A Mixed Message from Someone “In the Know”
July 8th, 2008 | by Paul Rushing Published in Brand Building, Email Marketing | 26 Comments
Almost daily I receive UCE (unsolicited commercial email) and I am sure most that read this blog do as well. I have even done some post in the past about how the vendors in the industry do not follow the CAN SPAM Act. But what is amazing is when I receive UCE from someone who proclaims to be
Masters of eMarketing
Yep that bold, in a message that reeks spam from the top to the bottom. It was an alleged personal email from someone who works for Jim Zeigler based my membership at Ralph Paglia’s social network, Automotive Digital Marketing Professional Community.
Please keep in mind I had no idea who Jim Ziegler was prior to receiving this spam email promoting “The Masters of Internet Sales and eMarketing Seminar” in Atlanta, GA. Mixed message indeed. Apparently he is someone who makes his living from publishing content as a dealer advocate, training seminars and paid speaking engagements. Some of the things he publishes make me really wonder what his true motivations are. I can tell by his pen demeanor he will not be real happy with this post reviewing his product.
FYI, Bully Marketing is dead, unless you are in the make money online niche. Well I guess he is in that sub niche of the automobile industry, he just calls it training and motivation.
The SPAM was based on a an abuse of a social networking platform wanting to sell a training package on how to market online. I just need to ask….
What is he training here?
- How to abuse social networks to harvest email addresses?
- How to send mass spam using yahoo email accounts?
- How to alienate a prospect before they even desire what you are selling?
Believe me I know how to do these things already and have in the past made a lot of money doing it via affiliate marketing. Those days are long gone they died out with the CAN SPAM Act and affiliate networks setting guidelines as it became evident this type of marketing did not bring prospects in, but only infuriated people and opened up legal problems.
Let me make a recommendation to you Mr Ziegler before you attempt to sell a training program that allegedly teaches people:
- Social eNetworking
- Building your on-line brand with effective marketing strategies
- Strategic eMarketing and SEO techniques
You need to learn the ropes yourself.
Social networking sites have built in measures to prevent overt spam such as this but it does happen. The email address that was harvested and spammed was set up exclusively to open an account at Squidoo.com and posted in my profile at Ralph’s site. I do not use that email for any other purpose. Ralph has confirmed with me that he DID NOT provide Mr Ziegler with any email addresses from his site and even pointed out what I already knew. My email address was mined from there, either using software or by his employees going through the profiles and scraping the email addresses. Nothing new or novel about that.
Terms of Service at ning make this a violation of the communal standards in place to safeguard member from receiving spam based on their participation.
This type of behavior is illegal. The letter did not have any of the components in it for it comply with 15 § U.S.C. 7704 (a)(5). (i) It did not contain the verbiage that the message was an advertisement. (ii) It did not contain an opt out method. (iii) It did not contain the physical address of the sender. The Ziegler corporation sells law book on their website and they cannot even abide the Can Spam Act. The fact that the employees that sent the emails in their names with a deceptive subject title does not give them a pass on having to comply with the Can SPAM Act as they were not members of the networking site. How can you trust anything coming from them? If you can more power to you. This is the type of behavior that can cause you problems in your email marketing efforts. Legal Disclaimer : I am not an attorney, do not construe my opinion as legal advice!
It does appear that they are going to also be pushing video blogging and “effective” blogging techniques. After reviewing The Ziegler Corporation’s blog and online properties I do not see what is very effective about them.
Remember you lead by example and if this is the example you wish to follow you are very gullible. Remember the saying “A fool and his money are soon parted”. Don’t be a fool!!
You can learn to do these things on your own all of that is available for you now. Just use Google to learn how to set up a wordpress blog or you can wait I will set up a tutorial to show you how to set up and effective lead generating blog at a price that everyone can afford. FREE
Stay tuned at Internet Sales Manager in Training
UPDATE 7/18/08
I had given my dealer notice to pursue other opportunities on 7/15/2008. We reached an agreement for me to train someone to take my place. Daily I received communication from someone inside my store that I need to be careful with “blog postings” that I have made and was asked to leave yesterday in an amicable fashion. This was immediately after an online chat with someone inside the “Ziegler Corporations”.
