Email and Spam

How do you build a large email list, communicate to them effectivly, and not be considered spam? In the Chisholm articel about building an email list, she suggests having friends on the emila list use their own initiative ot expand it. Also, at every possible opportunity one should be give the chance to sign up for the newsletter. However, even if it is not spam, many users will treat mass emails in such a way. Even worse, there are spam filters that will screen out non-spam emails simply because of certain trigger words in the subject line. In order to avoid this, Kari Chisholm's article is linked to another which guides email senders to prevent their message from being confused with spam: http://www.mandatemedia.com/cgi-bin/display.cgi?page=emailprimer

I know I still don't like opening mass emails. . . especially if they say they're from John Kerry or from some staff minion at the DNC or DCCC. . . but there are some that I can be persuaded to open. I don't know why or on what criteria. . .but I suppose that it works out to a law of averages. IF you send me 10 emails, chances are i'll open 1.