Consider newsgroups a massive, organized version of your supermarket bulletin board. This is a place where people are coming to seek out information and assistance.
Here are some tips on finding the best newsgroups for your posts or contacting other industry experts. These tips will help businesses as well as personal users gain a better understanding on how to use newsgroups.
1. Use a browser or newsreader that allows you to do keyword searches amongst the newsgroup categories. With over 10,000 groups on most news servers, this feature allows for easy access to groups that contain words related to your calling or interests.
2. Once you start exploring these groups, you'll find lots of great contacts for sales, technical information, and common objectives. Feel free to post your questions and insights. However, it is common practice to avoid hideously obvious sales pitches. Think of this as an area where relationships and networking contacts are built. Rewards will come later, in other forms of communication.
3. Most newsreaders allow you to single click on any post in order to email the author. Use this when you don't want the whole group to see your communications or if you have something to relate to the post's author specifically.
4. Pay attention to the most popular posts. You can determine what interests the group by counting the entries below the original post (click on the + to expand the directory).
5. Avoid the junk. Most it comes in the form of subject lines that look like this: $$$$$$LOSE WEIGHT BY EATING DOUGHNUTS$$$$$$$.
The all caps and symbols #@$^% are a dead giveaway. Ignore these posts and you'll save yourself some time.
 

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