The hackers are drawn to Yahoo Groups, because there’s large databases of targeted email addresses they can pirate (the words “erotic” and “romance” draw them like pixies to honey). I think that’s why mine was hacked. I had close to a thousand addresses. I lost them all — they didn’t just copy them, they *took* them. Luckily, I had an old, back-up copy on my hard drive, but it was out of date, and short by about 250 addresses.

I tried a pay-for professional service for over a year, but it’s *too* professional — forcing readers to go through three screens worth of sign-up dialogue just scares ‘em away. I don’t care what the Can-Spam act says, readers just want to get to the good stuff, pronto. The pay-for services like iContact work for professional marketers who work their email contact lists daily, and need the double-opt in as much for their own protection as the receiver does. And with as many subscribers as I’ve got, and given how much authors really make, paying over $50 US a month plus exchange rates was killing me.

So I went the DIY route, instead. The contact list lives safely on my hard drive, and I have a remote back-up server on my own home network, so it’s double-safe. I have 100% control over everything, and any reader who signs up gets my personal attention from start to finish.

It’s not Yahoo Groups by a long chalk. But it works for me. And it seemed to work for my readers, too. I got so many “It’s good to have you back!” messages when I got rid of iContact, that it was scary.

Tracy

I have to admit, you get the trophy for being “unique.”
Your newsletters beat all, they’re like opening a mini-book. Love it!

Tracy and Keira:
All this talk about spamming & hacking makes me want to shut down my computer! I understand your points and of course’ its validity, which is why I have Norton 360. For other times of vulnerability, I just cross fingers and toes for the tiki gods to protect me.

And I got tired of the hackers and spammers trying to get at my subscription list, which I worked hard to build up for three years, before some jerk destroyed it overnight.

Now I run my newsletter through my own system. Combined with my blog, where I can still get readers chatting back and forth, just like on Groups, I have the best of both worlds, and so do the readers.

But I love Yahoo Groups for everything else that you include above.

Tracy