eMailMagic

Web Guru - Jeremiah Owyang

2007-12-19T14:23:00.000+09:00

Jeremiah is a well-known web strategy and media expert and director of corporate media strategy at PodTech.net, where he consults with PodTech's Fortune 1000.

He also writes a daily technology, PR, and marketing strategy Web Strategy by Jeremiah blog

Preventing avoidable exposure

2007-12-13T19:54:00.000+09:00

A man is getting into the shower just as his wife is finishing up her shower when the doorbell rings. The wife quickly wraps herself in a towel and runs downstairs. When she opens the door, there stands Bob, the next door neighbor. Before she says a word, Bob says, "I'll give you $800 to drop that towel." She thinks for a moment, then drops her towel and stands naked in front of Bob. After a few seconds, Bob hands her $800 dollars and leaves.

The woman wraps back up in the towel and goes back upstairs. When she gets to the bathroom, her husband asks, "Who was that?" "It was Bob, our next door neighbor," she replies. "Great!" the husband says, "Did he say anything about the $800 he owes me?"

Moral of the story: If you share critical information pertaining to credit and risk with your shareholders in time, you may be in a position to prevent avoidable exposure.

For more light hearted corporate advice visit: www.bobpritchard.com

Web Guru - Jim Sterne

2007-11-19T14:20:00.000+09:00

An international speaker on electronic marketing and customer interaction and producer of the annual Emetrics Summit www.emetrics.org, Jim is founding president of the Web Analytics Association www.webanalyticsassociation.org

Sometimes Your Just need a Rest

2007-09-24T17:31:00.000+08:00

Poor Investment Buying Email Lists

2007-09-24T17:09:00.000+08:00

Be extremely wary of lists for purchase!

Often you'll come across sites offering to sell you something like a list of a million names for the low, low price of $59.95.

Buying a list like this might seem like a good idea... but it's not.

Chances are, the names and emails were taken without the people's permission. So when your emails start showing up in their inbox, they're going to think you're a spammer, and may even report you to their ISP or an anti-spam organization like SpamCop.

Bam! Now you're blacklisted and aren't allowed to send email to anybody. Definitely not worth $59.95, is it?

Even if the people on the list DID give their permission to be put on it, the majority of them simply aren't your target market, and won't be interested in your offer.

And why go to the trouble of emailing someone who's never going to buy anything from you?

Source: Mitch Tarr Internet Marketing Centre

Give first, get second

2007-09-22T17:16:00.000+08:00

This is truly one of the cardinal rules of email marketing: In order to "get," first you have to GIVE.

Never ask your subscribers to make a purchase unless you have offered them something of value beforehand.

For example, if you're gearing up for a major promotion, it's a good idea to send out a few "no strings attached" emails full of useful information and THEN follow them up with an email that includes a call to action.

The same thing is true of your newsletters. If you want to promote any of your products, make sure you include lots of free valuable information in the newsletter BEFORE you get to the product "plug."

That way, people won't mind so much if you ask them to buy something. After all, you've just given them a whole lot of useful content for free!

Plus, if your content really is valuable, it'll convince your readers that your product or service is valuable, too.

Automate List Management Tasks

2007-09-18T17:06:00.000+08:00

As your list grows, you'll want to invest in some software that will help you categorize and manage your bouncebacks.

Most email software packages or services provide this feature. If yours doesn't, then it's probably time to upgrade!

Don't Forget to Follow up and Get the New Address!

If you do get a hard bounceback from a previous customer, be sure to follow up with them via phone or even snail mail to get their updated information.

All your customers are valuable and you don't want to lose a single one from your list! The time you invest getting their updated email address is typically time well spent.

Remember, this is just one step in maintaining a clean email list that gets the best deliverability.

Get PERSONAL

2007-09-16T17:14:00.000+08:00

People want to deal with PEOPLE, not faceless companies. So you DON'T want your emails to come off sounding like they're official, corporate-sounding announcements.

In order to connect with your subscribers, your emails should be written in a casual, conversational tone.

Write like you're talking to a good friend. Let your personality shine through.

If you're a funny person, use humor in your emails. (Without being offensive, obviously.) If you speak with an accent, let that accent shine through in your writing. Include whatever characteristics make you, YOU.

It will help your subscribers feel like they know you...

... And that will go a long way to encouraging them to buy something from you!

Finally, in order to hammer home the point that your emails are coming from an actual person -- as opposed to an organization -- make sure the return address on all your emails has your name in it.

Source: Internet Marketing Centre

Tricks to Manage Your Bouncebacks

2007-09-11T17:02:00.000+08:00

Because soft bouncebacks are generated when an email account is still valid, you don't need to remove them from your email list. Where you want to focus your attention is on hard bouncebacks.

In order to maintain the highest deliverability, you need to constantly remove hard bouncebacks from your email list.

If you continue to send email to addresses that are no longer valid, the ISPs that previously hosted those addresses may consider you a spammer, and block ALL the email you send to any other email accounts they host.

For example, let's say you have 1000 @yahoo.com addresses on your email list and over a period of 6 months 100 of those email accounts are closed and become invalid.

If you still continue to send email to those invalid accounts, Yahoo will assume that you're a spammer sending unsolicited email to random accounts -- and they will block any emails you send to the 900 remaining valid accounts.

The process of managing your bouncebacks is called "list hygiene."

In order to get the highest amount of email delivered to your subscribers, you want to stay on top of your list hygiene and remove email addresses from your list as soon as you get a hard bounceback after sending to them.

More ideas from Internet Marketing Centre at www.marketingtips.com/emailsecrets

Bouncebacks and How to Handle them

2007-09-04T16:54:00.000+08:00

If you use email, chances are you have seen a "bounceback" message in your inbox. You get one whenever you send an email to someone and then -- for whatever reason -- their server rejects the message.

The "bounceback" message usually contains the original email you sent, as well as an explanation as to why the message was rejected.

There are two types of bouncebacks you need to know about:

Type 1: Hard Bouncebacks

A hard bounceback occurs when you send a message to an email account that no longer exists. The account has been closed for some reason, so the mail server that hosted the account will send your message back, notifying you of this change.

Hard bouncebacks are particularly common when you send mail to free email accounts with providers such as Hotmail, Gmail, and Yahoo. That's because many people use these free accounts as a secondary or disposable account for random newsletter subscriptions and such.

When the volume of email to their free account gets too high, people often shut it down, create a new one, and move on.

But unfortunately -- if they forget to send you their new address -- you're stuck with an email address that no longer exists!

Type 2: Soft Bouncebacks

A soft bounceback occurs when you send an email to an account that is still valid but is temporarily unable to receive email. The most common cause of soft bouncebacks is when an email account is too full or the server that hosts the account is temporarily down.

Source: Derek Gehl from Internet Marketing Centre

Respect your list

2007-08-12T17:12:00.000+08:00

One of the greatest benefits of email is that it helps overcome buyer resistance by encouraging your subscribers to trust you.

But first, you have to prove you're trustworthy!

You have to respect your list, and think more of THEIR needs than yours. And you have to meet their expectations by delivering what you promise.

For example, if they opt into your list because you've offered them a free report full of valuable information, make sure you GIVE them a free report full of valuable information and NOT a just sales pitch.

Also, resist the urge to hammer your list with promotional emails every single week. The valuable "free info" emails you send should outnumber the purely promotional messages. Otherwise, your subscribers will opt out in droves.

Finally, be sure to include a link to your privacy policy right in the opt-in box on your site. This reassures people that you respect their privacy and won't share their personal information with anyone else -- under ANY circumstances.

10 insider email marketing tips

2007-08-05T19:38:00.000+08:00

1) Build an email list! All online (and offline) businesses should have their own email list. Your list is a cornerstone of your marketing. Every page of your web site should have a sign-up form for your list.

2) Give away an interesting freebie. To get individuals to sign-up for your email list you need to provide an incentive that makes them want to join your list.

3) Use your subscriber's name. Your subscription form should ask for your subscriber's name in addition to his/her email address. Personalizing your emails will generate a better response from your readers.

4) Send valuable information. Email is all about building a relationship. Continue to send interesting content to your readers as well as valuable freebies.

5) Talk about yourself. You might say, what - I thought it was impolite to talk about myself. But in email communication you build rapport with your subscribers when you tell them about yourself and what you're doing in your life.

6) Make the most of the first 30 days. Studies show new subscribers are the most likely to read your emails and purchase from you in the first month.

7) Communicate regularly with your subscribers. Even after the first 30 days have passed do not throw out your list. When you communicate regularly with your list you continually remind them of your presence.

8) Get your own domain. Yes, having your own web site with your own domain is of tremendous importance.

9) Pick a niche market. If you want to stand out and get attention for your business you need to focus your marketing on a target group of people.

10) Test, test and test! Testing is an essential part of marketing and email marketing is no different. What should you test?

This list is adapted from the advice of Abbie Drew's DEMC e-nEWSLETTER

Survey is your Road to Success

2007-08-01T20:19:00.000+08:00

The Internet has revolutionized survey taking. While there are many methods of conducting surveys, traditional methods such as calling people at their home during dinner, or standing in a mall asking people for their opinions as they pass by, prove less productive.

Telephone surveys have dropped significantly over the last few years due to telemarketing. People just don't want to be bothered any longer. However, a telephone survey you can ask "Is there anything else you'd like to say?". Not all web surveys provide extended functionality such as that.

The advantages of running a survey from the Web include easy distribution, reduced data entry errors, and reduced costs.

Long copy works better than short copy

2007-07-29T20:27:00.000+08:00

Long copy works better than short copy in email marketing if it's interesting, captivating and riveting. Call it "edutainment." Copy must be educational and entertaining.

Yet in a handful of cases shorter copy is warranted. But the only real way to know for sure is to test, test and test.

Claude Hopkins, author of "Scientific Advertising," wrote an important axiom:

"Almost any question can be answered cheaply, quickly and finally, by a test campaign. This is the only way to answer them, not by arguments around a table. Go to the court of last resort. The buyers of your product."

Copywriting genius Dan Kennedy (pictured right), once said in a recent interview:

"Now, the person who says 'But I would never read all that copy' makes the mistake of thinking they are their customer . And they are not. We are never our own customers.

There is a thing in copywriting I teach called 'message-to-market match'. It is this: when your message is matched to a target market that has a high level of interest in it, not only does the level of responsiveness go up but readership goes up, too... the whole issue of interest goes up."

Can my subject line be confused with spam

2007-07-25T21:09:00.000+08:00

If your message's "Subject" line reads like Subject lines commonly used in spam, your recipients (or their email filters) will likely confuse it with spam and possibly file complaints or block your future emails.

To improve the chances of your message getting opened AND to reduce the chances of someone filing a complaint against you, ask yourself these questions when composing your message's Subject line:

If you read only your Subject line and nothing else, would it cause you to question whether the email was legitimate? (Does the tone resemble Subject lines often found in spam?)

Will the Subject line enable recipients to recognize immediately why they are receiving the email? (Does the Subject contain your "brand" name?)

Think about your subject line and message text very carefully before you send your message. Anything that screams of "in your face" advertising may generate complaints from your subscribers, even when using the double opt-in method of acquiring list members.

Terms like these in your Subject line or in the content of your message will likely be red flags to recipients:

URGENT!
FREE!!!
Save
Lowest Prices
Double Your Sales
Breaking News
!!!
***
$$$

Consider giving your list a name and use a similar Subject line each time you send a message. For example, many organizations use this format as their message's Subject line:

Weekly Newsletter: and then include the newsletter's topic for that issue and possibly even the date.

If a recipient sees something recognizable about you in the Subject line, you will likely see an increased open rate while simultaneously reducing or eliminating spam complaints.

Article adapted from MailerMailer

Why does direct email marketing work?

2007-07-20T09:43:00.000+08:00

Why does direct e-mail marketing work?

The Internet is a scary place for many people so when these people find a business they trust, they are more comfortable buying again. When you supply a quality product your customers come to trust you and then you can use e-mail marketing to let customers know about new products. With e-mail marketing you can target people that trust you and have expressed an interest in your products.

What do you need for effective e-mail marketing? The first thing you need is a way to collect names and e-mail addresses. Please take a moment and sign up for our e-mail list. You will see how easy it is and receive periodic updates on e-mail marketing chances, tips and products. You will find the sign-up on the right side of the page.

Difference between b-to-b email marketing and b-to-c

2007-07-19T09:47:00.000+08:00

It should be noted that you might find some receptivity to email marketing campaigns that are sent out to individual consumers late in the workweek or even early in the weekend. This is the primary difference between business-to-business email marketing and business-to-consumer marketing.

Tuesday through Thursday – These are the three days when all email marketing seems to have the greatest impact. Employees and business owners are fully entrenched in their workweek and the result is their minds may be better geared toward business decisions or consumer purchases.

Interestingly if you can send your emails out around either 9 am or 1 pm, response seems to be better than if you wait for either lunch or the end of the workday.

Essentially what we are seeing is if you can approach consumers and business contacts during the ‘trench’ part of the workweek, when their minds aren’t focused on either closing time or lunch you may stand a better chance at affecting a site visit and potential sale. You may even find fewer opt-out requests when you work within this simple time frame for email marketing.

Remember, no one likes junk mail and they don’t like emails that are thought of in terms of spam. Make sure your content is relevant to the topic the individual signed up for, make sure you can provide information or price reductions on products the customer may be interested in or has purchased in the past. Relevancy and timing are keys to acceptability in all email-marketing campaigns.

Keep ‘Em Coming Back

2007-07-18T09:41:00.000+08:00

A happy customer is a loyal customer, which often means more repeat business for you. Happy customers also tend to refer their friends and family, generating new customers for you as well. Use email marketing to keep in touch with customers, offering them special discounts or add-on items, or letting them be among the first to know when a sale is coming up. Email marketing is a great tool for enhancing customer retention and satisfaction.

With email marketing, it’s pretty easy to get feedback from your customers just by sending a quick follow-up email after the sale. It’s a good way to find out what they think of your products or services, and gives them another opportunity to interact with you, too.

Lots of people use the web to research the products and services they need, then make their purchase locally from a store in their community. In fact, a recent survey by MarketingSherpa found that more than 60% of web users do this on a regular basis! Email marketing can help you stay in touch with the customers in your area, creating awareness for your company and bringing more shoppers through your door.

Be consistent with your email marketing efforts and they may become even more effective than some of your other marketing activities. Email marketing is cost effective, measurable, trackable, and easy to do – what more could anyone want in a marketing strategy?

Use An Auto-Responder

2007-07-16T09:42:00.000+08:00

To make e-mail marketing simpler you can use an auto-responder. An auto-responder allows you to pre-program messages to be sent to your e-mail marketing list.

The big advantage to this is that you can send these pre-programed e-mail marketing messages to the customers that sign up to your e-mail marketing list, on a regularly basis. Advice on how often to send messages range from every couple of days, to every three weeks, to once a month. The big key is to be consistent so the customer learns to expect and look for your e-mail marketing message. This reliability also helps establish your credibility as a legitimate professional company. Customers feel more comfortable doing business with someone they believe is legitimate, professional and trustworthy.

This in turn leads to more sales for you.

Averages

2007-07-11T16:25:00.000+08:00

We learn wisdom from failure much more than from success.
We often discover what will do, by finding out what will not do;
and probably he who never made a mistake never made a discovery.

Samuel Smiles

The Actual Content

2007-07-09T09:46:00.000+08:00

This tip involves the actual content of your email ad. Because of all the spam filters that are placed on most commercial email account, you have to be very careful about the words that you use in your email ads. Words like "money" and "guarantee" and "earn" are big no-nos. There are many spam checkers online that you can use that are free. They will give your emails a spam score. Under 2, you're fine. From 2 to 5 you're on the borderline and over 5, your message is probably going to be flagged as spam.

The next tip involves the actual email account that you use to do your marketing with. Lots of people think that this doesn't matter. The truth is, it matters a great deal. If you are using a free email account such as AOL, Hotmail, Yahoo, or whatever it is you're using, while your emails may get delivered to other people, there is no guarantee that their return emails to you are going to get through.

What's that you say? Return emails? Um, yeah. You know, the ones that potential customers send to you asking you questions about your product or service? With the free email accounts, oh yeah, and free is another word you can't use in email advertising, where was I? Oh yes, with free email accounts, because of the spam filters that the ISPs put on them to protect you from spam, a lot of your email, especially the emails that you want, won't get delivered. This could mean the difference between making and losing a sale. So get yourself a professional email account so you know you're going to get your emails delivered.

These tips are just the tip of the iceberg, pardon the pun, but they should be enough to get you on the right road to a successful email marketing campaign.

Concentration

2007-07-02T09:12:00.000+08:00

Concentrated all your thoughts upon the work at hand.
The sun's rays do not burn until brought to a focus.

Alexander Graham Bell

The weakest living creature,
by concentrating his powers on a single object,
can accomplish something; whereas the strongest,
by dispersing his over many, may fail to accomplish anything.

Thomas Carlyle

Would Your Customer Think??

2007-06-24T09:28:00.000+08:00

What you must understand is that there exists a whole lot of difference between spam and legitimate email marketing with the receiver’s permission. Spam could be understood as an email that is not wanted by the receiver and is sent by a company that the recipient has no idea about. Such companies harvest these email ids from chat rooms and newsgroups or similar other unethical ways.

Never resort to spamming as it would get you blacklisted. And yes, always pay attention to the content and layout of your email campaign. It should always be very professional and devoid of any typo errors and grammatical mistakes.

Achievement

2007-06-16T16:29:00.000+08:00

The most important thing in life is not the triumph but the stuggle.
The essestial thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well.

BARON PIERRE DE COUBERTIN

Inexpensive auto responder

2007-06-14T09:45:00.000+08:00

Use a reliable and inexpensive auto responder service that will consolidate all of your email lists. Using a service like aweber.com you can create unlimited auto responders and have potential customers opt-in to your email lists from any where. (website, blog, etc.) You can create the opt-in forms and have scheduled messages sent automatically or manually to all of your members.

Generate more sales and credibility through offering useful series of emails that can be sent by your auto responder over several different emails. Keep the series of emails related, promoting a relevant product or service.

Encourage your recipients to forward the emails to their friends, relatives, and colleagues. This will increase the amount of exposure and improve the reach of your email marketing broadcast.

These are just a few ideas to consider when developing your own email marketing campaign. Email marketing is extremely affordable and is a powerful tool consistently generating long term sales and contact with potential customers.

Choice

2007-06-12T16:38:00.000+08:00

Knowing that you have complete control
of your thinking you will recognize the power...

Mikhail Strabo

The key to your universe is that you can choose.

Carl Frederick

D List Part 5

2007-06-03T10:06:00.000+08:00

These blogs have the no follow link disabled from the comments, which means that if you comment on these sites, you will get an actual link. If you would like to be included here, please let me know.

If you find this list useful, please consider linking to it.

This DoFollow Blog list is courtesy of Courtney Tuttle and was created originally by Coleen as the D-List.