Apparently there have been multiple emails and conversations with my former employer. What is amusing is the grief I received from people inside of the company and they have not even read the whole post here. All referral traffic from the corporate mail server only went to the home page of http://ismintraining.com.
I have received tremendous support from people in the industry as well as some not so supportive interactions. I have heard innuendo, suppositions and have some of my own, which was shared with the contact inside of the Ziegler camp.
Even some of the interactions I have had with people that do not have a clue about online networking have made some comical statements about this blog post and the organizations mentioned here.
No contact from JZ directly. I welcome it in an amicable setting. The original intent of the post was to show the etiquette needed when involved in social networking and to give an example of how not to leverage those mediums. Apparently Mr Ziegler has construed this as a personal attack and that was not the intent.
It is not him that was attacked. His product was scrutinized based on the way his company chose to advertise it. Maybe he and I can take this as a learning experience and move on and do what we do best.
Deliver our message in the best way we see fit.
Update 7/23/2008 :
Received a phone call from “Da Man”. Once the call was answered and he confirmed he was speaking with we me were disconnected. I promptly returned his call thinking that maybe it was a bad connection on my end. He stated “Nope it was not on your end, this is Jim Ziegler and just wanted to confirm that you would answer the phone. Click….” He would not answer again. I have confirmed that the number the call was placed from is one that he advertises on several of his online listings.
Not long ago I had to take my 10 yo sons cell phone away from him for making crank calls. I think I need to get my child to explain to him how rude it is to call people and hang up. He, the 10 yo, remembers his lesson well. Maybe next week if when I take the kids to 6 Flags we can stop in and let him give “The Master of eMarketing” a lesson on phone etiquette.
I misconstrued the reason for the calls per Jim Ziegler:
James A. Ziegler, CSP, HSG
“Wed, Jul 23, 2008 at 5:37 PM”>5:37 PM (25 minutes ago)
My apology for accidentally calling you. I was actually trying to reach Carl Gregory Hyundai, your former employer doing research concerning my case. (against who for what?)
I used the phone number on their Hyundai web site and, unfortunately, it was still your phone number. It was not intentional. Sorry to bother you.
J.C. Hurst and I and my employees have been instructed by attorney NOT to communicate you while we have an ongoing legal case happening. I am sure you understand…JIM
James A. Ziegler, CSP, HSG
This Man Means Business (R)
Update July 26, 2008
Received a letter from Myers & Fuller P.A. Demanding that this blog post be taken down. You can see the letter at scribd.com the live link is Letter from Jim Ziegler’s Attorney to Paul Rushing
This was attached to that letter : Draft complaint James Ziegler vs Paul Rushing
My reply to this letter can be viewed at My Response to James Ziegler vs Paul Rushing
My Second Letter removing my retraction: My Second Response to James Ziegler vs Paul Rushing
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July 8th, 2008at 11:51 pm(#)
Paul,
Please consider accepting my sincerest apologies in regards to your experience receiving unsolicited emails to the address you posted in your personal profile at http://www.AutomotiveDigitalMarketing.com. The spamming strategies and practices you describe are not something that either I, nor the company I work for condone or support. As you know, at ADM I set up the member profiles to display websites each member lists as live links, just a little something to contribute towards link popularity… But, I set it to that email addresses used are displayed as static text, in an ettempt to make it just a little more difficult to use scraping software to harvest email addresses without the site’s permission… Of course, that does not prevent visitors from copying and pasting. As a result of your experience, I am going to try and set email addresses for ADM members to be displayed on an optional basis… Thank you for your participation at ADM… The community is better off because o your generous contributions of guidance, strategies and digital marketing best practices.
July 9th, 2008at 12:02 am(#)
Thanks Ralph,
It really is not your fault and I am aware of that as well as anyone else who would receive spam messages like this. If it would have been from the Russian Wives.
I would not of paid it second thought.
It is a shame that people think using social networks to deliver their messages think that this is proper decorum in these settings.
Unfortunately for all involved in this segment to make the industry better we have people that think this behavior is acceptable and how it should be done.
This was not a post to ridicule but to educate. The offender and others that try to follow this example really need to understand the gravity of this type of marketing.
Or they find them selves in court!!
