) for a possible investment in your country.

Therefore if you can maintain the high level of secrecy required in this project, kindly respond with the following information for details of

Your full names and address
Your private telephone and fax numbers
Your private email address
Age and profession

Best Regard,

Miss.Ayesha Gaddafi”

It’s nearly 4 years since Colonel Gadaffi died but still some moron thinks he should send out this old scam email. This is both ridiculous and pathetic.

March 28, 2016

Emails From Yourself Scam

Guest Post by Gerry

Gerry says I received a spam email the other day – from myself!

Somehow, my email address has been spoofed, and used to send out emails that appear to be from me.

It’s quite scary to receive spam from yourself. I scanned my PC for viruses, but it came up clean. It’s an email address I have had since the dawn of email, so I imagine somewhere along the line, it’s been picked up by some unscrupulous junk emailers. It does make the point, however, that you need to be careful even when an email appears to come from someone you know.

This email was just a one liner, saying click here, and the link appeared to be an advert, although I didn’t look too closely. Is someone you know likely to send you a website link out of the blue, with no explanation? Think twice before clicking.

Why would someone send me emails using my own email address. Because most people have spam filters on their email to weed out the rubbish but if the email is from yourself then it will bypass those filters.

If you receive an email from yourself – then just delete it.

March 2, 2016

How To Use Email Safely

Safety First

There are many things you can do to prevent scam emails causing you problems. The main thing is just to be vigilant. Here are a few ways to be safe.

General

Most Microsoft and other email clients come with spam filtering as standard. Ensure yours is switched on.
Most spam and junk filters can be set to allow email to be received from trusted sources, and blocked from untrusted sources.
Do not open emails which you suspect as being spam.

Unknown Sender

Do not respond to emails from unknown sources.
Do not open attachments from unknown sources.

Links in the Email

Do not readily click on links in emails from unknown sources. Instead, roll your mouse pointer over the link to reveal its true destination, displayed in the bottom left corner of your screen. Beware if this is different from what is displayed in the text of the link from the email.
Sometimes emails have an Unsubscribe link. If the email is from a reputable organisation then you can click on that if you wish to avoid further emails from them. But if the email is from an unknown sender then beware clicking on Unsubscribe as it may just be a method to get a reply from you.

Do not make purchases or charity donations in response to spam email.

Remember – stay vigilant.

February 22, 2016

The Bill to be Paid Scam

All businesses and many individuals get these scam emails.

The emails are made to look as if from a reputable company sending you a bill for some product or service you have received. The bill is usually a file attachment. Maybe a .doc file or ,zip or .exe or .php. Do not open any of these as they can contain viruses.

The scam relies on businesses processing the bill as if it was genuine and only realising when too late that it wasn’t for a genuine product or service received.

With individuals they rely on people opening the attached file or clicking on the link. The attachment may contain a virus that will infect your PC or the link may take you to a bogus website designed to steal your identity or financial information.

How do you tell if the email is genuine or a scam?

The simple answer is if you are not expecting such a bill then assume it is fake and delete the email. Do not open the attachment to see what it is – especially if it is a .zip file or .exe file or .php link

These scams only work if people don’t pay attention – don’t be caught out.