Tricia's Musings

krissy.nu -life.unscripted

NickQueen.com

Shadowscope

My Thoughts, Ideas, and Ramblings

Electric venom

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FullosseousFlaps Dental Blog

Chubby Mommy

A Peculiar Blog

Confessions of an Everyday Housewife

Just Not Martha

The Den of Iniquity

Just for Today

Raw Vegan Momma

I Think Therefore I Blog

Gothic-Peach.Net

Big Bucks Blogger

Dont Fear the Truth

The BenSpark

The Knitting Fiend

Lifecruiser

Blacksheep Speaks

Odd Planet

Dragonhearts Domain

Celebrity Scoop

Pointless Drivel

Daisy the Curly Cat

The (Other) End of the Internet

Flos Place

Shellis Sentiments

WebStyle

Dilithium Crystalworks

Craft Blog

Gadget Girl Accessories

Molly-Coddled.com

Home Biz Blogger

As the Garden rows

Skeets Stuff

Up Scheidt Creek

Window Shopper

Tinas Treasured Thoughts

Lisa Reviews

Losing It

Learn Spanish fast: vocabulary tricks and visualization

Open Road Biker

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You are in My World Now

The Web Files

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chilli*technology

A Saxy Girl

Simple PC Talk

Musings Of A Manic Mom

JT Music Review

Total Web Review

The Coffee House

A Strange Life

Up the Hill Gang

Ferrets Haven

Wampago - Music Videos and Entertainment Database

chilli*music

chilli*movies

Colloquium

Smart Marketing Ideas

Blogozine

I am Who I am

www.sandrafirebird.com

Endangered Spaces

Texas RV Travel blog

CoolAdzine for Marketers

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Pink Poison Store

Gator Byte

How Can I Do That?

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That's what she said

my daily snippets

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go get global news & views

Ask Laane

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Ask Jason Business

Tip Tail - From Agility to Zen!

New Century Politics

ShowMeMoneyBiz.com

Selenas Musings About Travel and Culture

Picture Clusters

The Ruff Draft

Opinionated

ShowMeHealthBiz

Musings of a Learning Wife and Mother

The Tech Inspector

Scribble On The Wall

Confessions of an Everyday housewife

Ask Jason Marketing

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JOIN - Do Follow Bloggers **

Aaron Roselo

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PBriscoe.com

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gimme a break

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genki desu yo

Genki!!

Home Office Women

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Buy better - Have a Better Life

The Fibromyalgia Experiment

Down Memory Lanes

Magical Rose Garden

Midlife Musings

Life Passion Travel & More

DorisGoShopping.com

JMH Techtronics

chonksworld

BenSpark 2: Electric Boogaloo

Flatwater Tech

The Pond

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MomReviews.net

Whats All This Then!

My Opinion Counts

The Sassy Southerner

Elements of Fishing

Aylee bits

Chief Prognosticator 2

Ask Jason Personal Tech

Selenas Musings About Raising Children

tales from the ballpark: 2007

The passionate ailurophile

Adapt, Adopt, and Improve

Internet. Serious Business

Wanders World

Ordinary Folk

My Happy Place

MomCooks

Xillys Blog

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The Raw Review

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http://www.it-everyday.com/index.php

Not just any ordinary blog

Chimeric Daydreams

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The Talking Fingers on the Web

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OnTheWebEd.com

Christy's Coffee Break

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Fanaticspace - Blog

Successful Blogging With Random Shock

Life With Heathens

Forever Parents

pinay g-spot

Is It So?

Bloggers for Dollars

Pixie Tail

Chanceless

Blog Avenues

cyberst0rm

The Birds & The Beads

Muffin Mumblings

Infektia.net

Cactuus

DRiNK . a . MOChA !

Call Me When You Get There

Mslovelys Blog Palace

Kalamaf Drackonsbane

On the Horizon

gone shopping!

girls day out

Im Blogging That!

Polliwogs Pond

An Unschooling Life

My Happy Place

the so called me

Yourmoneyinfo.com

Healthy Living

Laane on the World

homemadehealthypetfood.com

That Bitchy Chick

Casual Blogging

TutorialsPortal - Photoshop Tutorials ...

My Adventures into The Street

A Geek Mom's Net Journey

pamibe

pinay.ws

Twas Brillig

ForumFinderBlog

Julies Journal

UtterlyGeek.com

campingcoop.org

Frequency Of Your eMail

2007-05-25T09:11:00.000+08:00

In the part 2 of Sean Mize's article, he introduced most marketers mail about 2 – 3 times per week. Many mail once per week. Less than once per week, and you are probably losing people’s interest.

More than 2-3 times per week, you tend to get many more unsubscribes and unhappy people.

He also said he would mail practically daily. Why? He makes more sales that way. But you have to keep in mind – he get between 50 and 200 subscribers per day. He can afford to lose 10-20 people per day who unsubscribe. His feeling is, if they don’t like him, they will never buy anyway, so who cares?

But if you are only getting 10-20 subscribers per day, you cannot afford to lose 10-20 per day.

So what is best for you?

Find more about eMail Marketing here AND/OR

Dring your traffic here

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Sean_Mize

Email Marketing - How Often Should You Mail?

2007-05-25T09:07:00.000+08:00

By Sean Mize

This is a highly debated subject and many different marketers use many different frequencies of mailing.

The difficulty with this is that each email list is a market on its own. You see, each keyword around which you might build your list, is a market on its own. Then, you are writing your own articles or driving your own traffic – which makes your list even more unique. So it is difficult to compare response rates from list to list.

Here is the thing about frequency of mailing:

The more frequently you mail, the more sales you will make, the more unsubscribes you will get, the lower your open rates will be and the lower your click through rates will be.

On the other hand, the less frequently you mail, the higher your conversion rates will be, the fewer unsubscribes you will get (unless you mail sporadically, then the unsubscribe rate will go up again), the higher your open rates will be and the higher your click through rates will be.

Difference Between A Good EMail Campaign And A Bad One

2007-05-24T08:28:00.000+08:00

By Raymond Nesa

eMail marketing is no doubt "one of the most effective ways" of reaching out to your potential customers. Email marketing also proves effective in increasing traffic to your site in turn increasing your sales and that is why it is essential that your email marketing campaign should be very well designed and professional looking. If it is not so, it could proved counterproductive to your business.

The very first thing that needs to be determined is your goals. What is it that you want to achieve with your email marketing campaign? Who are the people whom you want to reach and what kind of marketing you are looking for. It would involve some research on your part. But first thing first, you would need to be very clear about your goals.

Can Email Marketing Be A Good Source of Income Online?

2007-05-23T09:59:00.000+08:00

One of the most common methods being used currently by the internet marketers is e-Marketing. e-Mail marketing is a very favorite way of marketing your website or your product by the internet marketers because this tool of marketing your product or website is quite cheaper as compared to the other much expensive methods of marketing your website. E-mail marketing campaigns can be very effective if those are carried out carefully. These campaigns can prove to be a disaster if the plan is not chalked out carefully. Spam e-mails are a problem which annoys the internet users all around the globe. Due to spam e-mailing, many people do not like e-mail marketing campaigns. The list used to send the promotional or informative e-mails should be carefully sorted out. Once you have the opt-in kind of list ready, your e-mail marketing campaigns will become very effective.

E-mail marketing can be a good source of making money. If the campaign is effective, it will result in the increase in the volume of business. The money making in the online world is all about getting web traffic. E-mail marketing campaigns can help you in doing so by promoting not only the product you are talking about in your e-mail, but also your website in general. This will increase the chances of your website being visited by the people who can be your target market. These efforts can result in increased flow of traffic and as a result the volume of your business will grow.

Email Marketing - How to Deal With Unsubscribes

2007-05-22T08:19:00.000+08:00

I have a very pragmatic approach to unsubscribes – the harder I work, and the more value I deliver online, the more unsubscribes I am likely to have.

Now, you may think that is crazy. The more I deliver, the more unsubscribes I will get? You might think it is the other way around – the more and better I deliver, the fewer unsubscribes I will get.

But in reality, the better you are at delivering great content and information, the more people will unsubscribe. In fact, if you are not getting some hate mail from time to time, you probably aren’t pushing your list enough. You see, I push my list. I ask them why they haven’t taken action. I want to know why they haven’t started making money online.

And I don’t want to hear excuses like, ‘my niche is no good’ or ‘I just don’t know what to do’ or ‘nobody will help me’. Look, you have to put in the work, you have to sweat a little. And I don’t like it when people whine about how they can’t do it.

The only reason someone can’t do it online, if the can read and write and have access to an internet connection, is because they aren’t trying hard enough, aren’t working hard enough, or have failed to get enough of the right information.

Are you struggling with something online? Get help. Find someone who has done it before and pay them to teach you how to do it.

Benefits of Email Marketing

2007-05-18T08:33:00.000+08:00

If you’re already using email marketing, then you know that it is a very cost-effective way to communicate with your customers and prospective customers. Email is fast, inexpensive, and quite easy to use as a marketing strategy, which could be why it has become so popular with companies of all sizes. There are many tangible, measurable benefits to email marketing, but here are five benefits that are particularly noteworthy:

Boost Your Bottom Line – Studies show that the average consumer needs to hear or see your message about seven times before he or she will buy from you. That’s a lot of repetition! With email marketing, you can create marketing campaigns consisting of a series of emails to reinforce your message and build your brand so that when they are ready to buy, they think of your company first.

Name Recognition – Using email marketing is a great way to generate name recognition and stay in front of your customers regularly. You can send newsletters, special offers, coupons, announcements, or anything else that might be of value to your customers.

Making Money With Email Marketing

2007-05-17T08:22:00.000+08:00

In the online businesses the email marketing is some thing very important. In the recent past the internet has grown a lot. It has become the most important source of information for us now. Internet also now serves as the most important market and trading center for the people. In this situation it is important that you plan your marketing campaign properly. If the marketing campaigns are planned properly, your email marketing efforts will result in creating lots of money for you. These campaigns can be made more effective if you build the email lists properly. If you do that by your self, you will be in a better position to make money out of all this effort.

Email marketing is the preferred type of online marketing these days. The sole reason behind this is that the email marketing campaigns take lesser time than any other means of marketing used by online marketers. This source generates results quickly. It generates results on a much faster pace provided the email list is made with care. If the email addresses on the list are not from the target market you are planning to invade, your email campaign will be very successful. If this is not the case the emails will not be able to generate lots of queries and replies. If the list is not build are fully most of the people may consider your email to be only a spam and do not take it seriously. If you want to make money from your email marketing, you need to be careful about the quality of your emailing list.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=James_Krawder

Focus Your eMail Marketing Campaigns

2007-05-16T09:42:00.000+08:00

You want to be able to focus your e-mail marketing campaigns so you want people that are actually interested in what you have to offer to sign up. If you are doing e-mail marketing on dog products it will not do you any good to have a bunch of people looking for cars on your e-mail marketing list.

By building you own list you can best focus your e-mail marketing. You will have people that trust you, are interested in what you have to offer, and signed up to your e-mail marketing list. This will also avoid you being accused of spamming, or to defend yourself if someone accuses you of using spamming for your e-mail marketing.

Starting E-mail Marketing: You need to send out regular e-mail marketing messages to your list. Your customers will start to recognize your name and be more willing to read you e-mails. If they only receive an e-mail marketing message every six months you will not build a relationship with customers and they will not recognize your e-mails. The messages you create for your e-mail marketing need to be short, informative, interesting and the titles of your e-mail marketing messages need to catch the reader's attention.

Effective E-mail Marketing

2007-05-16T09:35:00.000+08:00

Direct E-mail marketing can be used to add another layer of profit to your business. E-mail marketing very likely will be come your #1 most profitable marketing technique. The most profitable e-mail marketing will be to a targeted list that you create. You can buy a list for your e-mail marketing campaigns but this will cost you money and will not allow you to target your e-mail marketing as well.

E-mail marketing is common these days and will continue to expand as more people learn the value. With the expansion of e-mail marketing came the increase in spam with is universally despised. This has resulted in many systems that will keep your e-mail marketing campaigns from reaching your customers.

Fast Email Marketing

2007-05-15T08:14:00.000+08:00

Email marketing is by far one of the most effective means of internet marketing these days. But despite this fact this medium is generally not used up to its potential and it generally doesn't generate as much returns as it should generate.

The very first thing that you should understand is that there must be some sort of relationship between you and your potential buyers. They should get an impression that you care and if they don’t feel so, you won't realize your true potential. Most often than not, it is easier said than done.

Let us have a look at a few ways in which you can show you care and concern for your potential customers.

• Always remember one thing. Freebies are something that each one of us likes to have. Offer them free gift without any strings attached. It need not be very costly but something that has some utility.
• Always be prepared to offer any help your subscribers need. Always be prepared to resolve any doubts they might have. And yes, it means you should be able to answer each and every question that is being asked of you. If it’s fairly common, you can reply in general but if the question is specific, you can mail them their answers. It would be time consuming but it’s worth it.
• Emails should not be used to sell. It should be used to provide useful content with a link that could take them to your sales page. And yes, always ask for their feedback and try to provide information about things they need.

Email Marketing - How To Increase Its Effectiveness

2007-05-14T08:55:00.000+08:00

Making Money With Email Marketing

2007-05-11T09:04:00.000+08:00

In the online businesses the email marketing is some thing very important. In the recent past the internet has grown a lot. It has become the most important source of information for us now. Internet also now serves as the most important market and trading center for the people. In this situation it is important that you plan your marketing campaign properly. If the marketing campaigns are planned properly, your email marketing efforts will result in creating lots of money for you. These campaigns can be made more effective if you build the email lists properly. If you do that by your self, you will be in a better position to make money out of all this effort.

Email marketing is the preferred type of online marketing these days. The sole reason behind this is that the email marketing campaigns take lesser time than any other means of marketing used by online marketers. This source generates results quickly. It generates results on a much faster pace provided the email list is made with care. If the email addresses on the list are not from the target market you are planning to invade, your email campaign will be very successful. If this is not the case the emails will not be able to generate lots of queries and replies. If the list is not build are fully most of the people may consider your email to be only a spam and do not take it seriously. If you want to make money from your email marketing, you need to be careful about the quality of your emailing list.

Value of Direct Email Marketing

2007-05-10T08:41:00.000+08:00

The kind of internet marketing which has a specific target audience is known as direct email marketing. In this kind of email marketing is directed towards specific individuals. It is not an open ended marketing tool like the bill board or television advertisements. While it's a very effective means of reaching out and popularising the products you are selling, there are some negative sides to it as well.

The most important advantage of direct email marketing is that you can easily assess your success rate. That is to say, if you send emails to one hundred people with promotional material and forty five people respond, you can immediately see how successful or unsuccessful your email campaign was. In case of a hoarding or advertisement on the television, on the other hand, it is much more difficult to accurately find out the success rate. At any rate, it takes a longer period of time. Therefore, direct email marketing is also a good way to evaluate your marketing techniques.

Direct mail marketing can also be risky. It must be remembered that spamming is to be avoided at all costs. Spam will not be appreciated by most of your potential customers, and putting them off will obviously backfire. Spam is very common on the internet and there are several laws in various countries making marketing through spamming illegal.

Well, so it boils down to the most important question of all: is using such a marketing technique worth it after all? We have given you the pros and the cons. Now It is upto you to decide whether you will use it or not.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Raymond_Nesa

Tips For Email Marketing

2007-05-09T09:03:00.000+08:00

There are a lot of people involved in Internet marketing who think that email marketing is dead for a variety of reasons that I will touch on in this article. The truth of the matter is, email marketing can be very effective if done correctly. This article will give you a few tips to make your email marketing campaign a successful one. Hopefully, after reading this, you will have a good solid foundation on which to build your email marketing campaign.

Let's get this first tip out of the way. Don't spam. I know that you've probably been told that by sending out your email to millions of people, even if you get a one tenth of one percent return you can make a lot of money, but the truth is, with the spam filtering that's out there, most of your emails won't get delivered and ultimately you will only end up earning a reputation as a spammer and with it your business will go down in flames. Okay, don't spam. That means, only send information to people who have specifically asked for it.

Email Marketing - The Timing and the Relevance

2007-05-08T09:34:00.000+08:00

If you look hard enough you will find research on almost any given topic. For instance, were you aware that there are certain times when sending email marketing is probably a bad idea? There are also times when sending marketing emails makes perfect sense.

Monday and Friday – These two days are not as useful to email marketing as other days of the workweek. The primary reason is Monday is generally a time to get back into the swing of work, while Friday is a time to gear down. Your email is likely to be lost in the shuffle. Since most email marketing can be sent out on command this is something to consider when developing an email marketing campaign.

Saturday and Sunday – The weekend is generally throwaway days for email marketing for much the same reason as Monday and Friday. If someone is in the office on the weekend, the last thing they are interested in is marketing emails. If your email comes in over the weekend chances are pretty good your email marketing campaign will be subject to a readily used email purge without serious consideration.

The Best Email Internet Marketing Strategy

2007-05-07T08:39:00.000+08:00

So is there really a best email internet marketing strategy out there that you could be using to generate wealth? Are there ways to market to your list that are better than others? Is there some tips that you should follow in order to get better response from your list when you send them messages?

There is a best email internet marketing strategy and there is a better way to generate a better response and make more money with your list. Here are 3 helpful tips to remember when setting up your email marketing campaigns.

Best Email Internet Marketing Strategy tip #1 – Don’t over promote to your list

When you promote to your list on a daily basis they get sick of you. You have to stay in their minds, but not be annoying. A good rule of thumb is to promote 3 times maximum to your list per week.

Best Email Internet Marketing Strategy tip #2 – Send something worthwhile to your list

If all you do is send product recommendations and promotions your readers will stop reading your message. You have to give them an article, free eBook, or helpful tool to keep them coming back for more. Do this 1-2 times a week and they will be more likely to buy when you do promote to them.

Best Email Internet Marketing Strategy tip #3 – Be personable with your subscribers

When you treat your subscribers like they are your new found friends, and you write to them like that, instead of like you are a big corporation and they are just a number in your database you will get a better response. Try this and you will be amazed at how much your new subscribers love reading your messages.

There you have it 3 very helpful tips to really boost your email marketing. This is just part of what can be considered the best email internet marketing strategy. There is more that you can learn and use, but this should get you started.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Ben_Ehinger

D-List Part 4

2007-05-03T14:42:00.000+08:00

Patrick Says v2.0
Paula Mooney
PBriscoe.com
Pegs AZ Life
Pencil Thin
PimpMyPageRank
Pink Poison Store
Pond, The
Ramblings Of An Undisturbed Mind
Randa Clay Design
Raw Vegan Momma
Reasoner, The
Rotten Bananas
Sassy Southerner, The
Scribble On The Wall
Scuttlebutt Pipeline
Selena’s Travel and Culture
SelfHynosisProgram
Shopping Flavor
ShowMeHealthBiz
ShowMeMoneyBiz.com
Simple Kind Of Life
Simplify Every Obstacle
Skeets Stuff
Solo Technology
Sophistishe.Org Personal Blog
SQKIKs Simple Tech
Super Blogging
Sun-Flower Family, The
Table for Five
TDZ Travel
TeaScoop
TechieZone
Teenage Angst Regression
Texas RV
Travel blog
Thermal
TimeForBlogging
Tricia\’s Musings
Two Dog Zoo
Utterly Geek
Wanders World
Web Files, The
WebStyle
Whatever I Feel Like
Wild & Crazy Ride
Winding Threads
Wired Kayaker, The
Women Mumbles
Work At Home Mom Revolution
Yoga Blog

To be continued

3 Email Marketing Mistakes To Avoid

2007-05-03T09:01:00.000+08:00

Here are three common mistakes to avoid during your email marketing campaign.

Do not try to sell the product in your email

Your number one goal for the email should be to pre-sell (or soft-sell) the product or service you’re promoting, even if it’s your own. Introduce the product and attempt to generate some curiosity and excitement. Then once you have the reader’s interest, send them to the sales page – the merchant’s or your own - for the actual sales pitch.

Focus on creating a positive attitude towards the product, which should result in many more people visiting the sales page. Readers do not want a long sales letter in their email; and if they do in fact click your link, they may be increasingly annoyed to read yet another sales letter with the same information they just saw in the email.

Poorly formatted emails are a major turn-off

Although this may appear to be obvious, it’s surprising how often I receive a promotional email that is difficult to read - full of spelling mistakes and poor grammar; if I have trouble getting through the first few sentences, the email will quickly find its way into my Deleted folder.