July 9th, 2008at 9:58 am(#)
Paul, thanks for pointing that out. I was close to posting something about this too. I don’t know Jim personally but he sure sure has a way of “making a mark”.
July 9th, 2008at 10:19 am(#)
Well Jeff we are all “Marks” on the retail side. The sad thing is this technique can work. He just picked the wrong place to mine email addresses from.
There are easier ways to build a list like that but I don’t want to give them any ideas.
July 9th, 2008at 7:07 pm(#)
Ouch, embarassing moment for a Master of eMarketing… As I see it there are two problems here:
1. He scraped the email right off a social network, a place where you join with valued associates in a trusted environment. It makes one wonder how much he understands the true value of the network or environment created there.
2. The email blast was not even can spam compliant in the most basic elements.
All this is compounded because he proclaims himself as a “world renowned internet marketing expert.” Now, in his defense he has done some great stuff with traditional dealerships and traditional tacticts… he just missed the boat here big time.
There are plenty of legitimate ways to build and market to a list. He should know better from his position, I hope it was a staffer who did it in his name without him knowing. (benifit of doubt)
July 9th, 2008at 7:59 pm(#)
[...] A Mixed Message from Someone “In the Know” [...]
July 9th, 2008at 8:07 pm(#)
Jared Said “I hope it was a staffer who did it in his name without him knowing. (benifit of doubt)”
From the interactions I had today with the other name on the email I do not think that is the case.
I have offered Mr Ziegler the opportunity to address this and he has not thus far. That really says a lot about the other diatribe he publishes.
You cant be a “Master of Internet Sales and eMarketing” and get this wrong.
July 15th, 2008at 8:27 pm(#)
“Technology-Assisted Relationship Sales with Jim Ziegler was really out there. Even for me! That was just enough information for a green pea to become really dangerous, and not in a good way.”
I actually feel bad for Jim. He has been respected for many years throughout the automotive dealer community. There is nothing wrong with reinventing yourself but be sure you know the game before you step on the field, especially if you’re viewed as a coach.
Jeff
July 15th, 2008at 8:29 pm(#)
Jim is one of those extremely rare individuals that can actually perform what he teaches in the real world environments. As Ziegler will tell you… “I am the best there is at what I do!”
July 15th, 2008at 10:11 pm(#)
[...] those of you who haven’t heard yet, Paul Rushing called out Jim Ziegler on breaking some basic rules of e-marketing, while e-marketing to dealers about training them on [...]
July 16th, 2008at 12:06 pm(#)
Paul,
FIRST OF ALL, I would like to sincerely apologize to you and anyone here who received the “eMarketing” email.
(I have been out of town or I would have responded to this matter days ago).
I’m the IT/Internet Marketing Director for The Ziegler Corporations. I have total control over all marketing materials, (print & electronic), that leave our office. The ball is in my court… and I’ve gotta’ shoot. I take FULL responsibility for the un-solicited email that you and other members of Ralph Paglia’s site received early last week. I did not personally send it, but I have confirmed who did. There is one thing that you all can be certain of, it WILL NOT happen again!
I am a CAN-SPAM advocate 100%. Our newsletters require a double opt-in to subscribe and always contain an un-subscribe link. Our lists are very secure as well.
Ralph, given that the addys were pulled from your networking site, a huge and sincere apology goes out to you as well! I know how much Jim thinks of you and respects you.
Sincerely,
J.C.
J.C. Hurst
IT/Internet Marketing Director
The Ziegler Corporations
July 16th, 2008at 2:32 pm(#)
J.C.,
A lot of water has run under the bridge since this incident occurred. I am sure your apology is very welcomed and appreciated. However, Mr. Ziegler owes Paul Rushing a sincere and public apology for his intimidation and veiled threats through his representative.
July 16th, 2008at 3:16 pm(#)
JC I appreciate your comments and do accept your apology. I hope you did not condone the emails and phone calls to my employer.
As Frank said Mr Ziegler went way over board with his reaction and lack of acknowledgment. With that being said he handled this in a very sophomoric and juvenile manner.
He has a long way to go before anything coming from the Ziegler Camp will ever have any credibility in my eyes or the eyes of many in the industry.
July 17th, 2008at 10:50 am(#)
All -
It seems to me we have a lot of people here that need to channel this energy into selling cars and not trying to run down someone that may or may not have made a mistake. I could understand it if you had received several emails but for one email this seems a bit ridiculous.
