It makes sense, instead of chasing hard to get traffic you simply fire out an email to a list of subscribers that you already have a relationship with.

I received an email today (from a list I could have sworn I un-subscribed from a while back) informing me of a new product that is designed to build a list virally.

The idea is you sign up to 6 newsletters and in return get an affiliate link which will encourage others to sign up to your newsletter. Handy, because I only got around to signing up for Aweber today.

Now this sounds a lot to me like a classic pyramid or MLM scheme. Please note, I’m sure the vendors must have looked into this and ensured they aren’t breaking any rules. I’m not claiming this is a pyramid scheme, it just looks a lot like one.

I sign up 10 people, they all sign up 10 people and so on.

It’s a flashy launch, a lot of people will probably sign up, I’m sure I’ll get a few subscribers to my newsletter – which doesn’t exist yet. Add another task to the list.

My worry is with the quality of sign-ups. If people are just signing-up so they can in turn get signatures to their own list then where’s the value in any of this? The promo video even reminds you you can un-subscribe from the initial 6 lists at any time.

To be honest, I haven’t even confirmed any of the 6 sign-ups yet. I probably will just to give this thing a fair chance. But all-in-all I’m dubious.

Mostly I signed up to give my new Aweber account something to do and learn the auto-responder ropes as I went along.

Anyway, if you want to try it out it’s free, unless you opt for the “Elite” member package. I actually managed to avoid doing this, I’m getting better at keeping my cash in my pocket. Here’s my affiliate link:

The Viral Secret

Check it out for yourself.

Initially, like I did, you might think yes because it’s one way to limit the amount of spam you’ll get on your blog.

However, I’m in the world of Internet Marketing now so I need to look at this question in a particular way.

What is it that most Internet Marketers strive for? Answer, a mailing list. So by forcing readers to register so they can leave a comment it might appear you are attempting to build a list on the sly.

Genuinely, I initially thought requiring registration was a good idea but now I’ve had a chance to think again, and following some helpful advice from a reader over at NetMarketingGuides.com, it can only hurt to keep the registration requirement in place.

So I’ve switched it off. I think I’ll be able to manually handle the “deluge” of comments for the time being.