It doesn’t take much effort to use a spell-checker and proof read the email copy before sending it out. If the sender can’t take the time to do this, why should I value his or her opinion on a particular product?

Do not use too much hype in your email

Although you may be excited about the product or service and you want to get your readers to feel the same way, you should avoid using too much hype in your email copy, as this will lower your click through rate.

It’s ok to display sincere enthusiasm, you don’t want your emails to be boring, but take care not to over do it. The email shouldn’t sound artificial just because you want your wording to sound more energize.

If you truly believe in the product you’re promoting and think it will benefit your readers, you shouldn’t have a problem convincing them of this without including useless hype.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Sean_Kenaston

How to Benefit from Email Marketing

2007-05-02T08:56:00.000+08:00

You have tried buying phone lists, ads in the yellow pages, seeming all your marketing options have been exhausted, but if you have not yet used email marketing, you may have missed out on one of the most cost effective marketing solutions. Researchers have made the estimate that in 2006 alone, US companies spent more than $400 million on email marketing. Obviously, there is something to this method.

One of the advantages of email marketing is its relative inexpensiveness when compared with direct mail or printed newsletters. Also, it has proven to provide a high return on investment when done correctly. It is easy to track, and allows active and aggressive marketing, instead of similar internet marketing that forces the user to sit and wait while people click through. It is also instantaneous, as opposed to its predecessor, direct mail, which can take days or weeks to arrive.

All these benefits can make lucrative email marketing a smart choice, and in order to take advantage of it, there are many services that you can hire to help you market your company via email. However, because “junk” email has become so prevalent, a 2003 act of congress called the CAN-SPAM Act authorized $11,000 US for every violation of spamming, or repeated, unsolicited advertising, to each person. This means that you should make sure whichever email marketing service you hire complies with this act.

Lucrative email marketing can be a beneficial step toward increasing your internet presence and making more money. To take advantage of this, the internet is a good resource for investigating email marketing and companies that provide such services.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Raymond_Nesa

Opt In Email Marketing

2007-05-01T08:29:00.000+08:00

How many times have you heard that the money is in the list? I hear it on a daily basis and I have to smile every time I do because it is so true! Welcome to the direct mail of the 21st century.

So why does it work? Well mostly it works because you will be using opt in email marketing (to avoid spam accusations) which is where people request information from you and then confirm that they did request it. Anybody that requests information and then also confirms is a good prospect who wants to receive your first email!

Now you have to make sure the information that you give them in that first email is good. Try not to sell to them in that first email or you will sour the relationship, and opt in email marketing is all about building a relationship. You need to cultivate trust with that individual so that when you do recommend a product that they listen to what you have to say and are responsive to the offer.

Most of the time people complain as they don't have a huge list of people to email to. Well first of all then build that list! Create a capture page and start promoting that page. Secondly, with just 100 good subscribers I have a good relationship with I could make some good money. It is all about quality rather than quantity, although both would be better…

So what do you promote? Well by far the easiest products to promote are those sold through Clickbank as all the payment and commissions are automated so you do not need to worry about fraud too much or not receiving your cheque. You receive up to 75% of the sale as they are digital products and you receive a cheque every two weeks, and you can promote the product with just a simple link. So you buy the product first (you can't recommend it if you do not know what it is like) then you write a review of all the best points, put your link at the bottom and blast it out to your list and watch out for the commissions if you did everything right.

Opt in email marketing is my favourite way to earn money and certainly the best way I have found. Just make sure you do not abuse the power and start to promote inferior products or you will lose the relationship you have so carefully cultivated.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=James_Beckett

How To do Email Marketing

2007-04-30T08:31:00.000+08:00

So you have decided that learning how to do email marketing is going to be your way of getting traffic, which leads to sales, which leads to profits, which leads to having a nice car, house, and more. Not a bad idea as long as we are talking about the same type of email marketing.

I am referring to building your own list of opt-in subscribers to market to. Yes this will take some time and will be more work than purchasing or renting a list, but you will also make a ton more money and the results will be well worth your time and energy.

Let’s get on with how to do email marketing. Basically it starts with an autoresponder service which you can get for around $20 a month. That is your only real cost as long as you already have a hosting account and a website. If you don’t already have a website and a hosting account that is where you should start.

Let’s assume you do and you, then start with an autoresponder. Oncer you have signed up you will be able to create a form that will allow your website visitors to sign up for your newsletter, free course, free eBook download, or just to receive special offers and advice.

Now you can create a series of email messages that can be sent out over a period of 2 weeks to 2 years. Then, you plug the messages into your autoresponder and when a new lead signs up they will start receiving each message as you have it set.

For example, if you set it up with 10 messages to be send every 3 days and I sign up, then I will get a message every 3 days until I have received all 10. This is a huge benefit and will save you a ton of time.

Now you know a little bit about how to do email marketing and how to build your own list. It is always better to have your own list so that you don’t get accused of spamming and there are no questions on whether or not someone actually signed up or not.

Email Marketing Technique

2007-04-24T08:37:00.000+08:00

Most people think that they are pretty good at writing emails, yet most people do not have clue how to write an email properly. This indicates a lack of understanding that an email is more than just a means of communication. It is a persuasive work of art that requires specific skills even to get it opened.

First you must decide what format your email is to be in. If you have the choice of only one, it should be plain text rather than html. Everybody can receive plain text. Even if the have their email system set to html, it will default to plain text if the email is in that format. he reason for this is that many people do not like html emails, and always accept only plain text.

Even some of the most successful internet marketers use plain text only. If you have the option of both, then use both. Send in html with a plain text alternative. Then you have to think about the line formatting. Keep to below 65 characters per line. Most email systems can handle up to 65, but if you go over, the text that overruns will appear on the next line, then your next line start under that.

A badly formatted email looks amateurish and does nothing to improve the confidence of the reader that you are competent in internet marketer. These errors are generally made by amateurs, and your prospect is less liable to purchase from you.

Best to Build Your Own Email Lists

2007-04-23T08:17:00.000+08:00

In the present era e-mail marketing has become one of the most important methods used by the service or manufacturing industries. The companies which are producing goods or services rely heavily on the e-mail marketing campaigns. These campaigns can only be effective if the e-mails are received by the people who are a part of your target market.

List building is not a very difficult task but it does need your full attention. It basically means that you are creating a list of e-mail addresses of those people who can be interested in purchasing your product. The promotional and informational e-mails are sent to these e-mail addresses.

If you want to build your own lists of e-mail addresses you can go about it in many ways. One way of doing it is that you purchase a ready made list. This may reduce the time you need to build a list to minimum, but mostly this method is not effective as many of the users may not be interested in your product. Others may consider your e-mail as a Spam mail and may block you.

The most appropriate way of building your own list is to collect the required data your self. In this way may be your list will be smaller but it will be an effective list. For example, if you are an online store, you can ask all the people who visit your website to fill out a form and allow you to e-mail the information about new products. The list built in this manner may take some time but the effort will be truly fruitful in the long run.

Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, ‘Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide‘

Email Marketing - Organic is Better

2007-04-20T08:54:00.000+08:00

Many online businesses look at email marketing as a viable means of directing traffic to their website. Buying lists from a third party can be expensive. This type of email marketing is often viewed as spam because the recipient did not ask to receive the material you sent. Most businesses that use this type of list will work to invite recipients to opt in to future listings with a promise to make this a one-time email unless they actually sign up.

Some ecommerce merchants also use rented lists. This can also be expensive and the list can only be used once. Recipients often have the same feeling about this type of email marketing campaign, which is often viewed as spam.

Organic Email Marketing

This takes longer and is built on a more ‘grass roots’ concept. This type of campaign only relies on those that have already made contact with your business and have willingly provided their email address for future emailings.

This type of ‘opt in’ relies on free membership offers. The visitor willingly provides their contact information in exchange for free membership benefits. This scenario provides a positive means of connection with a more receptive audience.

The good news is the collection of email addresses can be derived from a multitude of sources. If your business receives customer calls you can collect emails by phone. Other possibilities include online web forms as well as tradeshows and other personal contacts.

If you can make it easy to opt in and then provide details in each mailing on how to opt out you will minimize the number of spam complaints your business may receive.

A more organic approach is helpful to the long-term success of your business because it allows you to begin with a smaller group of very interested customers and then continue adding to a list of individuals that places value in what you are sending them.

When you start with a bought or rented list you ultimately wind up in a pronounced adversarial relationship with those who are more interested in keeping spam out of their mailbox than whatever ‘good’ information you might be sending.

It is also a great idea to make sure your valued customers are assured that your email list is not for sale. Provide your recipients with the assurance that no third party will receive their information and that you are concerned about their privacy.

An organic list may be harder to establish, but it is targeting a more relevant group of potential customers who want a reason to trust you. Make sure they find that reason.

Email Marketing For Maximum Success

2007-04-19T08:52:00.000+08:00

Once you have overcome these basic errors, that most email marketers have been guilty of in the past, email marketing can be very lucrative. The Number One Rule is never to email anybody that has not given you permission. This permission is normally given when they sign your opt-in list, and that is what we will now concentrate on. What is the most effective way to use such a list.

The first rule is never to over-use your email list in email marketing. This could prompt many people to unsubscribe, and others just to stop opening your emails. You should email your list when you have something genuinely to offer. This can be a free gift or even just some free information on the topic of your site. Don’t try to sell in every emailing. A reasonable rule is to offer a hard sell for a product in every third or fourth email you send to your entire list.

Where appropriate you can split your list up into interests. For example, you might have a health list. There is little point in emailing every one with the same product. It is best to try to identify those most likely to be interested in the product, and then email only to them. Your conversion rate will be much higher, though you must provide them with an immediate means of making payment, or they might change their minds.

Finally, email marketing for maximum success involves a lot of interaction with the customer. This can come from the provision of free items now and again, and through encouraging them to email you personally whenever they have a problem in their business that they think you might to be able to help with. If you can get this sort of relationship going, then that is email marketing at its best.

Email marketing can provide you with maximum success, but you must know how to go about it, and to do it in such a way that your customers feel that you are providing them with a service, rather than relying on them for your income.

Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, ‘Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide‘

Targeted E-Mail Marketing

2007-04-18T08:58:00.000+08:00

The targeted e-mail marketing, just like any other marketing instruments, showed a potential success on capturing prospective markets. This tool gives a marketing analyst a chance to perceive from a perspective the target market of a product. This gives him the allowance to invest on a potentially strong market rather than vouching on a large market but with little return of prospective market. When a business indulges in such a technique, there are only few rules that the marketing analyst should remember. Remember that the targeted e-mail marketing only gives you a clear view on who may be your clients but are not directly potential to accommodate the product.

One should remember that in order to catch a targeted client, he should be enticed first. Getting the attention of the client allows your product to the least be given attention. In order to do this, the e-mail material that you send out to a prospective targeted market should be very catchy and “attention-getter”. By doing this, you are assured that your e-mail material was to the least given time to be noticed and read and eventually capture your client’s desire to buy your product.

Along with a catchy subject line is a content that is carefully thought and professionally written. Remember that the impression of the consumer to the product relies heavily on how you market it. With e-mail marketing, there is no visible or any tangible thing yet that the consumer has about it; therefore, your e-mail tool says a lot of things about it. Therefore, the content of the e-mail material should be equally powerful to that of your subject line. Remember that a grammatically and syntactically incorrect e-mail will never catch a prospective consumer.

Email Marketing - Making Your Emails Effective

2007-04-17T08:07:00.000+08:00

People e-mail each other all the time but not all of the e-mails are written in an attractive manner. The e-mails which are written for the purpose of advertising or marketing need to be promotional in true sense of the word. Not every copywriter knows how to write a concise yet interesting and engaging e-mail.

E-mail marketing is a common practice these days. The use of e-mails as a tool to market your product and services has resulted in creating the problems like Spam e-mails. As a result there are many firewalls which can prevent your e-mail form reaching the desired destination. To avoid this problem you need to carefully word your e-mail as well as the subject line of the e-mail to ensure that it is not Spam.

The effective e-mails are always sent by some sender name and not from a system. The subject line needs to be catchy enough to force the recipient to open the e-mail. Once the e-mail is opened and being read by the recipient the way you have written it becomes the most important point.

The e-mails should be worded carefully. The words should be concise but interesting. The information which is to be sent needs to be accurate. The words used should be simple. If the language used is complex there are chances that the recipient will not read it completely. If you want to ensure that your e-mails gets positive response you need to make it simple yet appealing to read

Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, ‘Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide‘

Small Business Email Marketing

2007-04-16T08:26:00.000+08:00

Are you a small retailer or service business owner? Have you harnessed the power of the internet, specifically email, to communicate your marketing and sales messages to your customers and prospects? You should… here’s why and how to use small business email marketing!

It’s estimated that over 60 billion emails are sent daily. That’s “billion” with a b! Admittedly, many of those are SPAM of one sort or another, but it’s also safe to say that hundreds of millions of them are carrying marketing messages. Sadly, most of those will never be opened. Of those that are opened, many will never be read.

As a small retailer or service business owner, your emails most likely WOULD be opened and read by your customers and prospects… IF you were using small business email marketing. Since you’re not, the question is why?

Email marketing and advertising offers you a surprisingly cost and labor-effective way to reach your customers and prospects with a laser-focused marketing message. Then, once you have found a strategy that works, it’s easy to repeat it. What could be bad about that?

Imagine you have a large shipment of a particular product, or an overstock. How will you get the word out? If you had a list of your customer’s email addresses, and were set-up to send them an email blast, you would know exactly what to do. Both of those things are very easy to set up, and once they’re in place it’s like having your very own fleet of mail carriers waiting to deliver your personalized marketing message.

You may have thought that small business email marketing was beyond your skills, but it’s safe to say that a business owner with even the most rudimentary computer skill can have an email campaign up and running in an afternoon. After that, less than an hour a week will keep you in regular, personal contact with your customers and prospects.

Wouldn’t you like to be able to let your customers know about your specials, sales, and discounts with the touch of a button. Small business email marketing isn’t QUITE that easy, but it’s close!

I can teach you how to set up and manage an effective campaign for small business email marketing. You’ll be amazed at the power and flexibility you’ve been missing.

D-List Part 3

2007-04-03T14:42:00.000+08:00

These blogs have the ‘no follow’ link disabled from the comments, which means that if you comment on these sites, you will get an actual link. If you would like to be included here, please let me know.

If you find this list useful, please consider linking to it.

This DoFollow Blog list is courtesy of Courtney Tuttle and was created originally by Coleen as the D-List.

Jonlee
Jones PC
JOIN - Do Follow Bloggers **
Julies
Journal
Just Not Martha
Kansha Shite
Knitting Fiend, The
Last Blogger
LeaveAmerica
Life in the Fast Lane
Life Is Risky
Life Learning Today
Life Of A School Bus Driver, The
Life Passion Travel & More
Life through eyes of Krissy
Lifecruiser
LittleAmerica.us
Live Life Organics & Your Health
Magical Rose Garden
Marketing Blagger
Master Cleanse
Midlife Musings
Mom is Nutz
MomReviews.net
Mothering Many
My Credit Group
My Dandelion Patch
My Home Recipe
My Muddled Mind
My Opinion Counts
My Thoughts, Ideas, and Ramblings
Nanashi-Inc.net
New Century Politics
No Average Mom
Odd Planet
On the Horizon
Open Road Biker

To be continued

The Importance of Email Marketing

2007-03-20T00:28:00.000+09:00

Most of the people who visit your site will never buy. In fact, if your website produces a 1% conversion rate your website is considered successful.

In most cases, that means that 99 out of every 100 people who visit your site will leave and never come back… ever.

By offering something of high perceived value absolutely free to your website visitors, in exchange for their name and email address, you can capture a much larger number of people into your marketing system.

Where a good conversion rate for a site that is selling something is around 1%, a good ‘opt-in rate’ (the number of people who take up your free offer) is around 20%, and can be as high as 50%!Instead of losing 99 out of 100 people who visit your site, you’re now only losing 50 to 80 people. Or in other words, you’re capturing 20 to 50 people out of every 100 people who visit your site, instead of just one.

Most of the people who visit your site have some interest in what you sell, but for any number of reasons they won’t buy on the spot…… they might be researching to buy in the future; they might be looking to buy now but were distracted; or they might be at work and can’t take the required action to buy your product or service… it could be anything.

But, if you capture their name and email address, you can send them regular emails with solid information which is of value to them, as well as promotional emails selling your services.

By doing that, you stay in the mind of your prospect, so when they do make the decision to buyFree Reprint Articles, your business it he first they think of.

Email marketing is critical in generating the maximum profits from your website visitors.

The Purpose of Email Marketing Explained

2007-03-16T14:52:00.000+09:00

article by Ryan Healy

Recently, a client of mine began to offer his feedback about some autoresponder emails I had written for him. His complaint: I had not included enough features and benefits in the email.
Before I addressed my client's concern, I thought about how to respond. I concluded that my client and I had two differing views on the purpose of email. Before we could reach agreement, we had to reconcile our opinions.

What is the purpose of email anyway?
My client seemed to think that each email should be stuffed full of sales copy. That no features or benefits should be omitted. That the email should do the entire sales job, so to speak.
It's my opinion that my client was expecting an email to do what a web site should.
The real purpose of email marketing is twofold:

To pre-sell your product or service.
To get a click to your sales page.
That's all an email should do.

If an email pre-sells the product or service... and creates enough curiosity to persuade your reader to click a link... then the email has done its job beautifully.

It's then the web site's job to "close the deal" and collect the money.

After all, you can't process credit cards inside an email. Your reader must go to a secure web site for that. So it's the web site's responsibility to get the order and capture the person's payment information.

In your email writing, remember the ultimate purpose of what you're trying to do: pre-sell and get a click. That's it. Let the sales copy on your web site convert your interested prospect into a paying customer.

D-List Part 2

2007-03-03T14:41:00.000+09:00

These blogs have the ‘no follow’ link disabled from the comments, which means that if you comment on these sites, you will get an actual link. If you would like to be included here, please let me know.

If you find this list useful, please consider linking to it.

This DoFollow Blog list is courtesy of Courtney Tuttle and was created originally by Coleen as the D-List.

Andy Beard
Ang’s Chicken Coop
Are we there yet
Army Mom:New Jersey
Art Kauffman
Article Writer, The
Ask Jason
Ask Jason Business
Axplay
BenSpark,
The BenSpark 2: Electric Boogaloo
BiggerPockets
BizMark Tech
BlogAboutMoneyOnline
BloggingForBills
BloggingTips
Blogging WV
Blogocola
Blogozine
BMonaco
BodyFitnessInfo
Body, Mind & Solar
Boston Brat
BrownSista
Buy better - Have a Better Life
BuyMeBlog
Buzz Queen, The
By the Sea
Cade’s WriteToRight
CampingCoop.org
Candid Quips
Charmed and Dangerous
Cheffin\’ It!!
Clapping Trees
Colloquium
Comedy Plus
Community Building Blog
Curious Cat Science
Confessions of a Housewife
Confessions of an Everyday housewife
CoolAdzine for Marketers
Craftblog
Crafts 4 Dummies
David Dairey
Dont Fear the Truth
DorisGoShopping.com
Down Memory Lanes
Ecomm Tips
EMomsAtHome
EMoneyMarketing
Endangered Spaces
Fibromyalgia Experiment, The
Finding Life\’s Enchantments
FitForFreedom
Flatwater Tech
Fools Wisdom
FootPrints On the Moon
Fuzzy Future

To be continued

Responsible Email Marketing

2007-02-23T09:42:00.000+09:00

Why be responsible, and how to be responsible, when it comes to running email campaigns.

Firstly, why would you want to be responsible?
1. Reputation - keep it intact.
2. Improving customer relationships (and not harming them).
3. To be a good internet citizen, and make the internet a better place.