Everyone makes mistakes but to personally attack someone over something this minor is too much for me. I’m really not in to hate blogs. If you have something constructive to share do so. If you just want to attack and spread hate, well in my opinion your the lowest form of web presence far below spammers.
Larry Bruce
Founder / President / CEO
AIMData
July 17th, 2008at 3:53 pm(#)
Seems like a fairly constructive dialog to me, Larry.
Paul did what he does best which is to boldly exploit a lot of the setbacks we observe and experience in this industry. It is stuff like this that leads dealers astray and creates such bad tastes in peoples’ mouths, and Paul exercised his personality and influence in the industry to address the concern.
But the constructive aspect here is how, JC Hurst, the person claiming responsibility for this event has performed a constructive act of damage control.
The likeliness of Paul’s bad experience here being so constructively addressed by the vendor had he contacted them about it directly is pretty slim.
The Spirit of blogging at hand. The more dealers that see this the better!
July 17th, 2008at 7:43 pm(#)
In response to Larry,
Obviously you do not realize how much a spam complaint could really cost Ziegler. Do some research. As said earlier you can’t be a Master of eMarketing and get this wrong.
If it was the activity of a “renegade” employee it means some one is not minding the store. How often is accountability overused in this industry? Probably as much as the old guard thinks tacky interstitials with auto played audio with fast moving graphics is what web visitors want to see, unless they are on a quest to induce a seizure.
In response to Ryan,
I emailed and called Ziegler prior to publishing this article and did not receive a response. To many other self important things going on to respond to someone about unethical marketing practices, would be my guess?
He did take the time to call and email my dealer principle. Which was the wrong person to address this with and may have other implications that I have been advised not to discuss.
The whole purpose of this post was to show others how NOT to leverage social networking. If it draws scorn from the old school they are the ones with a problem not me.
July 18th, 2008at 7:01 pm(#)
Larry Bruce,
Please take a second and look at at Mr. Ziegler’s last article in Dealer Magazine. Look how negative he is in his column and how many derogatory references me makes towards individuals. Look how he disparages people with reckless abandon.
Here for example is a little ditty from his July column, “Once again, if the dealers would come forward and produce the evidence, we certainly hurt this fool and punish the company. You dealers in Kansas, Missouri and Iowa could probably even tell me this moron’s name if I were to ask.(Notice I said “moron” to be polite, actually, I was thinking “rat-bastard.”)
If you want to talk about anybody “running down” anyone, please address Mr. Ziegler and not Paul Rushing. I know you are defending your fiend, but you cannot defend the indefeasible.
In your own words you just described Mr. Ziegler as, “The lowest form of web presence far below spammers.”
July 19th, 2008at 2:00 am(#)
Hi Paul,
After reading this thread I went back to the emails(yes plural) that I got from the EMarketing genius that has not heard of the Can Spam Act, I got two, one was from Kimberly and the other was from Abbey. I searched the emails for an opt out button or opt out instructions and couldn’t find anything. I personally don’t consider myself an EMarketing guru by any means, but I do know any email I send needs to have something adressing an opt out to keep myself legal.
Evidently your employer is very short sighted, I have not seen anything posted here that should have any bearing on your employment, you called someone out for abusing a social network and not having compliant emails, in fact your ex-employer should be happy that you know the laws and are keeping him from having legal action taken against him.
I unfortunatly saw “Da Man” speak once, the main message I took away from his session was that he wasn’t being paid enough to be there, but I guess he thought he could make that up by plugging his product the rest of the time.
Does anybody have a copy of the Can Spam act they can the Ziegler company to help them make their emails compliant?
Jon
July 19th, 2008at 9:11 am(#)
Joe I was told by someone that those emails were only sent to people who were close to the “Masters of eMarketing” location. You are in Oregon from best I can tell. Pretty far from Atlanta. I may be wrong but even the tracks that are being covered have holes in them!!
