Congratulations or kicks in the teeth? What do you think these bozos deserve?

My friend Michael Rhodes tells me the leading US internet retailers sent 12% more marketing emails in 2009 than they did the year before, at an average of 132 emails to each subscriber, according to a new analysis by Smith-Harmon.

Now, ask yourself. Is that good? What should you conclude?

Should you say, "Wow, these guys are really getting to grips with the internet?" Or, "Stupid bastards. Who wants to hear from a bloody shop nearly 3 times a week? Doesn't life have more to offer?"

I know what I think.

It's just like the way TV spots in the US drive you mad with endless, dreary, boring repetition. Quantity will never beat quality. As my old boss said (better than anyone else, as usual) "You cannot bore people into buying".

He also said that nobody should ever write advertising copy until they have spent two years doing direct response. I did it the other way round; I was an advertising creative director before I really got to grips with direct marketing.

When I did I learned one thing these buggers don't know: that people's attention and reponse to messages decreases VERY fast with repetition. Rosser Reeves, only begetter of the USP, wrote about this in "Reality in Advertising". But most of these advertising bozos don't read books. They practice with other people's money.

When will they ever learn?

To those loveable souls who helped me last month - a confession and one or two promises

When I was performing to utter indifference punctuated by occasional snorts of derision in my first school play I recall being told that dress rehearsals are usually a disaster.

So it was with my trial of Commonsense Marketing last month. The idea, if you recall, was to offer you something a bit better than the sort of thing typified by an email I just got - "Is it this easy? Simple data entry earns up to $924.73 a day" - because it bloody well isn't.

I thought - and still do - that out there there must be a few hundred people who recognise bullshit when they see it, and would like to learn from the ghastly mistakes I made and the odd triumph I enjoyed over the last 50 years in what I now reckon is 50 countries.

I also hoped that there might be a few people who realise that there is life outside the internet; there are still people watching TV commercials, reading ads, opening and replying to direct mail, filling in questionnaires - and so on.

And so it proved. There is intelligent life out there. Thee is room for serious stuff. Quite a few of you are bright enough to recognise and dismiss lies when you read them, and hanker for the genuine article. E mails I sent out got up to 27% opening rate at the beginning of December and I recruited enough of you to teach me how to do better.

So I'd like to thank everyone who gallantly volunteered to give it a try and do one thing I learned is essential: tell you what the results were - especially as I shall spend most of tomorrow filming stuff for you.

1. Everything did indeed go wrong. Despite our prior tests, people didn't receive emails about what was happening about money and when I was running seminars. My friends who attended the EADIM course in London were neglected. The first webinar was a disaster. My pricing was up the spout. My explanations of the deal were confusing. Timing was wrong for people in Australia and New Zealand. And just to distract me, at the same time one or two clients screwed me around for serious money

2. But despite it all, most of you who bravely persevered loved it. Thank you! And thank you, too those who didn't for telling me what you really want. You are all individuals, so your views differed, but I shall try to accommodate as many as possible.

3. Some people wanted a structured A to Z course. I shall be filming the start of that in the morning (though it is morning now, I realise) analysing what marketing is really all about with revealing examples and how to set about it.

4. Others asked for analysis of creative work. I shall give you it. Not just in one medium, but many. TV commercials, direct mail, websites, ads - the lot. Not just selling to consumers but to businesses. Not just British or US, but from all over the world, aimed at all sorts of customers and selling all sorts of products and services at all sorts of prices. Tomorrow I shall be analysing a piece I wrote which doubled the membership of a supporters group at a world-famous Soccer club.

5. Some asked what relevance the interviews I planned would have. I can only say that if you can't learn anything from spending time with some of the world's most imaginative and successful marketers - some of whom have never revealed their secrets - poor you. For example in the past month I have set up interviews with a friend in Santa Monica making big money in the ONLY type of advertising that's currently flourishing, with another in Hawaii who is, quite simply, a REAL marketing legend, and with a man here in London who will explain why one medium which most people are not using at all is going to transform marketing.

Some of you asked if there would be an affiliate programmne. The answer is yes. And one man asked what I could give you that two other experts he named couldn't. The answer was simple: neither of them had worked for a major brand in their lives. They just sell "I'll make you rich" stuff they mostly picked up in seminars. Oh, and I am entertaining, so they tell me. Why should getting better not be fun?

That's enough from me now. It's 4 30 am in London, and time to go to sleep. Keep an eye open if you're interested. More to come.