Responsible email marketing consists of the following:

Subscribers - only email those people who have subscribed to receive your emails, or where you can justifiably demonstrate that their consent to receive your emails has been implied. So what is justifiable? Here are a couple of examples:A/ You have a bowl in your premises asking people to drop in their business card to win a prize, and you have a notice on the bowl that email addresses will be added to your mailing listto receive information from your business. B/ As part of the process of selling a product to a person, youask for the customer's email address.

Relevance - only send out information that is relevant to the recipient and associated with the purpose for which you received the email. For example, if you gathered the email address in response to selling a motor vehicle to a customer then sending that customer an email about a business opportunity would be inappropriate. However, sending an email about vehicle accessories, servicing, road-side assistance and new vehicles may be relevant.

Volume - I recently ordered self-address label printing from an online printer. After receiving the printed material, I now receive approximately one email per day regarding some deal or other, or requesting that I complete a survey. The constant emails are very annoying. With each email I receive I become:1) less likely to recommend the company to anyone else, despite the fact that their service was very good and inexpensive, and 2) less likely to order from the company again, and more likely to ask to be removed from their email list.

Keep the number of emails you send to your contacts to a reasonable volume!

Attachments - keep them small in size; no more than 300KB. You can't assume that everyone has broadband and therefore can download emails quickly. Nor can you assume that everyone checks their email everyday and wont run the risk of exceeding their mailbox size limit.

Unsubscribe - always give the recipient the opportunity to unsubscribe from your emails, and make it easy. To make this easy for yourself you should use an un-subscribe service, which will also ensure that you don't accidentally send a later email to that address. The only time you may send another email would be to confirm that you have in fact removed the recipient from your list, and to ask for feedback as to why they wish to be removed (if you didn't get this at the time they un-subscribed).

Business or Pleasure - try to only send business information to business email addresses, and only send personal information to personal addresses. In this way, a person will consider their personal email most likely when they are at home outside of working hours and will have the time to focus on it. On the other hand, they will receive their business related email at work, rather than during the personal time. If at all possible, when you collect an email address find out whether it is a personal or business address, and try to obtain both types of email addresses. If one of the email addresses bounces (i.e. the email cannot be delivered, perhaps a person has moved employment), having an alternative email address can be helpful.

Bouncing - don't continue to send emails to addresses that have previously bounced. This is just increasing the traffic on the internet for no good purpose.

Email Format - give recipients the choice of receiving text only emails (as opposed to HTML format), and then only send the format that they choose. The recipients who only want text emails (for security or other reasons) will be very grateful.

Much of the characteristics of responsible email marketing described above are actually embodied in spam legislation. Spam legislation also applies to SMS and other electronic messages. It is no longer a matter of just being considerate and maintaining your reputation, but also a matter of law.

US eBay Turns More International

2007-02-22T10:17:00.000+09:00

eBay is changing the way British listings appear on the US eBay.com website. Previously, items listed on eBay.co.uk also appeared in the default search results on eBay.com, but are no longer guaranteed to appear there.

eBay UK said it is testing different options because, “As eBay.co.uk has grown over time, the volume of items listed on eBay.co.uk that appear on eBay.com can make it difficult for US-based buyers to find and buy the items they want.” eBay executives have stated that they would be focusing on “finability” and the buyer experience in 2007.

Permission Email Marketing Tips

2007-02-21T10:53:00.000+09:00

Is your offline small business ready for email marketing? Read some effective tips and learn how your offline small business can benefit from this powerful online marketing tool.

Unless your small business is situated under a rock, you've probably heard something about email marketing by now, and you may have even wondered if it's time for your small business to get into it.

In its simplest terms, email marketing means communicating with consumers through email. But there's a big difference between trying to talk to consumers who never asked to be talked to in the first place, and talking to your own customers, who at some point have said, "Yes, I'd love to hear from you."

That's where permission email marketing comes in. Permission email marketing means giving valuable information to consumers who have requested to receive it. It is the ONLY legitimate way to send an email marketing campaign, and it is the only way your small business can benefit from email marketing.

But how do you get your customers to say "I do"?

If you have an online business, or if your offline business has a website that receives many visitors, compiling subscribers can be as easy as adding a subscription box to your website. You would offer users something valuable, like a periodical newsletter or emails with discount coupons and, in return, your users would subscribe to your mailing list.

Sounds great. But what if your business is primarily offline, and what if you don't even have a website?

Many businesses think that's reason enough to step out of email marketing altogether. But what they're missing here is that compiling a permission email marketing list offline can be as easy, if not easier in some instances, as building a list online.

We have advised many clients on tips to collect email addresses at the point of purchase. Here are some of our favorite tactics:

- Collect business cards, Offer a prize.
This is one of the oldest, most proven methods of collecting customer information in-store. Your prize doesn't even have to be huge. If you own a restaurant, it can be as simple as a free dinner for two. If you own a hair dresser, it can be as easy a 50% off coupon towards their next cut. The beauty here is that customers who submit their business cards have expressed genuine interest in your products or services. So when you contact them by email with further offers, you know you're talking to people who want to buy what you're selling.

The one thing to keep in mind here is that you MUST inform users that by submitting their business cards, they are agreeing to receive email communication from you. This can be as simple as adding a sign to the business card drop-off box saying: "We will send you an email to notify you if you have won. We may also send you periodical emails with special offers and announcements. If you do not wish to receive emails from us, please write 'No Email' on your business card."

- Start a V.I.P. Club
Many consumers like the idea of belonging to something exclusive, and receiving offers that are extended only to a select group of people. The labor on your part is minimal. It's as easy as keeping a notebook by the cashier. As a customer comes up to complete a purchase, casually tell them about your businesses' V.I.P. Club and ask them if they would like to join. Customers will appreciate this if you position it as a rewards club, or a way to say "Thank you, we love to have you around" to your most loyal customers. Of course, you should offer V.I.P. Club membership to any of your consumers, as you may find, once you start emailing them offers, that's a great way to build your most loyal customers. Make sure the offers you send them are, in fact, exclusive, and that you email V.I.P. Club members often enough, but not too often to become annoying (once or twice a month is usually a good interval).

Again, when you're collecting customer emails for the V.I.P. Club, make sure your customers know they're signing up to receive email offers from you.

These are just some ideas to get your permission email marketing subscriber list started. The best news here is that compiling a list is actually the toughest part of managing an email marketing campaign. As long as you're using an email marketing manager program that's specifically designed for small businesses like yours, the rest of the process is a breeze.

Creating a campaign involves little more than selecting a professionally-designed template, typing text and choosing a few good images. Your campaigns will be scheduled and sent automatically, so you'll never have to worry about being involved in that part.

What you will get to do (and this is probably the most exciting and most rewarding part of email marketing), is analyze your campaign after it's been sent. You'll be able to see how many people opened your email message, how many people clicked on each link within the message and, best of all, exactly who did what. Now that's what we call accurate, detailed, and immediate consumer research (you actually get to track your consumers' actions from the exact moment they happen). And while you would previously pay a fortune just to get this research data, today your small business can send professional email marketing campaigns and track detailed consumer behavior for less than it would cost you to print store flyers.

It's the new age of marketing, and there's never been a better time for your offline small business to get into the game.

Preventing Email Overload

2007-02-20T08:52:00.000+09:00

Email can be both a blessing and a curse. The immediacy of the communication provided by email is wonderful, but your workday can easily be spent trying to combat all of the spam and viruses that accompany your email. Here are 6 quick tips that I use to help me better manage my email.

I wonder now who was the genius who said email would make our lives easier? Don't you want to strangle this person on some days??I've found email to be both a blessing and a curse. I love the immediacy of the communication, but hate all of the spam and viruses that I have to be vigilant about.
So, here's 6 quick tips that I use to help me better manage my email:

1. The rule of handling email is the same as handling paper correspondence. Only handle it once. When you've read it, decide at that point to delete it, answer it, or file it for later action. Don't let you email inbox grow to 1000 or more messages--that becomes incredibly overwhelming and drains too much energy from you every day. I receive roughly about 600 pieces of email a day, so if I didn't do something to manage it properly, I'd be drowning in email.

2. Control your urge to check your email all of the time. I have my email program set to check email every 4 hours, which is twice a day for my workday, rather than having the program check it automatically during the day. I know that many of my clients will procrastinate on what they need to do by deciding to read their email rather than to do the pressing items on their to do lists. Limiting your ability to read your email will result in getting productivity--I guarantee it!

3. Set up filters (in Eudora) or rules (in Outlook) to automatically shuffle email into appropriate folders. I have numerous mailboxes set up in Eudora to house all of the posts of the discussion lists I belong to or newsletters I receive or daily correspondence that I get from clients. In many cases, I have sub-mailboxes set up under my primary mailboxes to further categorize the email that I receive. I've set these mailboxes up over time, and in many cases at the point where the email arrives in my inbox. It may take you 30 or so days to set up filters or rules for your email, but the effort will be very worthwhile. Now, when I check email, the mailboxes containing new mail appear across the bottom of my screen, so I can quickly eyeball them and figure out what on which emails immediate action is needed.

4. Be sure that your virus system, firewall system, junk mail systems are up-to-date. I use Norton for viruses and have it connected to my email system so that all incoming and outgoing messages are scanned for viruses. Norton prompts me to update it regularly. ZoneAlarm, my firewall system, www.zonealarm.com is up and running whenever I'm online to protect me from any type of intrusive attacks. Eudora has a built-in junk email detector system that works relatively well, but I'd prefer that most of my junkmail never even reach my email program. Consequently, I use SpamArrest, www.spamarrest.com, which runs $34.95/year. All of my email goes through SpamArrest before it's downloaded into Eudora, and I can approve or block certain senders as I see fit. I log in at the beginning of the day and the end of the day to see if something was labeled as spam and rescue it, and then proceed to delete all the spam. Of the 600 emails a day I receive, I would estimate that at least 400/day are due to spam. Thanks goodness for SpamArrest!

5. If you're receiving emails via your domain name, like yourname@yourdomainname.com, and the email address is set up as a POP3 account, log into your web hosting account and be sure that you're set up only to receive emails at designated email addresses. Many times spammers will send emails out to postmaster@ or webmaster@ or info@, as these are pretty common email address aliases. If your hosting email account has an address that is set up to receive all the email to the bogus aliases (unrouted email) , you'll be getting lots of spam. Instead, log in to your hosting account and set your default email address to :blackhole: or to :fail: No Such User Here so that you'll only get the email at the addresses you've created.

6. Never put your email address on your website. Spammers buy robot or spider programs that scour websites for unecoded email addresses to add to their spam database. You can use a contact form where a visitor will have to input information and send the form data to you, or you can use an email address encoder program. I like to maintain the ability for my visitors to email me if they wish, so I use a program called Natata Anit-Spam Encoder, http://natata.hn3.net/antispam_encoder.htm. I encode all the email addresses on my websites and those of clients. The program is free of charge.

You can tame the email beast, but it'll take a little effort and energy and due diligence to make it all work. Implement these steps, and you'll stop dreading receiving email.

Use An Email Marketing For Profit

2007-02-19T09:01:00.000+09:00

Email marketing has been one of the greatest things to every happen to smart business owners. Let's take a look at how you can use an email marketing course forEmail marketing has been one of the greatest things to every happen to smart business owners. The number one reason people use the internet for is to send email. The second reason people go online is to find information. With a well thought out email marketing course you can do both. Let's take a look at how you can use an email marketing course for a more profitable business.

1. You will need an autoresponder. An autoresponder allows you to automate your follow-up by capturing name and email addresses and automatically sending them pre-written messages. You can Google search and find all kinds of autoresponders. Make sure you are getting one from a reputable company as this is the primary tool you will use.

2. Your email marketing course should be stay on topic. Write about a problem your audience has and then over a series of messages solve their problem.

3. Keep your emails informational. One sales letter after another does not solve their problem, but asking and answering questions that they have will. Remember they are researching information and you are giving it to them.

4. Work in your products and services into the content of your messages naturally. This may even mean you do not mention a product or your website address until your signature at the bottom of the email. By doing it this way you are giving your potential customers a way to find you in a non threatening way.

5. Write professional content. If you can not do this yourself hire it out. There are people who make a full time living selling products by email. You can be one of them, but if your email marketing course is poorly written no one will pay attention to it and they will never buy anything from you.

6. Consider selling digital products. No matter what your product is you can add to it by selling digital products that can be downloaded instantly. eBooks are great for this because you find thousands of them that relate to the topic of your course. Another thing you can do is give away a brandable copy of an eBook for free. Brandable means that it has your i.d. number in it for a product you sell. When people read the eBook you have a chance to make a sale. Make it a viral marketing tool by allowing people to give the eBook away for free as well.

In summary you can use an email marketing course to make more money if you do it right. One thing you might do is subscribe to a few courses by email yourself. Create a swipe file and put any good ideas you see in it for future courses of you own.

a more profitable business

The Importance of Email Marketing

2007-02-16T08:20:00.000+09:00

Why email marketing is critical to online success.

Most of the people who visit your site will never buy. In fact, if your website produces a 1% conversion rate your website is considered successful.
In most cases, that means that 99 out of every 100 people who visit your site will leave and never come back… ever.

By offering something of high perceived value absolutely free to your website visitors, in exchange for their name and email address, you can capture a much larger number of people into your marketing system.

Where a good conversion rate for a site that is selling something is around 1%, a good ‘opt-in rate’ (the number of people who take up your free offer) is around 20%, and can be as high as 50%!Instead of losing 99 out of 100 people who visit your site, you’re now only losing 50 to 80 people. Or in other words, you’re capturing 20 to 50 people out of every 100 people who visit your site, instead of just one.

Most of the people who visit your site have some interest in what you sell, but for any number of reasons they won’t buy on the spot…… they might be researching to buy in the future; they might be looking to buy now but were distracted; or they might be at work and can’t take the required action to buy your product or service… it could be anything.

But, if you capture their name and email address, you can send them regular emails with solid information which is of value to them, as well as promotional emails selling your services.

By doing that, you stay in the mind of your prospect, so when they do make the decision to buy, your business it he first they think of.

Email marketing is critical in generating the maximum profits from your website visitors.

Targeted Email Marketing

2007-02-15T16:27:00.000+09:00

There’s five ingredients required for any successful targeted email marketing campaign. Only five, but every one is vital.

The first and most important of these ingredients is to ensure that you have an appropriate email list. Appropriate, in this case, is a question of “targeting”. Do you have an email list for the market you seek to penetrate? Do the people on the list have the needed “authority” to make the purchase you want from them? Are there other characteristics of the list that make them more likely to purchase? Good examples of this might be that (a) they’ve recently purchased something from you before; (b) they’ve recently purchased similar goods or services from someone else; or (c) they have a history of making purchases or decisions in response to email offers.

The second ingredient is the “offer”. There’s little, if any value, in targeted email marketing if you don’t make an offer. (In fact, this is the number one cause of failure in email marketing campaigns!) Consider compelling offers such as one-time discounts, money-back guarantees, premiums (buy this and get this FREE). Do not complicate offers by trying to sell too many products in one targeted email marketing campaign. It’s been demonstrated again and again that a multi-product offers will rarely do as well as a single product offer.

Like in a restaurant, the third ingredient for a successful campaign is “presentation”. Make sure your email is presented well – that the graphics are clear and the offer is highly visible. Part of successful presentation is to make sure that the offer, or the benefit of the offer, is presented early in the email. Example: Put “Now there’s a great way to save time and money on your bookkeeping!” up front followed quickly by Dear Mr. Smith…

The two remaining ingredients are often overlooked. Always make sure you have a reliable email distribution firm do your mailing. It makes the distribution and measurement of your targeted email marketing campaign that much easier and it’s not expensive.

Lastly, don’t forget the final ingredient -- planning for the “fulfillment”. What happens if your targeted email marketing campaign is a SMASHING success! Can you handle it? Make sure you how you’ll handle 30% more sales than expected. It would be a shame to have gone to all the trouble to have a successful campaign only to lose the customers because you can’t fill their orders in a timely way. Don’t laugh, it happens all the time!

Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, ‘Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide‘

Multi-Level Marketing with Email Leads

2007-02-14T08:44:00.000+09:00

The Multi-level marketing independent distributor continually faces the challenge of contacting new leads that may result in a customer for the company’s product or service. An MLM Email Lead is just like any other lead, except that the business owner (independent distributor) contacts this lead via email, rather than using standard offline methods of contact. Email leads should not be confused with a generic email list.

The difference is that an actual lead has expressed some interest in the product, service, or business opportunity that an MLM business owner has to offer. An email list can be acquired through various channels, including internet spiders that retrieve email addresses from web sites. These types of lists often result in “spam” or unwanted emails.

Like all other MLM leads, the business owner may purchase a list of MLM email leads from any number of companies that offer these types of services to MLM companies. The business owner can also generate his or her own list through a variety of marketing methods. The simple exchange of business cards between the MLM business owner and a potential lead is a good way to guarantee that the lead was interested. The business owner can also create a web site explaining the product or service and business opportunity.

A web site is valuable in generating MLM email leads, because the web site visitor will probably already be interested in the company. The web site can require registration in order to navigate to some of the more informative areas. The registration process can include the visitor’s email address, physical address, and phone number.

Effective Email Marketing

2007-02-13T09:49:00.000+09:00

Email Marketing is a very powerful and cost-effective tool to boost your business. But there are several factors that can prevent an email campaign from being successful. The tips below will guide you on how to perform effective email marketing and achieve the best possible results.

Over the past few years, research has continued to prove the benefits of e-mail marketing for business: low costs, high conversion rates and detailed tracking are all notable features. But e-mail marketing is becoming much more than just a tool for spammers and e-businesses. Consumers are becoming increasingly savvy on the differences between spam and permission-based emails, and more and more of them are accepting permission-based e-mail marketing as a positive replacement for direct mail.

The best news is that the majority of people who receive permission-based e-mails open, on average, 78% of them.

Jupiter Research reports effective email marketing campaigns can produce nine times the revenues and 18 times the profits of broadcast mailings. But crafting an effective business email is both an art and a science. Here is a list of factors, potential problems and effective solutions to keep in mind:

1. Spam! Spam! Spam! I don't need any Viagra!
The average consumer receives more than 300 emails a week, 62% of which are spam. No wonder there's such hostility towards the industry. But spam filters, bulk folders and "report spam" features are helping consumers become more at ease about the perils of spam. While 89% of users cited spam as a major concern in 2003, that number dropped to 85% in 2004, proportionally to an increase in the use of spam-fighting tools.

So as a permission-based business email marketer, what can you do? One tip is to remind your subscribers to add you to their "safe senders" list. The second, and most important, tactic is to make sure your email marketing service provider has a good relationship with ISPs. This will ensure that your email marketing campaigns go into your subscribers' inboxes, not their junk mail folders. When choosing an email marketing software, make sure the company has strict anti-spam policies and complies with the guidelines of Can-Spam.

2. Images and formatting: Why do my emails look broken?
Broken email campaigns are an increasing concern among email marketers, especially since several companies and web-based email providers now block graphics as a measure to combat spam. In fact, according to ClickZ, 40% of email marketing messages delivered to inboxes are "broken."

This was actually something that came up during Eliteweb.cc's beta-testing phases, as we had a client in the Canadian Government whose recipients were mostly using highly secure email programs. The solution we came up has now become one of our key competitive advantages.

What Eliteweb.cc does is it publishes every single email marketing campaign sent to a secure location on the web (a location only original recipients of the email can access, thanks to encrypted technology that automatically authenticates the user). The technology also ensures you can track your users' behaviors, even if they are reading your email campaign at the secure web location.

