"Hey, we all get "caught" once in a while! No apology needed, you were only thinking in our best interests!" --Sherry

"I also did same thing once." --Marion

"And Add To The List: The Homepage Virus Is Doing The rounds again." --Michael

"Please check out any "virus warning" you receive. Most are hoaxes." --Sharon

"Thanks for information. It is better to be safe, and warn your friends and customers, than to be sorry!" --Ben

"You were trying to do right thing and that's all that matters." --Cindy

I'm not aware of any unsubscribes due to my snafu but I did get an online greeting card to cheer me up.

I learned 2 things from this incident:

1) Treat people right and they will return it tenfold. --Treat them as you would be treated.

2) Investigate any and all unknown virus claims. --It only takes a couple of minutes to check out a virus warning to see if it's real or not.

The word *propagate* is defined as: to transmit (characteristics) from one generation to another; to breed or multiply.

Check out these useful and informative sites before you unknowingly propagate a *deadly virus*:

http://www.Vmyths.com http://hoaxbusters.ciac.org/ http://www.hoaxkill.com/

So, take it from a *former email viral propagator victim*, investigate that next virus warning before you send it out, and see if it's on list.

Otherwise, hoax will be on you.

1)HIGHLY TARGETED The campaign was highly targeted - at just 54 companies, from USA and other parts of Europe, who we knew were not represented in Scandinavia.

2)SPECIFIC EVENT It was aimed at a particular event, International Online Show, where we knew a number of relevant prospects would be attending.

3)SOMETHING VALUABLE TO OFFER It was aimed at companies who had an interest in selling online information services to business and academic sectors, where my client had a wide range of existing contacts.

4)GOOD TIMING The timing was good - it was sent out in week before Show, when exhibitors were absolutely focused on what they wanted to get out of Show.

5)MANAGEABLE FOLLOW UP The number of companies approached was a manageable number, and resulted in a number of successful responses, which could all be followed up in 3 day duration of Show.

6)REASON TO SAY "YES" The two step approach - a mailing, followed up with a meeting at a venue they were definitely going to attend, made it easier for them to say "yes" to a meeting.

7)DEMONSTRATION OF CREDIBILITY The subsequent meeting was an opportunity to demonstrate credibility and confidence in client's ability to deliver desired result - new business from Scandinavian customers.

8)POWERFUL SALES LETTER And Sales letter was a powerful invitation from an organisation with access to a customer base that each of companies would like to reach, without them having to devote expensive resources to starting from scratch.

It needed to be good. It was being aimed at business professionals, who are notoriously difficult to persuade.

You can see it here at http://www.informationcity.com

I highly recommend this combination of trade show and email campaign. With a little thought, I'm sure many of you can mould such a strategy to your own business circumstances.