Hi everyone.
I have been doing email marketing for some time now and to be quite frank, it's a pain in the ass. Here are some of my problems

1) pricing (more i send, more I pay... bleh)
2) integrating with social media - for example: rewarding people for spreading the word (similar to Good Karma Listbuilder)
3) annoying opt-in issues w/various email marketing service guys

Does anyone have anything else to add? I'm gonna spend my own time + money to come up with a solution that i intend on open sourcing. Would love to get a feedback from people before i start delving into this...

Instead of using an email service, why not get some software and rent a mail server and do it yourself? Here is a good site for finding the software:

http://email-marketing-software-comparison.com

Hi,

i visited Simon's link but i think that it needs to be updated. I use Sendblaster (desktop software) on my pc and it's very cheap as user friendly. You could use the free version too that allows you to send unlimited emails (100 at times). Purchasing the license you can always send email to your customers without number restrictions. The license will be for ever yours and don't need to pay anymore.

I hope to have been helpful

You can find all info about it by clicking here: Email marketing software: Mailing software | SendBlaster

Taewoo, I'm sorry to hear your frustrations! Email Marketing solutions have become so comprehensive these days that they do all of the hard work for you (including administration) and offer step-by-step guides to creating a fabulous campaign. Also, the more emails you send out the less you pay and this is why it has been shown to deliver one of the highest ROI of any e-marketing tactic. check out Email Marketing | Mail Blaze | Home.

Sending email is not exactly hard. You don't need to pay a service for doing something so simple. For the same money, you can reach a lot more people with a good mailing program.

I agree Simon, compiling a campaign isn't that difficult and certainly once you have sent your first few campaigns it gets easier. However, I think that if you are new to email marketing it can be quite daunting. Many people incorrectly assume that they need to have HTML or techie knowledge, which is not the case. Most email marketing solutions offer pre-built templates (for newbies) and start from scratch templates (for advanced users), making it a effective solution for both parties.