3. Personalization and relevant content: In a business e-mail, one size does not fit all.
In a recent study by DoubleClick, email users were 72% more likely to respond to a business e-mail if its content was based on the interests they had specified. That number points out the absolute importance of allowing users to choose their own interest groups and have control over which business e-mails they receive. The most popular interest categories, according to the study, are coupons and household goods.

But you're coupon is no good unless the user opens the email. Users in the study said the most compelling reason for them to open a business email is the name in the "from" field. So it's a good idea to make sure your company name is clearly stated there. Another major factor is the "subject" line. Users cite discount offers and interesting news as the most compelling subject lines, followed by new product announcements and free shipping offers.

4. Click-through and conversion: Show me the money!
So the user has opened your email and read the content. Great. But where's the sale? There's good news here. For one, consumers are increasingly likely to make purchases as a direct result of a business email campaign. One-third of users in the DoubleClick study had purchased something by clicking a link on an email. Another 42% clicked on an email link for more information, then purchased the product at a later time. Second, online couponing is booming: 73% of consumers have redeemed an online coupon for an online purchase, and 59% have redeemed an online coupon offline.

In terms of industries, the top performers are travel, hardware/software, electronics, apparel, food, home furnishings, gifts/flowers and sporting goods. All companies sending business emails in those categories said between 71% and 80% of recipients have purchased their products because of an email campaign.

There's no need to fret if your company doesn't fit in to one of those industries. The overall landscape for email marketing conversions is looking brighter every day. The average click-to-purchase rate has increased nearly 30% since 2004 and the average orders-per-email-delivered rate has increased more than 18% since last year.

5. Stats tracking: Who are my real consumers?
E-mail marketing is an increasingly popular tool in effective CRM, and it's about time more businesses recognize that. First off, if your provider's email services for business do not include detailed, real-time tracking, you're getting a raw deal. Real-time tracking is now an industry standard, and it's highly valuable, as it allows you to see the exact moment a user opens your campaign, clicks on your link and makes that purchase. Studying your users can help you improve your communications efforts, so each campaign performs better than the last (several email service providers also let you compare the performance of your campaigns).

But many marketers are still in the dark. According to a recent WebTrends research, only 5% of marketers are very confident in the measurement of their online marketing efforts, while 26% admit they're "flying blind." WebTrends says the low confidence comes from a lack of knowledge when it comes to measurement, which means there's still a lot of work to be done.

In email marketing, a blind shot won't take you very far. But if you aim properly by following these essential rules of play, you should soon be reaping the same major results as so many online and offline businesses.

Using Email Courses for Internet Marketing

2007-02-09T08:13:00.000+09:00

Email Marketing can be a very effective way of getting leads or sales. This article discusses different methods of creating and distributing email campaigns.

Email courses are not surprisingly becoming an increasingly popular way for perceptive Internet marketers to raise awareness of their products and services. Email courses generally contain short presentations which contain good content for specialized topics. In the main these courses are commonly offered in multiple brief segments to retain the student's attention in the subject. This brand of advertising serves a gainful purpose and most of the participants do not even come to realize that they are subconsciously subjected to a clever marketing campaign. This article will reveal methods of creating and distributing an email campaign for the purposes of marketing your business.
The formation of an online campaign in the form of an email course ought to start with a popular subject which relates to your business and is likely being of interest to your future clients. Informative email courses can on occasion be sold for profit themselves but if you are patient and see the value of using the courses as marketing material you will more than likely be gifting these courses free of charge in an attempt to lure potential customers to buy your goods or services.

Deciding on the topic of your courses is extremely vital because it can determine the level of success that your marketing campaign can achieve. Consider an online distributor of fishing equipment. This business owner may wish to write a set of email courses on subjects such as fly fishing, sea fishing, bait fishing, fishing venues etc. etc.. Each of these courses may have in it a few segments which offer distinct perspectives on the subject. These types of courses are perfect for this topic because they are subjects which are liable to be of interest to the participant's of the sport. Similarly a legal practise agent may opt to offer email courses on subjects such as understanding the importance of making a will, how valuable legal representation is when appearing in court or when buying or selling real estate.

These are all subjects which are likely to be of interest to the legal practice's list of clients.

The distribution database list for email courses should in the main consist of members of your targeted market. This can be achieved by either giving the course as a download online where just responsive Internet users are more than likely to participate in the course or just limit emailing the course to recipients who have indicated that they show an interest in receiving additional details relating to your products and services and importantly have submitted their personal details for this reason.

When you make a decision on which subject will be used for your email course, search out a proficient writer to write the content for chosen course. This should help to give your transcript a more proficient appearance. The writer can support you by penning copy which is educational and valuable to your readers but is also adequately written, neat, not too long and simple to interpret. If your niche subject is immensely unique you could then supply the writer with product reports as well as fact-finding materials to assure the content is instructive and precise. Furthermore, you have to examine the content when it is completed to certify the information provided is accurate.

When it comes the time for distributing your email course, it is useful to ask for feedback from the users on completion of the course. This is entirely voluntary but when users reply they can provide you with helpful feedback which should be exceptionally useful if you propose to add a similar marketing campaign in the future.

An Autoresponder is the most widely used tool for email distribution and is an absolute must for the serious Internet Marketer.

E-mail newsletters: Increasing subscriber numbers

2007-02-08T10:13:00.000+09:00

Mary was frustrated with the lack of subscribers to her new e-mail newsletter. She had taken care to make it a double opt-in type, and was always careful to avoid any hint of spamming.

She believed her e-mail newsletter contained a nice balance of valuable information, along with some great special offers for her subscribers.

The problem for Mary was no one was becoming a subscriber. She didn’t know what to do to improve her subscription numbers. If your e-mail newsletter is suffering from low readership numbers, there are many remedies you can use to cure the problem. What is needed is a little marketing creativity, and a willingness to test the results.

Most e-mail newsletter subscriber efforts make the mistake of being entirely online in their marketing focus. Many more good quality names can be added through offline marketing as well. In fact, some of a business’s most profitable customers might arrive from one of many offline sign-up vehicles.

While many new subscribers can be added away from the internet, most businesses gain the bulk of their newsletter readership from online sources. The many tried and true techniques can be coupled with many imaginative new concepts, gaining many new names in the process. The company website itself, is an often underused resource for recruitment, demanding special attention.

Consideration must be given to privacy issues, as the trust barrier must be passed, for a potential customer to provide their name, e-mail address, or any other personal information that might be required. After the names have been collected, each name adding technique should be tracked for volume of recruitments, and tested for improvements in effectiveness.

With proper attention to every aspect of e-mail newsletter subscriber recruitment, a business’s customer mailing list can grow larger than ever imagined.

Onsite sign up changes get more subscribers

The business’s own website is the most logical, and the most profitable, place to start an newsletter subscriber campaign. Simply making some changes to the structure and content of the website, will add many more new newsletter readers, without any other marketing efforts. Making the company website more newsletter subscriber friendly should be the first place to start.

Any onsite efforts to increase subscriber enrollments should begin with the on page sign up box. The box should be prominently placed on every page of the website. Since visitors enter a site at many different pages, the opportunity should be available to become a newsletter subscriber.

Restricting the sign up box, to only one on the home page, loses the visitors who land on another web page. A chance to enrol as a subscriber, by signing up from every page, increases the number of subscribers.

Often, there is so much interest in what is offered on a page, that the sign up box is overlooked. By simply presenting them, with a way to join the mailing list from an inside page, captures those people who may have clicked away from the home page.

Placing the sign up box, high on the right hand side of the page, is usually better eye placement than on the left hand side of the page. While that location might vary for some people, many researchers have found it effective placement for the majority.

Take advantage of natural eye movement, to ensure that your sign up box gets seen by as many visitors as possible. Note that placement on every page, picks up those potential subscribers, a quick home page scan might have missed.

Some sites do have opposite scans, based on the placement of their most eye catching information. Testing the box on both sides, and measuring the results from several locations, will provide the ideal sport for your site.

Be sure to place the subscriber box above the fold on the page. That means placing the box as close to the top of the page as possible. While you don’t want to crash the sign up box into the top banners, or whatever might be required in that prime real estate, you don’t want to have anyone need to scroll.

To prevent dropping below the fold, where scrolling down the page will be necessary, take into account the average size computer screens of 15 and 17 inches. Don’t forget that some screens have been reduced in size from the installation of one or more browser toolbars.

Use the thank you for purchases (you do have one of those, right?) page to offer a subscription to the newsletter, prior to leaving the shopping cart and the website. Many strong buyers will be motivated to add their name and e-mail to the subscriber list. Those who have already bought, are likely to do so in the future as well.

Taking care of subscribers nets more of them

A plainly worded and easy to understand privacy policy is essential for higher subscriber rates. Make available, at a single click, a highly visible privacy policy page as well. At the sign up location, tell the potential subscriber that their name and e-mail address will never be sold, rented out, or given away. Ever.

On the privacy policy page, repeat those promises, and guarantee them again. Don’t let your legal department use their legendary confusing terminology. That will only frighten people away, as they will suspect all sorts of loopholes, letting their e-mail address become a spam target. Make certain that a spam concerned visitor can enrol from the privacy page, once they are comfortable with your privacy guarantee.

Make certain that any newsletter is what is called “double opt-in”. By that, a subscriber must submit a working e-mail address to the site. A response will be sent back to the potential recipient, who must confirm the request. The method assures the newsletter was wanted and is not likely to be considered spam. While not required by law, double opt-in is considered a best practice.

Sending the sign up response immediately, with a personally written and not default message, will reassure the potential subscriber of the quality of the product. Delays cost the site many subscribers. While at the double opt-in confirmation page, other site’s newsletters can be offered as well.

Such exchanges, of similarly themed e-zines, can gain more subscribers for everyone. Check each newsletter partner, prior to entering into an exchange arrangement, to be sure they also adhere to best practices. Look especially for double opt-in and a strong privacy policy. Avoid anyone who violates those principles.

Be certain that along with making it easy for a subscriber to be added to the list, make it easy and problem free to unsubscribe from the list. While that idea might sound counterproductive, it really helps enrollment.

If a potential recipient believes they might never be able to remove their name from the list, in the event the newsletter is no longer useful, that person won’t join in the first place. Easy enrollment, coupled with simple and problem free unsubscription will add more readers than it will lose.

Other handy ideas for adding subscribers

Offer a free download or a gift to every new subscriber, simply for enrolling. With the ease of creating an e-book or PDF file, any webmasters can turn their knowledge in their area of business, into a book consisting of several pages. For those who prefer to not create their own downloadable book, there are many such items available on the internet. It is better for your online business, however, to use your own informational materials.

Develop your reputation as an expert in your industry. By posting helpful information, at the various internet message boards on your topic, you can become known as an expert in your business area. If the message board permits a signature, use it to recommend signing up for your newsletter. Visitors to your site, seeking additional information, will also find your sign up boxes.

Don’t overlook the obvious benefit of providing high quality content on your website itself. If the website provides useful information to the visitor, that person is highly likely to want your e-mail newsletter as well. The newsletters can also be archived, on the website itself, to provide additional content for both the site visitors and for the search engines.

Subscribers can help add even more enrollments. Make sure there is a link to “forward to a friend” on every newsletter. Many people will pass along the newsletter to their friends and associates, resulting in more new subscribers.

Providing prizes to subscribers for sending a certain number of new enrollments works as a powerful incentive to forward the newsletter. The use of such viral marketing and endorsement techniques is often one of the most powerful list builders available.

Current subscribers, who enjoyed your newsletter information and its special offers, can help get more readers by providing testimonials. Get the permission of satisfied customers and subscribers to print their comments, along with their name and address.

Testimonials are one of the most powerful techniques to build any business. Potential subscribers are much more likely to believe the words of a site’s customers, than those of the business owner.

Add extra subscribers offline

While online subscriptions might form the largest numbers of subscribers, many businesses have found their offline enrollment efforts produced some of their best buying customers.

A business with a bricks and mortar location can offer a sign up offer right at their point of purchase location. The business owner can offer a subscription to the newsletter to product or service buyers. These already existing customers and clients provide some of the best subscribers, from a sales conversion standpoint. A person who has bought from a business in the past is very apt to do so in the future.

Trade shows create a tremendous newsletter recruitment point for adding subscribers. Many interested people will be delighted to join a company mailing list, especially if they have shown interest in the business’s products and services. Offering a prize, a special pricing discount, or similar incentive will also boost trade show driven e-mail subscription levels. The newsletter can supply much needed followup to trade show attendees, as an article can easily be written about the show itself.

Place an offer to subscribe to the company e-mail newsletter in all purchases, on all invoices, business cards, and any other materials, that leave the doors of the business. Make enrollment in this manner a simple process, and offer an incentive for new subscribers to gain even more readers.

Along with adding subscribers, who may click through newsletter offers, many current and potential customers may simply go directly to the website as buyers. Either way, a new customer is born, or an existing buyer retained.

By combining elements of improved website design, with good online and offline marketing techniques, the subscriber list for an e-mail newsletter can be rapidly enlarged.

Add those new subscribers today!

Email Marketing Ideas

2007-02-07T07:52:00.000+09:00

Email marketing involves a great deal more than sales messages. It’s multi-faceted and multi-talented. And if you enjoy thinking outside the box, it’s a marketing tool you can have fun with, developing your own email marketing ideas.

In the meantime, some of these email marketing ideas might be obvious, some might surprise you:

1. Get higher response rates by using email lists that reach small but very specific groups of people, tailoring messages to their particular concerns, interests and desires.

2. Stay in touch with the people more likely than any other group to buy your goods and services – your existing customers – by capturing their email address (with permission, of course) at the time of sale.

3. Build your own email list of potential customers by starting a free email newsletter (ezine) on a subject closely related to your products and expertise.

4. Promote your email newsletter – and get links to your website – by submitting details of your newsletter to ezine directories.

5. Generate long-term sales and minimise unsubscribe rates by providing a consistently relevant and useful newsletter that builds trust and loyalty.

6. Build an email list of potential customers quickly and easily by adding a sign-up page to your website offering details by email of special offers and new products – simpler and less time-consuming than writing a newsletter.

7. Get inbound links and traffic to your website by submitting articles to article-sharing directories used as a source of content by other email newsletters and websites.

8. Get inbound links as well as sales by advertising in web-based ezines which have back issues - including your ad and a link to your website – available to view online.

9. Save money and increase response rates in more expensive marketing channels by using low-cost email marketing options to test your ads (e.g., ezine classified ads are similar in size and format to Google AdWords.)

10. Expand your email list and generate sales by offering a genuinely useful series of emails (e.g. a “mini-course”) to be sent by autoresponder over a period of time, promoting a relevant product or service in each message.

11. Maximise the reach and potential of email promotions by inviting recipients to “forward this message” to friends/colleagues.

12. Build brand image and awareness by including a simple statement about your business and how it differs from the competition in each and every email.

These are just a few ideas for email marketing, designed to show how email marketing can achieve much more than sales.

Email marketing is also highly affordable. In fact, all the above ideas can be put into action for free. So, feel free to make the most of them, and encouraged to develop your own email marketing ideas.

How to Write Personalized Emails

2007-02-06T08:48:00.000+09:00

One of the most important things when you are writing your emails for your autoresponder email campaign is to make sure that the people reading them feel as though the emails are written directly to them, and not to the entire group.

Now, you may think that you are getting that if you are writing your emails using your autoresponder's personalization feature, but that is not nearly enough.

One of the things that is important is that all of your language is congruent with writing the email to one person, not multiple people. For example, when you are writing your email, do not use language like: “you all”, or “to all my subscribers”, or “a free gift for all my valued subscribers”. Instead, use personalized language like: “you”, or “to you”, or “a free gift for you”.

If you are having trouble writing to the audience of one, imagine that you are writing the email to your best friend – one on one. Write each email as if it were written specifically to that one person. If imagining it isn’t working, ask a good friend of yours to subscribe to your email list, not for the purpose of ever buying from you, but for the purpose of reading each email and replying back with feedback about whether the email felt personal or if it instead felt canned. Then when you write, you really are writing to your friend, and the emails should come out more personal.

Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, ‘Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide‘

Email Marketing Course For Profit

2007-02-05T09:08:00.000+09:00

Email marketing has been one of the greatest things to every happen to smart business owners. Let's take a look at how you can use an email marketing course for a more profitable business.

Email marketing has been one of the greatest things to every happen to smart business owners. The number one reason people use the internet for is to send email. The second reason people go online is to find information. With a well thought out email marketing course you can do both. Let's take a look at how you can use an email marketing course for a more profitable business.
1. You will need an autoresponder. An autoresponder allows you to automate your follow-up by capturing name and email addresses and automatically sending them pre-written messages. You can Google search and find all kinds of autoresponders. Make sure you are getting one from a reputable company as this is the primary tool you will use.

2. Your email marketing course should be stay on topic. Write about a problem your audience has and then over a series of messages solve their problem.

3. Keep your emails informational. One sales letter after another does not solve their problem, but asking and answering questions that they have will. Remember they are researching information and you are giving it to them.

4. Work in your products and services into the content of your messages naturally. This may even mean you do not mention a product or your website address until your signature at the bottom of the email. By doing it this way you are giving your potential customers a way to find you in a non threatening way.

5. Write professional content. If you can not do this yourself hire it out. There are people who make a full time living selling products by email. You can be one of them, but if your email marketing course is poorly written no one will pay attention to it and they will never buy anything from you.

6. Consider selling digital products. No matter what your product is you can add to it by selling digital products that can be downloaded instantly. eBooks are great for this because you find thousands of them that relate to the topic of your course. Another thing you can do is give away a brandable copy of an eBook for free. Brandable means that it has your i.d. number in it for a product you sell. When people read the eBook you have a chance to make a sale. Make it a viral marketing tool by allowing people to give the eBook away for free as well.

In summary you can use an email marketing course to make more money if you do it right. One thing you might do is subscribe to a few courses by email yourself. Create a swipe file and put any good ideas you see in it for future courses of you own.

D-List Part 1

2007-02-03T14:41:00.000+09:00

These blogs have the ‘no follow’ link disabled from the comments, which means that if you comment on these sites, you will get an actual link. If you would like to be included here, please let me know.

If you find this list useful, please consider linking to it.

This DoFollow Blog list is courtesy of Courtney Tuttle and was created originally by Coleen as the D-List.

RealityWired.com
BrilliantCheers
Achille
OnTheWebEd
JonLee
ChrisHoyt
JulieAnnBonner
LinkItForMe
RamblingThoughtsBlog
BlogThatOutside
Tobsy
NOWG
CatchAFallingStar
SweetAgring
LayerCake
ErikSvend
PajamaProfessional
Hem
MyOpinionsAreImportant
HeckOfIt
RoadLessTravelled
The Fit Shack
Foximus
BetShopBoy
5xMom
Derek
Semmler
Linguistics Zone
Zr5
SmartWealthyRich
How To Split An Atom
The Alternative
Self-Employment Blog
A Politically Incorrect Entrepreneur
CrayonWriter
BlogRaters
TagsKitchen
TradeMacro
Bracing Your Brand
Mother’s Home
Brian Pratt
Best Real Income
1000MileJourney
3DayMom
A Writers Words, An Editors Eye
Aaron Roselo
Advertising for Success
And to Think

To be continued

Increase Effectiveness of eMail Marketing

2007-02-02T08:54:00.000+09:00

Email marketing has become one of the most used marketing techniques on the web today. When developing your own email marketing campaign there are several important things to consider. Don't let the appeal of quick leads stop you from developing your own opt-in email marketing campaign.

Email marketing is one of the most effective marketing tactics utilized by current internet business owners. It involves more than creating simple sales messages and with a little bit of creativity can become a powerful and even fun marketing tool.

There are many different ways to approach email marketing and each niche will have its own way of effectively utilizing this technique. Some ideas to keep in mind that you may find interesting:

1. Try to keep your email lists as targeted as possible. Lists that reach a specific group of people will generally have higher response rates. This allows you to really aim your emails at the specific interests and concerns of those particular users.