Smoke up your arse from those Internet Marketing Liars – Were YOU ever caught? Amen to Michel Fortin's comments - extra thought

I’m amazed at the cons that go on every day on the internet.

I spend a little time studying them, because you can learn so much. They all start with one fact I learned years ago. People believe what they want to believe.

So I’ve just spent half an hour listening to the utterly sincere, heartrendingly touching pitch from one of those guys who - like most of them - promises to liberate you from the slavery of working for a living. And, like most of them starts with the touching tale of how he was starving in a trailer park until ... Shazam! - he stumbled on this amazing system that will make YOU rich.

It was “freedom from work forever” – that sort of thing. It was brilliant. You saw how many $$$ you can make each month. You saw the wonderful life this guy leads, his adorable wife and kids, he stammered nervously - couldn't possibly be anything but a real guy like you and me - in fact he used every trick in the book to touch your greedy, foolish, credulous heart.

Then you saw how easy it is, and what an astounding deal you’re going to get. Not $5,000. Not $2,000. No, a mere $997 for this set of DVDs and a couple of booklets that cost, oh, at LEAST $5 to produce. In fact he told you everything you need to know - except the two things that are essential: what to sell and where to find your customers.

This reminded me of something excellent from Michel Fortin the other day. I've edited it slightly because old Michel does go on a bit for a guy who criticises long copy. He predicted:

'We’re going to see more and more marketing prin ciples, strategies and tactics applied to the Internet. More and more outside of Internet marketing, particularly outside the bizoppy, make-​​money arenas.

I’m talking about real businesses selling real stuff using real marketing strategies. And by “real” I don’t mean just physical products and hard goods. I include digital products.

I’m talking about businesses that sell non-​​Internet-​​marketing stuff. To me, too many products appear like ponzi schemes, where someone teaches how to make money online, and the way they make their money is by selling their make-​​money product.

No. I mean real stuff. Not snake-​​oil. Not “secrets.” Not “how to get a gazillion visitors or make a gazillion dollars overnight.” And certainly not circular, “Make money by becoming an affiliate of my make-​​money product!”

I sure hope he's right, because I'm going to spend the next year running round the world in the hope that there just might be enough people around who want to make money the old fashioned way.

EXTRA: after I drafted this at some insane hour this morning I heard about something Nick Usborne wrote explaining why this crap works so well. Some of the crooks I met in the '60's talked about putting people in "Promise Land". Quite so.

More smoke up your arse from those Internet Marketing Liars – Were YOU ever caught? Amen to this from Michel Fortin

I’m amazed at the cons that go on every day on the internet.

I spend a little time studying them, because you can learn so much. They all start with one fact I learned years ago. People believe what they want to believe.

So I’ve just spent half an hour listening to the utterly sincere, heartrendingly touching pitch from one of those guys who - like most of them - promises to liberate you from the slavery of working for a living. And, like most of them starts with the touching tale of how he was starving in a trailer park until ... Shazam! - he stumbled on this amazing system that will make YOU rich.

It was “freedom from work forever” – that sort of thing. It was brilliant. You saw how many $$$ you can make each month. You saw the wonderful life this guy leads, his adorable wife and kids, he stammered nervously - couldn't possibly be anything but a real guy like you and me - in fact he used every trick in the book to touch your greedy, foolish, credulous heart.

Then you saw how easy it is, and what an astounding deal you’re going to get. Not $5,000. Not $2,000. No, a mere $997 for this set of DVDs and a couple of booklets that cost, oh, at LEAST $5 to produce. In fact he told you everything you need to know - except the two things that are essential: what to sell and where to find your customers.

This reminded me of something excellent from Michel Fortin the other day. I've edited it slightly because old Michel does go on a bit for a guy who criticises long copy. He predicted:

'We’re going to see more and more marketing prin­ciples, strategies and tactics applied to the Internet. More and more outside of Internet marketing, particularly outside the bizoppy, make-​​money arenas.

I’m talking about real businesses selling real stuff using real marketing strategies. And by “real” I don’t mean just physical products and hard goods. I include digital products.

I’m talking about businesses that sell non-​​Internet-​​marketing stuff. To me, too many products appear like ponzi schemes, where someone teaches how to make money online, and the way they make their money is by selling their make-​​money product.

No. I mean real stuff. Not snake-​​oil. Not “secrets.” Not “how to get a gazillion visitors or make a gazillion dollars overnight.” And certainly not circular, “Make money by becoming an affiliate of my make-​​money product!”

I sure hope he's right, because I'm going to spend the next year running round the world in the hope that there just might be enough people around who want to make money the old fashioned way.

We shall see.