July 19th, 2008at 8:50 pm(#)
I liked the fact they sent two identical emails to me at the same time with two different names in the subject lines, it really added that personal non spam touch:)
I sent the Bastards, oops I’m sorry, the Masters of EMarketing an email last night pointing out how their email was not compliant with the Can Spam act and that I would like to opt out of any further emails from their company. At least now I know how they got my email address, I didn’t know I would need to hide my email address on ADM to escape spam. In my email last night I challenged them to see if they could get me fired for pointing out the facts to them, but I don’t think they will have much luck since my owner doesn’t have any clue who he is.
As for sending the emails to locations around the conference, you kind of have to give them a break, if they don’t know about the Can Spam act, how can you expect them to know about geography
Jon
July 19th, 2008at 9:08 pm(#)
Paul,
I read Mr. Zeigler’s monthly article in Dealer magazine for its entertainment value. It is reminiscent of the daily diatribes of Rush Limbaugh…fairly humorous yet narcissistic to a fault. And while I am in total agreement with Larry that we all make mistakes, if you call yourself one of the “Masters of eMarketing”, you expose yourself to much deserved scrutiny…especially if you violate a rookie mistake of eMarketing like “Da’ Man” did. Since Mr. Zeigler is still a respected trainer and leader in our industry, I think it would be appropriate if he would issue a statement…an apology…something or anything from him and NOT one of his constituents. If he did it and did it quickly, I think it would be easier to accept that “‘Da Man” is just “a man” and makes mistkaes as we all do.
Keep up the great work Paul.
By the way, I also received the email and I live almost 7 hours from Atlanta.
July 21st, 2008at 1:12 am(#)
I have been observing much of the discussions around this issue across several blogs and wanted to provide an update. After I read the following comment; “(this network publicly displays the email address of its members, whether they’ve consented to it or not - something that is against the tenets of DrivingSales)” in a DrivingSales.com post, I carefully considered the profile set up at http://www.AutomotiveDigitalMarketing.com and went into the Administrative application to make the following changes:
1. Each ADM Member now has 2 email fields to use
2. Email Field #1 is a Published address that will be visible to all ADM members
3. Email Field #2 is an Unpublished address visible only to ADM administrators
Previous to this new optional email setup, we “de-linked” the published field that contained ADM member email addresses to display them as static text only and not a live hyperlink. This was to prevent certain types of software from being able to generate automated emails from what was published, had it been in a live link format. The new ADM member profile setup allows ADM members to choose what, if any, email address they want to publish for all ADM members to see, and then use either the same email address, or a different one for access by ADM administrators.
I also believe that this comment, the actions it represents and all the various related posts, comments, emails and phone callls that many of us saw or received are a good example of how the automotive digital marketing professionals who use blogs and communities like http://www.DrivingSales.com , http://ISMinTraining.com and http://www.AutomotiveDigitalMarketing.com are proactively impacting our entire industry in a positive manner. For those of you who are automotive internet marketing and sales “old timers”, to say we have come a long way since the days of posting liner ads on BBS’s is truly an understatement!
Ralph Paglia
rpaglia@gmail.com
July 25th, 2008at 11:08 am(#)
[...] opinions expressed here are mine and are not those of any industry associations I may have. A recent post here caused some personal grief because a reader did not like what they saw and it has recently happened [...]
July 27th, 2008at 10:46 am(#)
[...] When I originally read this letter I was highly amused by it’s content then became incensed. Let’s face it. They attempted to abridge my freedoms that the Constitution of the United States of America imparts on the citizens of our great country under the 1st Amendment, by demanding that I remove my opinion of a marketing product and how they choose to promote it. Here is the full post “A mixed message from someone “in the Know”. [...]
July 30th, 2008at 4:24 pm(#)
To All -
Nobody can win this, there’s nothing to win just endless debate.
Jim messed up got the emails from the bad source and didn’t send them the right way. Paul messed up and blogged about it unknowing that Jim would take it the wrong way. I messed up even getting sucked into this deal, we’re all car guys and we are all trying to close the sale.
Enough is Enough! I’m over it
August 1st, 2008at 5:42 am(#)
All comments that could be taken as a highly personal attack on Mr Ziegler have been moved back to the moderation cue and this thread is now locked to new comments unless Mr Ziegler wishes comment. I will allow him an unedited comment if he desires and then open the tread back for discussion.
This is based on a gentleman’s agreement he and I have made. I am upholding my end of it, I hope he does as well.