2. Build your own email list by creating a free email newsletter. By offering free advice, products, or services you can get potential customers to opt-in to your email list. This way you can reach interested customers over time and refresh their memory about your products or services.

3. Generate consistent long term sales by regularly providing relevant newsletters to your opt-in users. Providing your potential customers with useful materials will build trust and lower your unsubscribe rate.

4. Use a reliable and inexpensive auto responder service that will consolidate all of your email lists. Using a service like aweber.com you can create unlimited auto responders and have potential customers opt-in to your email lists from any where. (website, blog, etc.) You can create the opt-in forms and have scheduled messages sent automatically or manually to all of your members.

5. Generate more sales and credibility through offering useful series of emails that can be sent by your auto responder over several different emails. Keep the series of emails related, promoting a relevant product or service.

6. Encourage your recipients to forward the emails to their friends, relatives, and colleagues. This will increase the amount of exposure and improve the reach of your email marketing broadcast.

These are just a few ideas to consider when developing your own email marketing campaign. Email marketing is extremely affordable and is a powerful tool consistently generating long term sales and contact with potential customers.

Top 5 Tips for Effective Email Marketing

2007-02-01T08:17:00.000+09:00

Email Marketing is a very powerful and cost-effective tool to boost your business. But there are several factors that can prevent an email campaign from being successful. The tips below will guide you on how to perform effective email marketing and achieve the best possible results.

Over the past few years, research has continued to prove the benefits of e-mail marketing for business: low costs, high conversion rates and detailed tracking are all notable features. But e-mail marketing is becoming much more than just a tool for spammers and e-businesses. Consumers are becoming increasingly savvy on the differences between spam and permission-based emails, and more and more of them are accepting permission-based e-mail marketing as a positive replacement for direct mail.

The best news is that the majority of people who receive permission-based e-mails open, on average, 78% of them.

Jupiter Research reports effective email marketing campaigns can produce nine times the revenues and 18 times the profits of broadcast mailings. But crafting an effective business email is both an art and a science. Here is a list of factors, potential problems and effective solutions to keep in mind:

1. Spam! Spam! Spam! I don't need any Viagra!
The average consumer receives more than 300 emails a week, 62% of which are spam. No wonder there's such hostility towards the industry. But spam filters, bulk folders and "report spam" features are helping consumers become more at ease about the perils of spam. While 89% of users cited spam as a major concern in 2003, that number dropped to 85% in 2004, proportionally to an increase in the use of spam-fighting tools.

So as a permission-based business email marketer, what can you do? One tip is to remind your subscribers to add you to their "safe senders" list. The second, and most important, tactic is to make sure your email marketing service provider has a good relationship with ISPs. This will ensure that your email marketing campaigns go into your subscribers' inboxes, not their junk mail folders. When choosing an email marketing software, make sure the company has strict anti-spam policies and complies with the guidelines of Can-Spam.

2. Images and formatting: Why do my emails look broken?
Broken email campaigns are an increasing concern among email marketers, especially since several companies and web-based email providers now block graphics as a measure to combat spam. In fact, according to ClickZ, 40% of email marketing messages delivered to inboxes are "broken."

This was actually something that came up during Eliteweb.cc's beta-testing phases, as we had a client in the Canadian Government whose recipients were mostly using highly secure email programs. The solution we came up has now become one of our key competitive advantages.

What Eliteweb.cc does is it publishes every single email marketing campaign sent to a secure location on the web (a location only original recipients of the email can access, thanks to encrypted technology that automatically authenticates the user). The technology also ensures you can track your users' behaviors, even if they are reading your email campaign at the secure web location.

3. Personalization and relevant content: In a business e-mail, one size does not fit all.
In a recent study by DoubleClick, email users were 72% more likely to respond to a business e-mail if its content was based on the interests they had specified. That number points out the absolute importance of allowing users to choose their own interest groups and have control over which business e-mails they receive. The most popular interest categories, according to the study, are coupons and household goods.

But you're coupon is no good unless the user opens the email. Users in the study said the most compelling reason for them to open a business email is the name in the "from" field. So it's a good idea to make sure your company name is clearly stated there. Another major factor is the "subject" line. Users cite discount offers and interesting news as the most compelling subject lines, followed by new product announcements and free shipping offers.

4. Click-through and conversion: Show me the money!
So the user has opened your email and read the content. Great. But where's the sale? There's good news here. For one, consumers are increasingly likely to make purchases as a direct result of a business email campaign. One-third of users in the DoubleClick study had purchased something by clicking a link on an email. Another 42% clicked on an email link for more information, then purchased the product at a later time. Second, online couponing is booming: 73% of consumers have redeemed an online coupon for an online purchase, and 59% have redeemed an online coupon offline.

In terms of industries, the top performers are travel, hardware/software, electronics, apparel, food, home furnishings, gifts/flowers and sporting goods. All companies sending business emails in those categories said between 71% and 80% of recipients have purchased their products because of an email campaign.

There's no need to fret if your company doesn't fit in to one of those industries. The overall landscape for email marketing conversions is looking brighter every day. The average click-to-purchase rate has increased nearly 30% since 2004 and the average orders-per-email-delivered rate has increased more than 18% since last year.

5. Stats tracking: Who are my real consumers?
E-mail marketing is an increasingly popular tool in effective CRM, and it's about time more businesses recognize that. First off, if your provider's email services for business do not include detailed, real-time tracking, you're getting a raw deal. Real-time tracking is now an industry standard, and it's highly valuable, as it allows you to see the exact moment a user opens your campaign, clicks on your link and makes that purchase. Studying your users can help you improve your communications efforts, so each campaign performs better than the last (several email service providers also let you compare the performance of your campaigns).

But many marketers are still in the dark. According to a recent WebTrends research, only 5% of marketers are very confident in the measurement of their online marketing efforts, while 26% admit they're "flying blind." WebTrends says the low confidence comes from a lack of knowledge when it comes to measurement, which means there's still a lot of work to be done.

In email marketing, a blind shot won't take you very far. But if you aim properly by following these essential rules of play, you should soon be reaping the same major results as so many online and offline businesses.

Outlook 2007 and HTML email design: a summary

2007-01-31T14:12:00.000+09:00

As the dust settles on the big bust up over Outlook 2007 and how it displays emails, I thought I'd sum up the arguments, issues and implications. Here goes...

The story so far

Microsoft's new version of Outlook, the email client included within their forthcoming Office 2007 software, features an important change in how it displays emails.

Previously, Outlook relied on the technology behind its sibling web browser (Internet Explorer) to interpret the underlying code and instructions that HTML emails use to tell Outlook where and how to display all those images, colors etc.

The new Outlook 2007 now uses Word to do that job instead.

The big deal is that Word is not nearly as good as Internet Explorer at understanding HTML elements and style properties (CSS). Microsoft themselves published an article describing the various things that Outlook 2007 will not be able to cope with. These include:

Forms

Background images

Animated GIFs

Flash

Float or position commands

Alt tags in images

In a nutshell, this places a lot of restrictions on email design. Needless to say, email designers are not happy.

The fires of protest first sparked into flame via an article in Sitepoint's newsletter. This led to a now-famous blog post by David Greiner, with the memorable title "Microsoft takes email design back 5 years."

David's post in turn led to a slew of similar posts from outraged designers, who like him were upset at the limitations imposed on their work by Outlook. The story even made it to the front page of ClickZ and Digg.

Is this bad for email marketing?

The general consensus is that the implications for email marketing are not huge. This is because Outlook is predominately used by the business community.

Other email clients typically used by business folk aren't particular good with HTML and CSS either. So most B2B email marketers are already sending out Outlook 2007-friendly HTML emails.

For example, the folk at MailChimp point out that much of the "lost" functionality was never standard in HTML email design anyway. In other words, we're losing a lot of functionality that wasn't particularly valuable in the first place.

That opinion is echoed by Bill Nussey of Silverpop, who notes, "Bottom line, Outlook 2007's rendering engine is not a game-changing event for email marketers."

The counterargument is that these other email clients never had enough market share to make it compulsory to send out "watered down" HTML emails.

So some people will inevitably have to go back to their email template and redesign them again, on the assumption that Outlook 2007 will likely become the most popular email software among business people.

Even then, say experts, there's no reason why simpler HTML has to mean poorer response rates.

Some suggest that the negative reaction is more to do with the creative restrictions it imposes on designers rather than any likely marketing problems.

In other words, yes, design needs to take account of Outlook 2007's relatively poor rendering capabilities, but you can still send decent looking, effective email to people using it.

That argument is exemplified by Greg Cangialosi, who writes on the Blue Sky Factory blog, "This is a small blow to email marketers, but certainly not the biggest deal. What this really does is make all of that great creative talent we have out there revert back to nascent HTML email design"

So why the fuss?

To some extent the uproar comes from a reopening of two traditional divisions in email marketing.

The first is between the creative folk and the marketing folk.

Some marketers have made relatively offhand comments along the lines, of "tough, get over it," which is a touch disrespectful to the trade and art of email design.

If you took away the color green from an artist's palette, she could still paint great works of art. But you wouldn't expect her to be happy about it.

The second division is between the email marketing community and a section of the anti-spam community...those who believe marketing email in general and HTML marketing email in particular is an abomination. See, for example, this article by Jack Schofield.

The anti-HTML-in-email brigade have welcomed the move, though it's a pyrrhic victory: it won't change the number of HTML emails around, it will just make them less creative.

So are there any practical implications?

Yes. If you are tackling a business audience with your list and never bothered to consider problems with how your emails display, then this is a necessary wake-up call. Various versions of Outlook have a market share among business users of over 50%. So expect Outlook 2007 to be widely used.

The change should be seen as a further reminder that how your emails display is a critical part of email marketing.

The more complex the email and the more fancy the coding within it, the less likely it is to be seen as you intended. It doesn't mean the end of email design creativity, but it certainly means you need to take a more circumspect approach to the whole topic.

People view your emails using different software. Some use a desktop email client, others use webmail. There are different webmail services. Some people read emails on their mobile device. This diversity needs accommodating in your email design.

Equally, the less creative flexibility you have in terms of layout, images and colors, the more thought needs to go into other aspects of the email, such as the words you use and the offer you present.

So while Outlook 2007 may not prove to be the disaster some have called it, it's certainly another good reason to take a longer deeper look at the email we send.

Do It Yourself Email Marketing Techniques

2007-01-31T08:31:00.000+09:00

Email marketing is one of the most effective Internet marketing strategies these days. Here are some helpful tips about do-it-yourself email marketing...

#1. Do-It-Yourself Message Templates

Whether you publish your own newsletter or want to follow up with your past customers, you need a professional design for your messages - especially if you're going to send your messages in HTML format.

The easiest way to find a design is downloading newsletter templates from the Internet. You can find many templates that you can use for free.

Even if you want your messages to have a unique design, you can get inspired from these free templates to come up with a better design idea.

Here's a link for you to download many free newsletter templates in HTML, plain text, and PDF.

#2. Do-It-Yourself Promotional Emails

The most important part of your email marketing campaign, is the promotional messages you send to your list. If they are compelling, you will make the sale. Otherwise, you won't.

To discover how to write killer email copy, you should learn from successful, money-making emails. You can simply read them to discover their secrets, and use the formula for writing your own messages. After all, if they're making other people rich, they will make you money too.

#3. Do-It-Yourself Follow Up System

Customer follow up is the most effective email marketing strategy, because selling to your past customers is much easier and more cost-effective than gaining new customers.

You can create a follow up system and then put it on autopilot. The only thing you need is an autoresponder service to automatically send your messages day after day and month after month.

Here's a free article on how to create a powerful customer follow up system.

To your success!

e-Marketing Strategy

2007-01-30T08:37:00.000+09:00

The frenzy around these new marketing techniques created by e-tailers and supported by the internet rapidly gave birth to a new dimension of what we knew as Marketing: the e-Marketing (electronic Marketing).

There are many definitions to what e-Marketing is, the simplest and shortest one being formulated by Mark Sceats: e-Marketing is Marketing that uses the internet as manifestation media. A working definition is that coming from a group of CISCO specialists: e-Marketing is the sum of all activities a business conducts through the internet with the purpose of finding, attracting, winning and retaining customers.

e-Marketing Strategy
The e-Marketing Strategy is normally based and built upon the principles that govern the traditional, offline Marketing – the well-known 4 P's (Product – Price – Promotion – Positioning) that form the classic Marketing mix. Add the extra 3 P's (People – Processes – Proof) and you got the whole extended Marketing mix.

Until here, there are no much aspects to differentiate e-Marketing from the traditional Marketing performed offline: the extended Marketing mix (4 + 3 P's) is built around the concept of "transactional" and its elements perform transactional functions defined by the exchange paradigm. What gives e-Marketing its uniqueness is a series of specific functions, relational functions, that can be synthesized in the 2P + 2C+ 3S formula: Personalization, Privacy, Customer Service, Community, Site, Security, Sales Promotion.

These 7 functions of the e-Marketing stay at the base of any e-Marketing strategy and they have a moderating character, unlike the classic Marketing mix that comprises situational functions only. Moderating functions of e-Marketing have the quality of moderate, operate upon all situational functions of the mix (the classic 4 P's) and upon each other.

1. Personalization
The fundamental concept of personalization as a part of the e-Marketing mix lies in the need of recognizing, identifying a certain customer in order to establish relations (establishing relations is a fundamental objective of Marketing). It is crucial to be able to identify our customers on individual level and gather all possible information about them, with the purpose of knowing our market and be able to develop customized, personalized products and services.

For example, a cookie strategically placed on the website visitor's computer can let us know vital information concerning the access speed available: in consequence, if we know the visitor is using a slow connection (eg. dial-up) we will offer a low-volume variation of our website, with reduced graphic content and no multimedia or flash applications. This will ease our customer's experience on our website and he will be prevented from leaving the website on the reason that it takes too long to load its pages.

Personalization can be applied to any component of the Marketing mix; therefore, it is a moderating function.

2. Privacy
Privacy is an element of the mix very much connected to the previous one – personalization. When we gather and store information about our customers and potential customers (therefore, when we perform the personalization part of the e-Marketing mix) a crucial issue arises: that of the way this information will be used, and by whom. A major task to do when implementing an e-Marketing strategy is that of creating and developing a policy upon access procedures to the collected information.

This is a duty and a must for any conscious marketer to consider all aspects of privacy, as long as data are collected and stored, data about individual persons.

Privacy is even more important when establishing the e-Marketing mix since there are many regulations and legal aspects to be considered regarding collection and usage of such information.

3. Customer Service
Customer service is one of the necessary and required activities among the support functions needed in transactional situations.

We will connect the apparition of the customer service processes to the inclusion of the "time" parameter in transactions. When switching from a situational perspective to a relational one, and e-Marketing is mostly based on a relational perspective, the marketer saw himself somehow forced into considering support and assistance on a non-temporal level, permanently, over time.

For these reasons, we should consider the Customer Service function (in its fullest and largest definition) as an essential one within the e-Marketing mix.

As we can easily figure out, the service (or assistance if you wish) can be performed upon any element from the classic 4 P's, hence its moderating character.

4. Community
We can all agree that e-Marketing is conditioned by the existence of this impressive network that the internet is. The merely existence of such a network implies that individuals as well as groups will eventually interact. A group of entities that interact for a common purpose is what we call a "community" and we will soon see why it is of absolute importance to participate, to be part of a community.

The Metcalf law (named after Robert Metcalf) states that the value of a network is given by the number of its components, more exactly the value of a network equals the square of the number of components. We can apply this simple law to communities, since they are a network: we will then conclude that the value of a community rises with the number of its members. This is the power of communities; this is why we have to be a part of it.

The customers / clients of a business can be seen as part of a community where they interact (either independent or influenced by the marketer) – therefore developing a community is a task to be performed by any business, even though it is not always seen as essential.

Interactions among members of such a community can address any of the other functions of e-Marketing, so it can be placed next to other moderating functions.

5. Site
We have seen and agreed that e-Marketing interactions take place on a digital media – the internet. But such interactions and relations also need a proper location, to be available at any moment and from any place – a digital location for digital interactions.

Such a location is what we call a "site", which is the most widespread name for it. It is now the time to mention that the "website" is merely a form of a "site" and should not be mistaken or seen as synonyms. The "site" can take other forms too, such as a Palm Pilot or any other handheld device, for example.

This special location, accessible through all sort of digital technologies is moderating all other functions of the e-Marketing – it is then a moderating function.

6. Security
The "security" function emerged as an essential function of e-Marketing once transactions began to be performed through internet channels.

What we need to keep in mind as marketers are the following two issues on security:

- security during transactions performed on our website, where we have to take all possible precautions that third parties will not be able to access any part of a developing transaction;

- security of data collected and stored, about our customers and visitors.

A honest marketer will have to consider these possible causes of further trouble and has to co-operate with the company's IT department in order to be able to formulate convincing (and true, honest!) messages towards the customers that their personal details are protected from unauthorized eyes.

7. Sales Promotion
At least but not last, we have to consider sales promotions when we build an e-Marketing strategy. Sales promotions are widely used in traditional Marketing as well, we all know this, and it is an excellent efficient strategy to achieve immediate sales goals in terms of volume.

This function counts on the marketer's ability to think creatively: a lot of work and inspiration is required in order to find new possibilities and new approaches for developing an efficient promotion plan.

On the other hand, the marketer needs to continuously keep up with the latest internet technologies and applications so that he can fully exploit them.

To conclude, we have seen that e-Marketing implies new dimensions to be considered aside of those inherited from the traditional Marketing. These dimensions revolve around the concept of relational functions and they are a must to be included in any e-Marketing strategy in order for it to be efficient and deliver results.
What is e-Marketing?
e-Marketing is still quite a controversial subject to talk about, since no one succeeded to unify the various theories around it; however there is one thing upon which there is no doubt – that e-Marketing first appeared under the form of various techniques deployed by pioneer companies selling their products via the internet in the early 90's.

Automatic Responder Email Marketing

2007-01-29T10:56:00.000+09:00

Once you have successfully established your online business, it's important to begin an email marketing campaign. You will want to have a subscriber form located in a highly visible area of your site. There are many types of email newsletter software on the market, however, an automatic responder will make your email campaign much easier to manage. The job of the automatic responder software is to email your subscribers on a regular basis (usually weekly or monthly.) You prepare newsletters in advance and pre-load them into the automatic responder. Choose your automatic responder wisely. There are free versions on the internet but free usually comes with a price such as ads on all of your emails.

Building Your Subscriber List
Building a large list is the goal for any successful internet marketer. You can build your list by joining ezine directories or offering free products for signing up. Free products are usually in the form of ebooks. You can also utilized what is called a "squeeze page." Squeeze pages work by displaying a newsletter sign-up form to the user before they have access to you web site. Pop-up windows used to be effective but with most people using pop-up blockers, it's a little harder to build a list. There are new types of pop-up windows which can work around pop-up blockers. The windows appears to float across your browser screen containing text along with the sign-up form.

Why Automatic Responders Work
Automatic responders work well for maintaining a relationship with your readers. You'll want to keep your newsletters useful and informative so that you build credibility. Having a good relationship with your subscribers builds trust and this is important when you recommend particular products. Many internet marketers earn a huge portion of their living from their subscriber lists.

As you can see, building a subscriber list is very important for any internet marketer. Automatic responders work great to quickly develop a trusting relationship with your readers.

RSS Versus Email

2007-01-25T08:40:00.000+09:00

All right, I admit it. I'm writing this in an emotionally charged situation. And no this is not about which is best, who is right and not doing one thing that will kill your business overnight. Actually this came about quite by accident when a friend asked about an article claiming that Email is doomed, RSS is the replacement and if a fellow marketer and I would agree.

