[thelist] Strategic Advertising

[Caleb Mazalevskis]

Hello.

I was hoping to seek advice on methods of mailing list advertisement, if 
anyone has any knowledge in that area.

I operate a small mailing list called HitList 
(http://hitlist.cmaza.net/), primarily aimed at an audience wanting to 
discuss content on my website, discuss any topics based on or arising 
from my website (such as music and digital art), but I don't feel it's 
reaching it's target audience all that strongely.

What's the best way to go about advertising my mailing list?

Usually if it's a forum or such, you could generate traffic by posting 
at other forums of similar interest, operate forum affiliation programs 
or add links in your signature on forums you reside at etcetra.
I know a few methods of advertising those sort of things... but I don't 
really have much experience advertising mailing lists.

They arn't accessable in the same terms of browser based discussion 
mediums in the sense you can't just load a page, read onwards, track a 
topic of intrigue, reply etectra (you get the idea).

At first I was thinking news groups... but most news groups don't 
tolerate advertising (or the less coated way of putting it, spam), 
unless ofcourse that's the sort of news group they are in which case you 
probably don't want their redirected traffic anyway.

Word of mouth works extremely well in this instance I've discovered, and 
probably better for mailing lists that it does for browser based 
discussion mediums, but that can only go so far as if it's word of 
mouth, your more likely to just talk to the person anyway and the point 
of joining is kind of defeated for the consumer.

Take in mind that I don't have a revenue of money to spend and would 
rather hear about methods that don't cost money.

Any advice is appreciated. Thanks.

-Caleb.