You should know that I am not selling any type of RSS related products. The reason you should know this is so you know my thoughts on RSS and the technology is not based on something that I can gain from, it is my real opinion based on my business experience. I also simply love email marketing, it's been very good to me. Email marketing has helped me build my income, no doubt, and I wouldn't be without if for anything. So what's this article all about?

Most people miss the point on RSS. RSS is not only capable of delivering newsletters or updates. An important point to always keep in mind is that email is not the same as RSS and RSS is not email, thinking they are will do a great injustice to how they can potentially be used. RSS offers many capabilities that just aren't leveraged. FedEx got it right when they started to offer parcel tracking via RSS.

Now you want to know what to do with RSS without dealing with a newsletter, right?

1. Syndicate. An article can be published in many different newspapers in many places all at the same time, ever wonder how this is possible? A radio show can be distributed nationally or globally, ever wonder how as well? It's because of syndication. When an article, radio show or your content is syndicated it automatically and instantly shows up in the format that has been determined, without you having to do anything else.

So in short, how would you like it if every time you published a new article, the article appears on a bunch of other people's websites immediately? No more article submissions, no more hoping an article will be picked up.

2. Affiliate support. Quit making your affiliates copy and paste codes. If you had a way to instantly update your affiliates websites when you had new specials, an event or something new to add to your product would you like that? Well, RSS can do that.

3. Research! Let's face it; we are all too busy to do research yes to stay on top of our industry or niches, we need to be up to date. On the latest news and happenings, what other people are discussing, what people are saying they want. You can create RSS feeds on anything that will alert you anytime something you want to know about in your niche comes up. Let the technology to the leg work for you and spend less time on your computer.

I hope from this article you've thought about doing more than just comparing email to RSS and starting thinking about the potential of this great technology. If you need more ideas and thoughts about how to use RSS visit my site and pick up the newsletter I offer on marketing technology. You'll get straight talk and easy to understand tips and ideas to help you make the most of it. Don't ever stop publishing your newsletter either.

Testing Email Campaigns

2007-01-24T10:06:00.000+09:00

Testing of your email campaign is all important...not only do you risk your campaign being a flop, but you also risk your reputation being at risk if you send a badly formatted copy. You can test the factors contributing towards the deliverability of the campaign as well as the factors contributing towards the overall success of the campaign, which includes open rates and response rates.

The key point to remember when testing is to use a control message as a basis for comparison. Don't be tempted by the ease of testing your campaign and test multiple parts of an email at once. Just test one facet of the campaign and compare it to the control message. Have a checklist which needs to be signed off. Also have a written testing procedure in place and record your results.

Factors to be tested:

Personalisation: Test whether you should personalize the subject line, whether you should work the business name into the copy...what other personalisations are relevant to your message? Do they make a difference to the result? Personalisation should not only be tested for response but also for deliverability differences. Segmentation: Test to see whether your response rates improve if the campaign is segmented even further. Generally the more targeted the offer, the better the response rate.

Tone: Change your tone of writing to suit the recipient...for example if your audience are lawyers, you can be more formal in your tone. Don't use the same tone when writing to both lawyers and graphic designers!

Time and Day: Test this thoroughly for receptiveness. It can be different for each sector within each country...Research your audience and don't be scared to try out different times and days.

The length of the message: Test short messages, long messages...different lengths will suit different audiences and offers.

The lead: Recipients will stop reading if the first paragraph doesn't grab them. Use the "above fold" (preview window) wisely and put some attention grabbing statements or offer in there. Don't let the preview window be filled only with the company logo or header.

The offer: Test the offer/s thoroughly...Make sure the offer correlates with the subject line. Hard versus soft sells, Full-price versus discount offers, Different discount levels, Buy-one/get-one offers, Money-back guarantees, Free gift offer.

Follow up mailings: Test these thoroughly - both the copy/offer and the mechanism. If they're automated, does the mechanism work? Is it simple to use? If using forms - check these aren't too long. The simpler the response mechanism, the better.

Subject line: This is one of the easiest tests and one of the most effective test you can perform. Should the subject line be personalized? If you put an offer in the subject line, make sure it is relevant and supported in the copy.

The "From" field: Who is the email from? Should you use the companies name or an actual person? Who will the recipient be more receptive to?

Format: When testing the format, always be sure to actually send a test message - don't just preview it. It is the sending of the email which brings out symbols and weird formatting.

Call(s) to action: Are they easy to find? Who does all the hard work...you or the recipient? Make sure you have procedures in place and make it as easy on the recipient to respond as possible. Test the positioning of these calls to actions and how many calls to action work best?

Spam rating: Most reputable email service providers supply a spam scoring test. Use it in conjunction with your general testing. You may have a fantastic subject line, but if it gets blocked by ISP's because they deem it to be too 'spam like', then it's no good using it.

Deliverability to major ISP's: Does your email service provider supply a feature which tests the deliverability to major ISP's? If so, then utilise this feature...

So, in summary:

1. Test only one element at a time

2. Use a control message

3. It can be as simple as sending different batches with different subject lines

4. Test the spam score and the deliverability of the message to major ISP's.

5. Use these results for your direct mail campaign…instead of having to wait months and having to do an expensive re-run of the direct mail campaign, utilise your easily gotten email campaign results to use on your direct mail campaign.

6. Keep notes of all tests, as this is very valuable information for your future campaigns.

Optimizing Your Email Marketing

2007-01-23T08:36:00.000+09:00

Email Campaigns

Email marketing can be a tremendously valuable tool for web businesses. Because it is so fast, cheap and easy, and because it is everywhere, email lends itself ideally to direct marketing. In this day and age, to say that the whole world is on the Web is not a stretch. Hundreds of millions of people plug into the Web on a regular basis.

Most regular internet users have an email address. Now that access to the Internet is available on PDAs and mobile phones, people can literally be reached anytime and anywhere. The capacity to send and receive email, and thus communicate with a large audience about your product, is huge and ever-broadening. Even though you only want to focus your email campaigns on those who have expressed an interest in your product, the way of attracting and finding large numbers of those targeted prospects is easier via the Internet.

There is no faster way to get your marketing message into the homes of consumers than through email. Additionally, no other method is less expensive. Other than internet access costs, which are likely already incurred for general use, emailing costs nothing. Unlike with direct mail, there are no printing or postage costs. Email allows you to reach potentially large numbers of people instantaneously for free.

Optimize Your Email Campaign
There are ways to optimize any email campaign. Valiss can help you direct your campaign to a targeted group of consumers and avoid crossing that line between responsible consumer communications and annoying spam. Our experts know how to use email marketing to enhance your web presence and convert prospects into loyal customers.

Opt In E-Mail Marketing

2007-01-22T08:28:00.000+09:00

Opt in e-mail marketing can be an incredibly lucrative area of online income for those who truly apply themselves to learning it. Opt in e-mail marketing is not something that you can just jump into blind, you literally have to learn how to do it. You need to learn to write e-mail title, and email content, and how to get the maximum number of e-mail readers to open your e-mails and click through from your e-mails.

In this article, I simply give you a few of the optimal techniques about opt in e-mail marketing that work for me, and I am confident that if you apply these to your own e-mail campaigns, you should be able to super charge your own e-mail campaigns.

Tips to super charge your opt in e-mail marketing:

1) To super charge your opt in e-mail marketing, invest in a copy writing course for writing sales letters. Now, your e-mails should not read like sales copy, but many of the tips and skills that you learn for writing compelling sales copy will apply to writing compelling e-mail copy.

2) To super charge your opt in e-mail marketing, begin testing everything you do in your e-mail marketing campaign. This is highly important. You see, a great subject line that works well for my list might not work for a very similar list of yours, due to the difference in the recruiting technique of your opt in e-mail marketing campaign. You must test to see what works better with your e-mail list, and then you can reuse those subject lines in the future, and discard ones that are less effective.

3) To super charge your opt in e-mail marketing, give away free gifts. And the free gifts, by the way, should be things you could have sold, but chose to give away. Do not give away garage-sale trash, give away the good stuff.

4) To super charge your opt in e-mail marketing, ask your subscribers what they want to receive from you. They will tell you what they want to learn about, and they will spend more with you if they receive offers from you that they are eagerly looking for.

Structure Your Email Campaign

2007-01-19T08:17:00.000+09:00

Because every email campaign is different, and will be structured differently according to the goals you have for it, I am going to share with you some ideas for some elements of the structure of your email campaign, and also share with you my email campaign structure.

First, some background.

One of the theories that I read a lot about when I first got started online proposes the need to build rapport with your email subscribers before you sell them anything. This theory proposes that you send out lots of great content emails at the beginning of your email campaign and then add in sales emails as time goes by.

I subscribed to this idea at first, but then I noticed that after about 5 or 6 emails – about the same time as I was about to start sending out sales letters, that my readership went down. After the introductory, rapport building emails, my readership was going down – right at the point where I wanted to start making money with them.

After some research and study, I discovered that people go through a period of buyer intensity. This is a period of time when they are most likely to buy something.

Here is an example. Assume that you are going to visit your long-time cousin in Florida. You and your cousin used to fish together. You have since moved to the Midwest, and no longer fish, and you also have no fishing equipment, and you are not familiar with the latest fishing equipment and terminology.

Now, let’s assume that you start looking for fishing information online. You go to my fishing niche web site. You also go to someone else’s fishing niche web site. For the sake of this example, let’s assume that my email campaign is a rapport builder, while the other person’s is a salesy campaign.

Now, you need this information now! You trip begins in two weeks. What happens? You buy from the other website; by the time I begin to promote anything to you, you have already bought from the other web site.

Now, you may think that this is just a remote example, but I do not believe that to be the case. I think that most people search for information online when they need it, when they are most interested in buying something.

So in response to this information, I changed my email campaigns so that they contained a mixture of content, free gifts, and sales letters – and my sales went up dramatically!

Now, keep in mind that the bulk of my subscribers are generated from articles. This means that my typical subscriber has a stronger level of rapport with me than they would if they would if they were recruited from a pay per click ad.

Perhaps if I were generating the bulk of my customers from other, more impersonal means, this would not work. But for me, it has been extremely effective.

Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, ‘Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide

Using Word in Email Marketing

2007-01-18T09:12:00.000+09:00

In many b2b (business to business) marketing emails I receive, the opening salutation is 'Hello Friend'.

In most cases, I don't know the people who have sent me these notes and given that I can count my true friends on the fingers of one hand, and with fingers to spare, it's highly unlikely these people will ever be listed among them.

I'm instantly suspicious of these emails; my finger automatically heads towards the delete button as notes that start out like this are usually either:

Nigerian/419 scams
Shady MLM schemes
People touting cheesey information products
Get rich quick scams
Black hat search optimization techniques
..and other various bottom feeding activities of the online world. I’m not stating that anyone who does use this salutation is unethical, but it’s just a huge red flag for me.

I can’t remember the last time that any of my friends commenced an email conversation by calling me 'Friend'. Oddly enough, they use my name or a nickname - go figure.

I also often see the use of the word 'friend' in business communications where some sort of negotiation has only very recently been established.

When someone I’m discussing a business partnership with writes back to me and states; 'we’ll do this for you my friend'; what I read is: 'we are more than likely going to shaft you'. This reaction isn't baseless paranoia, it's been honed through years of online business and partnership experiences.

I think this opening salutation ranks highly as another poison phrase in b2b marketing - it should not be used unless there's a very well established relationship and even then, with great caution.

At best, it's pointless. At worst, it's unprofessional and runs the risk of a negative reaction, especially if that person is a seasoned online business owner - and all within the first two words of your spiel. You only get one chance to make a good first impression.

'Hello', or 'Greetings' on their own is fine in my books if you don’t know the name (or gender) of person you are approaching.

In the online world, the word 'friend' used so loosely is fine for MySpace, not for business.

Email Marketing Campaign Mistakes

2007-01-17T08:17:00.000+09:00

Here are four major mistakes that you must avoid when you plan, organize and implement your next email marketing campaign.

Not Knowing Your Target Audience
One of the most frequent mistakes that email marketers make is failing to identify their target market. Quite often marketers believe that their product or service is needed or wanted by everyone. That is rarely the case.

Identifying your target market will ensure that your campaign is focused and will result in an effective and profitable mailing. Blindly sending your marketing materials to everyone you can think of or to a general list will generate few leads and fewer sales. So take the time to identify your target market.

Creating Spam emails
First of all, make sure that the people that you are sending your promotional materials to asked to be on your list and want the material that you are sending. Make sure that your emails contain useful information and are not just a series of sales letters. Otherwise, most people will delete your emails without even opening them.

Remember, the main idea behind an email marketing campaign is to get your email delivered and opened.

Failure To Follow Up
People rarely make a purchase or sign up for a service the first time that they receive your material so it's important that you have a way to follow up with additional information. This can include a periodic newsletter, postal mail or phone calls.

You should set up an autoresponder series to send additional information every few days or once a week. Also, get the address and telephone number of each prospect. Send a postcard or pick up the phone.

Follow up! Follow up! Follow up! They may not be interested today but the next time you send out your newsletter or mail a postcard they may be ready to buy.

Not Having Sufficient Inventory
When you plan your email marketing campaign, it's important to anticipate an increase in product sales or requests for your services. After all the purpose of all of this is to generate increased interest in your products or services.

So it's important that you have more than enough product on hand to handle the influx of new customers. If yours is a service then you need to make sure that you have enough trained employees to handle the increased volume. If you aren't prepared, then your potential customers will go to your competitor.

The next time you are planing an email marketing campaign, remember these four mistakes. Make sure that you make avoiding them a major part of your strategy.

The Technical Realities of E-mail Use and Privacy

2007-01-16T12:31:00.000+09:00

Most e-mail is insecure. It should be regarded as insecure unless it has been encoded or encrypted. E-mail is often compared to a postcard in that anyone who receives it can read it. E-mail may also be read if it is stored on servers during transmission.

E-mails are hard to destroy. Many people think that if they delete their e-mail it is gone forever. This is not so as most electronic documents are backed up and recoverable.

Logging. Most software used to operate networks, including web servers, mail servers and gateways, logs transactions and communications. These logs will normally include the e-mail addresses of senders and recipients of e-mail and the time of transmission. The content of e-mails themselves would not normally be logged but may be stored on mail servers. Similarly, web server logs record information on the sites that people visit. The keeping of these logs is usually necessary for the routine maintenance and management of networks and systems. System administrators are also capable of reading the contents of e-mails sent and received by the corporate network.

Risk of Email Marketing

2007-01-16T09:48:00.000+09:00

What is High risk Email marketing?

Simply defined as sending unsolicited email to spam list(s). People buy these spam lists on the internet. Have you seen a million email addresses for ten dollars? Those are spam lists... They get these emails extracted from internet websites by Emailbots. These emailbots do good job by extracting emails from 'mailto:' links on websites.

But what webmasters don't know is response rate from these lists. Its very poor and most of these email caught by spam filters.

Source for these spam lists:

1. Buying on the internet

2. Buying Emailbots and extract email by the webmaster itself

3. Rented lists

One question frequently asked by webmasters: I am an affiliate of these product and I made few sales. Can I send emails to them? ANSWER : Simply no. First, the customer is not your customer. He is your affiliate product owner's customer. Second, he didn't opt to receive your email. SOLUTION : If you want to send email to him, put a form on your website and ask him to sign up for your list.

What is Low risk Email marketing?

Simply defined as sending solicited email to your opt-in list. Webmasters has to keep a form on their website(s). Prospects if they want to receive email from that webmaster, they will enter their name and email address to subscribe. This in-house built list is safest to do email marketing with.

How to get them sign up?

1. Buy a mailing list manager software.

2. Create a mailing list there.

3. Copy and paste the html code on your website.

4. Use double opt-in. Means subscribers has to click on the link provided to them in their initial email.

5. Put the subscriber ip, subscriber email, date of subscription, web site from which he subscribed details in every email.

Advantages of Low risk Email marketing:

1. Low chance of spam accusations.

2. Good response from your list in the form of click throughs.

3. Your host won't ban your site becuase of spamming.

4. Your website ip won't be listed in spam lists.

5. Your piece of mind!!

Communication And Email

2007-01-15T08:37:00.000+09:00

Since flying in airplanes has become less expensive and more commonplace, television has brought culture from across the world into our living rooms, and cell phone usage has made overseas calls more affordable, people from all over the world have been able to visit, tour, and communicate more easily. But no other development has made commerce, education, falling in love, and swindling others more personal than the Internet. This paper will debate the premise of whether or not the world is becoming a “global village”.

The word “global” indicates a huge place, while the term “village” usually carries the connotation of a close-knit group or clan that is brought together by values or a common culture. This would bring to mind a place in which people develop lifelong relationships. Has the Internet been effective in joining people who work toward common goals? This really would depend on what the goal is.

E-mail is one of the easiest and least expensive methods of communication that is available in the present day. Because of the ease and low cost, it is also accessible to almost anyone with a computer. Computer swindles are now prevalent, with few safeguards present for those that are easy prey. One such scheme involves the request for a sizable sum of money by someone who claims to be in trouble. The trouble can only be resolved by an investment from the e-mail recipient. The sender of the e-mail promises to repay the kindness of the recipient by giving back a much larger sum of money.

These e-mails appear to have originated in Western Africa, usually Ghana or Nigeria. These scams have created a negative perception of how Africa and Africans are viewed as Internet users.

Direct Drip Email Marketing Tactic

2007-01-12T08:24:00.000+09:00

If you have the products or services that you want to sell on the Internet, you’ll want to create a web site where you’ll advertise what you are offering and you’ll also want to spread a word about your products or services to the world. You can easily and quickly do it via email. Email marketing is certainly one of the most powerful strategies in internet marketing. It’s quick, cost effective - you do not have to pay a set price for every email that is sent out - and allows contact people in all parts of the world. So, you can get more purchasers and respectively more revenue for less investment of time and money.

How does one accomplish bulk email marketing campaign?

You can use online bulk emailing services, or you can pay a marketing firm to do your bulk email promotions, or you can use direct email marketing software to distribute your email campaigns sitting at your computer.

Using software can be the most cost-effective method if you have the time to manage your prospects list and accomplish your email campaigns with a constant frequency.

There is wide choice of direct email marketing software packages available on the Internet market. Some are even freeware programs that don't require any investment. Although they don't generally have the value-added features that come with software packages that you purchase; however, if you aren't running a large email marketing campaign, they may suit your needs for accomplishing specific tasks just fine.

What is Drip Email Marketing?

The concept behind drip email marketing consists in sending periodic emails to prospects and clients hoping to bring them to your website and make them purchase products or services. It is an effective method to generate new purchasers from your prospects and keeping relationship with your existing clients.

Drip Email Marketing tactic results from the idea that nobody purchases online products or services instantly. A visitor can come to your web site a few times before he becomes a purchaser. Keeping this in mind, how are you going to stimulate your prospects’ interest to your site and keep them informed about your products and services? This is where a drip email marketing campaign is quite to the point.

Imagine that a prospect has just visited your site and left you the email address. It’s important to note that you should add a sign-in form to your web site to collect the prospects’ email addresses. It’s rather useful if your sign-in form asks the subscriber to provide some about additional and not only the email address. I’m not talking about private information. I’m talking about the subscriber’s area of interest, hobbies, specific needs, or at least the emails he prefers to receive, text or HTML. All this information will help you segment your prospects and send more relevant email messages to each group.

So, based on the subscribers’ preferences, you set up a drip email marketing campaign catered to their specific needs. Each message you send them give more information about their inquiries slightly hinting them at you and your products or services. It is an importunate way to stamp your name in their mind. Remember, you don’t sell anything yet. You just give an advice and information about their particular needs and wishes.

For your existing clients, a drip email marketing campaign is similar. You only need to tailor the emails so they are oriented to the client after purchase. Your email drips must contain relevant information that can help the customer with the products or services he purchased. The customer must be sure that you are always there to assist him. When your client believes that you are a faithful and reliable partner, he is ready to purchase again from you.

It may probably sound like you will need more than one tool to accomplish your drip email marketing campaign. But you can find many programs on the Internet that can handle your growing lists of prospective and present clients. Our email management software must be flexible enough to treat each client or prospect according to the routine of your drip email campaign.

The most important thing to remember about drip email marketing is that you must not send meaningless emails. Each message must have an informative content, a real reason to contact your prospects and clients, not just a note saying "Hi!" or "How are you?".

If your drip marketing email cannot keep the client's interest, it will be deleted immediately next time when they read the sender's email address. We all are busy people and won’t spend our time for dull messages. If you are trying to build the relationship based on trust and faith, you cannot tolerate that they never open your emails. You can start directly from the subject line. The subject itself must grab people’s attention and make them want to read your message. This is the essential concept behind a drip email marketing campaign - to develop a trust and faithful relationship with your customer by sending valuable information. When the rapport of informative and useful emails is established, your clients and prospects will be looking forward for every email from you and they will even recommend your company and your products to others. Isn’t it exactly what you want for you business? I’m sure it is.

Email Marketing: What is Your List Really there For?

2007-01-11T08:22:00.000+09:00

Have you ever been on a person's mailing list who repeatedly sends you the same offer over and over again? This is the fastest way to lose subscribers. You should make your messages useful and provide your readers with something educational to read. Sure every now and then you are going to want to remind them about the product you are selling, and that is normal.

I just un-subscribed from a list that started out great with lots of good information, but soon the well ran dry and I was getting two sales letters a day. This brings up a debate. Most marketers will say that the list is there for the purpose of presenting offers and trying to make money from sales. Some marketers will assault their list while others subtly coax them into buying.

I prefer the second method because I personally would rather buy from someone who is honest and not a money hungry annoyance. Sure you may make some money with all of those sales letters, but the rest of your list is going to head for the hills. The most successful approach would be to regularly send a product reminder along with some helpful information. Make your subscribers know that your product is worth the money because your free information is of high quality. Be sure not to skimp on the quality of your free material because this is what your readers will be judging you with.

Use common sense when mailing your list offers. Think about what you would or would not want to see in your mailbox if you were a subscriber. Remember your list will come back and buy time and time again as long as it is still there.

Want to learn how I draw large amounts of traffic to my websites?

email etiquette

2007-01-10T15:18:00.000+09:00

Why do you need email etiquette?

A company needs to implement etiquette rules for the following three reasons:

Professionalism: by using proper email language your company will convey a professional image.

Efficiency: emails that get to the point are much more effective than poorly worded emails.

Protection from liability: employee awareness of email risks will protect your company from costly law suits.

What are the etiquette rules?

There are many etiquette guides and many different etiquette rules. Some rules will differ according to the nature of your business and the corporate culture. Below we list what we consider as the 10 most important email etiquette rules that apply to nearly all companies.

1. Be concise and to the point

2. Answer all questions, and pre-empt further questions

3. Use proper spelling, grammar & punctuation

4. Make it personal

5. Use templates for frequently used responses

6. Answer swiftly

7. Do not attach unnecessary files

8. Use proper structure & layout

9. Do not overuse the high priority option

10. Do not write in CAPITALS

Email Marketing Success

2007-01-10T09:26:00.000+09:00

Isn’t that your goal?

The latest survey on email marketing revealed that email-marketing efforts are being dulled by record levels of Spam and email box over saturation. Those surveyed that use email primarily for home use stated that unwanted messages comprise of over one third of the email they receive daily. Those that use email at work indicated that over twenty five percent of their inbox is flooded with unwanted email.

The study also revealed that those who have long-term relationships with an opt-in mailer have had their buying decision affected by the mailings they received. They do no feel opt-in email as part of the saturation process.

While they are eager or at least curious enough to read permission based email, most said they delete op-in messages without reading them.

This high saturation level of unwanted messages is turning consumers off email as a communication method.

66% of those surveyed feel they get too much email. Less than 30% of these indicated that they are likely to “occasionally” respond to email-marketing mailings.

How do you deal with the problem of too much email?

As an Internet entrepreneur email marketing is the tool of choice to get your message out. How do you get your message read? What are the best practices to implement to achieve this goal?

The number of those who are competing for email user’s attention is growing.

How do you boost your readership and response rate?

How do you guarantee your messages get to legitimate consumers and business email users?

How do you make sure your potential customer does not mistake your email message for Spam?

WHAT IS YOUR PLAN???

The Spam epidemic is one of the online businesspersons greatest problems.

While many of those online that receive email regularly appreciate opt-in marketing messages and as stated above will respond to your message, research has shown that proliferation of Spam threaten the legitimate email marketing.

Consumers are experiencing inbox burnout. Over time they will become less responsive to your email campaigns.

How?

By deleting your email message without reading it first. Even your permission based email.

Additionally, your prospective customers and their Internet service providers are using email filtering and bulk sorter software to block your messages. Are your messages among those being redirected, filtered, bulk sorted and deleted by software like “Clean My Mailbox”?

What can you do to combat this?

Email marketing has proven to be a highly specialized medium.

It is being used to generate revenue, deepen customer relationships and influence potential customer behavior. Brick and mortar businesses are using it to increase catalog sales, improve call center response and as an interactive customer service assistant.

Dramatic positive effects on the customer’s behavior are occurring as the direct email marketing industry matures. It’s relative inexpensiveness, compared to direct mail marketing and its increased acceptance by the mass market is attracting a great deal of attention.

As a direct email marketer, you must position your messages so the various obstacles in place to combat your efforts to contact your prospective and your opt-in customers are unsuccessful. In this e-course we will outline successful strategies, which will help you, get your messages read.

Here are 7 strategies you can begin using right now.

(1.) Referrals
Your potential customers open e-mail messages based on the “from” field. The sender has an important impact on your potential customers’ willingness to open your email message. The use of a “refer a friend” button on your web pages stimulates referrals from satisfied visitors to your site.

Your follow-up with content rich, helpful information to these referrals and your request for them to take further action by opting into your e-zine or e-course mail list, as well as recommending a beneficial free offer will help you grow a list of loyal customers.

(2.) Privacy
Your potential customers want to know how you are going to maintain their privacy. Do you rent or exchange email list with others? This is a taboo to most of your potential customers.

Do you have a privacy policy? Is it listed where it can be easily reviewed? A hyper link on every message you send out, as well as on your web site should be in place. Let your current and potential customers know what your company’s privacy policy, rules and guidelines are. This adds a since of comfort when doing business with your company.

(3.) Personalization
The sweetest sound to anyone is the sound of his or her name. The use of your customers name in your message adds a since of ownership to the message. Most importantly, it is an attention getter and increases readership. Isn’t that your purpose, to get your message read by the receiver? Why not capture your potential customers’ name as well as their email address?

(4.) Show Your Expertise

Are you publishing a weekly content rich e-zine? Do you write and post on topic content rich articles in newsgroups? Do you submit content rich articles to other e-zines?

What do you do to show your expertise? How do you communicate to your current and potential customers that you know what you’re doing? That you know what you are talking about, that your advice is a result of experience, from walking the walk and talking the talk? This is an excellent method to grow your list and customer loyalty. Email how to articles and helpful tips to your list.

(5.) Deepen Customer Relationships
Your customers will remain loyal only after you have established a positive and useful relationship with them. You establish this type of relationship through continuous meaningful contact with them.

The follow-up messages you send in response to your customers inquires, the helpful articles you write and submit, your content rich web site, your e-zine and its content rich information, your company’s order fulfillment policies, and your customer service practices are your proof to your customer that you care about them.

When your customer feels you care about them, a “know, like and trust” connection develops between you and them. This makes them more responsive to your messages and offerings. Isn’t that your goal?

(6.) Opt-In List Care
Your list of customers who have opt-in to receive your mailings is one of the two must-have ingredients for the successful email marketer. The other must-have ingredient is your product or service. It is far easier to sell more to the customer you have than to sell to a new customer.

Regular management and maintenance of your list is important. Cleaning your list frequently so that it consists of deliverable address is essential. Purge all duplicate names and email addresses. Remove the names of those subscribers who have opt-out immediately. Use a double opt-in procedure to confirm that your new subscribers are authentic. Encourage your subscribers to provide more information about themselves, their likes and dislikes, and feedback about your product or service by using surveys. This will allow you to customize and/or target your product or service to fit your customers wants.

(7.) Long-term Associations
The number one cause for the loss of customers and subscribers is indifference. The online marketer’s failure to make periodic contact with their customers and subscribers is the major reason. The online entrepreneurs who maintain long-term relationships with their opt-in customers have the most responsive list.

Strategies to establish a long-term association have been discussed above. Good, strong, solid online relationships take time, effort and imagination to build. Once in place, they become a source of profitable dealings through a loyal customer base.

Successful email marketing is built on loyalty. Your loyal customers and subscriber base will not mistake your message for Spam. Your loyal customers and subscriber base will look forward to your mailings and offerings. Your loyal customer and subscriber base will continue to purchase your product and service for years to come.

Isn't that your goal?

Effective Email

2007-01-09T09:06:00.000+09:00

How to Communicate Powerfully by Email

When you're trying to locate some information in an e-mail someone sent you a few weeks back, what helps you find it quickly? If the sender included the information you want in a long message covering lots of points, the chances are that it will take you time to find it. Worse, if the sender is someone you communicate with regularly, and he or she just pressed Reply to a previous message about a different point, the heading of the mail you need won't actually be related to the information you want.

There are a few simple rules to ensure that your emails are read in the first place and stay useful to the recipient.

Subject Lines are Headlines

The headline in a newspaper does two things: It grabs your attention and informs you what the article is about so you can decide whether you want to read further. Email subject lines need to do the same thing. Use the subject line to inform the receiver of EXACTLY what the email is about in a few well-chosen words.

Because everyone gets emails they do not want (SPAM, etc.), appropriate use of the subject line increases the chances your email will be read and not deleted without so much as a glance.

Of course, just as it would be ridiculous to publish a newspaper without headlines, never leave the subject line blank.

Make One Point per Email

The beauty of email, compared with letters, is that it doesn't cost any more to send several mails than it does to send one. So, if you need to communicate with someone about several matters, write a separate email on each subject. That way your correspondent can reply to each one in the appropriate time-frame. One topic might only require a short reply that he or she can make straight away. Another topic might require more research. By writing separate emails, you get clearer answers.

However, as with traditional business letters, the email should be clear and concise, with the purpose of the email detailed in the very first paragraph. Sentences should be kept short and to the point.

The body of the email should contain all pertinent information and should be direct and informative.

Specify the Response You Want

Make sure to include any call to action you desire, such as a phone call or follow-up appointment. Then, make sure you include your contact information, including your name, title, and phone numbers. Do this even with internal messages: The easier you make it for someone else to respond (i.e. if they don't have to look up your phone number elsewhere), the more likely they are to do so.

Email Marketing Done Right

2007-01-09T08:42:00.000+09:00

Email marketing is one of those buzz phrases, striking a mixture of glee and trepidation all at once in the heart of most business owners and marketing departments. Email marketing and e-zines have become all the latest excitement, providing an opportunity to reach a large number of clients with little more than the rattle of a keyboard and the click of a mouse. The power of this marketing tool and a successful email campaign need hardly be argued, but there are many issues of etiquette and responsibility to be considered, or your presentation risks simply being labelled as spa and quickly blocked, filtered away or deleted.

As you design your email marketing campaign, it is a good idea to keep the following points in mind to make your campaign successful while still operating within the law and the expectations of your customers or potential customers.

• Sign up subscribers
• Allow for an opt-out
• Legitimate contact information
• Carry interesting and useful information, and non-aggressive advertising
• Don’t cut corners to bulk up your list

Let’s take a look at each of these points in detail, stressing the right ways to handle concerns and build your business.

SIGN UP SUBSCRIBERS

No matter what type of email marketing campaign you’re planning, be it an e-zine or simply a one-page blurb about a new shop’s grand opening, a mailing list with no-one signed up to it is a pretty poor list. You may be tempted to purchase email lists in bulk, but this is a temptation that should be avoided - it may give you a lot of names, but of those only a fraction are sure to be sufficiently interested in your product to actually open the email and read it. It is much better to sign up people you have met personally, or who have visited your off-line store, if you have one, or your website. At both a these locations you should create a means for customers to sign up for your e-zine or email updates. You’ll be surprised at how many people will do so and you can send your information to them with confidence that they will open and read it. Studies on mailing lists find that about 20% of the people on your mailing list provide 80% of the business you can expect to generate from that list. This percentage drops with an unfocused mailing list, and rises with greater focus.

ALLOW FOR AN OPT-OUT

At the bottom of your e-zine or advertising email, always provide a link for those who wish to be removed from the mailing list. Most people won’t take advantage of this, but they will be comforted to have the option to opt out. This reduces the pressure that some people call feel when they feel they are being targeted advertising campaigns, and makes them more likely to actually keep reading what you have sent.

LEGITEMATE CONTACT INFORMATION

When sending out an advertising email or e-zine, be sure to provide valid contact information to the customer. This serves several purposes, it legitimises your business and also gives customers a direct way to contact you if they are interested in what you are advertising.

CARRY USEFUL INFORMATION AND NON-AGGRESSIVE ADVERTISING

Generally, customers receiving an email expect the information to be more than just a sales pitch or jingle. They are looking for useful information that they can refer back to at a future time, or information in answer to questions they have asked. If your ad or e-zine is nothing more than sales babble, it is very likely to be discarded before more than the first line or two is ever read. The more legitimate and interesting the information you provide, the more likely your customers will read to the end, whether you sent them a short email, an e-zine or even a full email marketing campaign. In conjunction with making your information useful, it is best to present email advertising in a fashion that is inviting with out being overly aggressive.

Customers are accustomed to being blasted with ads on television and radio and to dealing with pushy salespeople face-to-face, even though these are all media that are harder to shut out than email or an e-zine. If advertising strikes customers as abrasive or overly pushy, they will simply erase. Make sure your design emphasises encouraging advertising, bringing your product to your customers and making your business a success: the goal is to invite a customer into the sale, not push customers away.

DON’T LIST BULK

Many services gather email addresses for sale, using web bots, spiders and other such technologies. While it is tempting to purchase these products in order to increase your exposure, it is generally best to resist this temptation and keep your email marketing focused on those who have a genuine interest in your product, or who have opted in of their own free will. This prevents you annoying those who don’t want to receive your communications; this is very important, because complaints to your ISP can result in your email server being shut down for spamming. Patience will pay off in the longer run if you take the time and make the effort to ensure your list is genuine. With these points in mind you’re on your way to creating a strong email marketing campaign.

Email Marketing

2007-01-08T11:48:00.000+09:00

One of the first techniques many people associate with internet advertising is email marketing. Here we discuss issues of spam and compare the cost and effectiveness of email marketing campaigns and PPC campaigns.

Is email marketing different from spam?

Spam or spamming, is the practice of sending large amount of unsolicited commercial email to consumers who have not consented to receiving this information
Illicit e-mail marketing antedates legitimate e-mail marketing, as the early Internet prohibited the use the medium for commercial purposes. Marketers trying to establish themselves as genuine businesses in e-mail marketing have therefore had a difficult time, made no easier by criminal spam operators who pose as legitimate internet advertisers.
Companies considering an e-mail marketing program must make sure that their program does not violate spam laws such as the United States' CAN-SPAM Act, the European Privacy & Electronic Communications Regulations 2003 or their Internet provider's acceptable use policy

Legitimate email marketing

Recent legal and media attention devoted to the illicit use of email marketing has given email advertising a bad name in recent years. There is no reason that thoughtful, legal use of this platform cannot be employed as a legitimate form of online advertising, but it's often not as cheap and effective as other forms of internet marketing.
The term 'email marketing' (when used to describe legitimate activity) generally refers to 2 strategic practices:
Sending e-mails to improve client relationships. Either to maintain current customers, or re-invite old customers back for repeat business
Placing advertisements in e-mails which other organisations send to their customers who have signed up for a newsletter
Email marketing is a bit like a digital version of the traditional paper mail-outs businesses have sent their clients for years. Without printing costs, emailed newsletters usually end up being cheaper than traditional pamphlets, but only become really cost effective for huge e-newsletters with 500 000 or more recipients.

Challenges of Email Marketing

2007-01-08T07:58:00.000+09:00

According to Forrester Research, internet users spend more than 35 percent of their time with emails. Thus, emails have enormous potential as far as building and managing customer relationship is concerned. Perhaps, that’s the reason why email marketing has become the new catchphrase among entrepreneurs. However, despite of its benefits, email marketing is inflicted with countless challenges. Some of the major challenges of email marketing are as follows:

Quality of Email Addresses

The greatest challenge associated with email marketing is compilation of the list of email addresses. Lack of proper email-address list is one of the main reasons for the failure of email marketing campaign. Hence, when you prepare the list of email addresses, one of the first things that you should do is to test the quality of email addresses. You should gain customer’s permission to use his/her email address.

One commonly used method to do so is to send an automatic message informing the customer that you intend to add his/her email address to your list and ask them to confirm the acceptance of your offer. Another technique is to request the customer to enter his/her email address twice. These easy techniques will help you to compile an authentic list of email addresses for your email marketing campaign.

Informing and Gaining Customer Permission

Merely preparing a list of email addresses is not enough. It’s your duty to inform the customer how you intend to use his/her email address and then seek his/her permission to use the address in that manner. This process is important because it will protect you from undergoing unnecessary trepidations like lawsuits and financial losses. Moreover, your reputation will also not be adversely affected by the label of spammer.

Maintenance of Email-Address List

Your email marketing campaign can never be successful unless you maintain regular contact with your customers. Regular maintenance of email-address list is the only way out. Keep in mind that email address list is a perishable commodity. NFO Research Group found that approximately 32 percent of customers change their email addresses after a year. Hence, it is essential to check the validity of email addresses regularly.

You should provide your customers easy methods to update their email addresses. Furthermore, you should also provide ways to reaffirm what kind of information your customer has agreed to accept. This step will not only help you to protect your

Disclosure Policy

2007-01-01T10:09:00.000+09:00

This policy is valid from 1st January 2007

This blog is a collaborative blog written by a group of individuals.

This blog accepts forms of cash advertising, sponsorship, paid insertions or other forms of compensation.

The compensation received may influence the advertising content, topics or posts made in this blog. That content, advertising space or post may not always be identified as paid or sponsored content.

The owner(s) of this blog is not compensated to provide opinion on products, services, websites and various other topics. The views and opinions expressed on this blog are purely the blog owners. If we claim or appear to be experts on a certain topic or product or service area, we will only endorse products or services that we believe, based on our expertise, are worthy of such endorsement. Any product claim, statistic, quote or other representation about a product or service should be verified with the manufacturer or provider.

This blog does not contain any content which might present a conflict of interest.

Disclosure Policys are a great idea, as they let the blogs readership know exactly what is behind the content and resaoning for the blog entries. I feel that this is a way of letting my readers know exactly what they will find on my blog site, the moral code I operate this blogsite by, and why I endorse and select the PayPerPost articles that I choose. I can now say what influences me on choosing these posts, and that the comments applied to these posts are those that are 100% my own. I am not being payed to endorse a product, I will only comment on it based on my personal opinion.

This Policy was created using Disclosure Policy Generator

How to Write an Email Campaign for Maximum Profits

2006-12-24T11:25:00.000+09:00

This is probably one of the trickiest things to do when you are getting started, because you obviously don’t know what to say.

This is also tricky because it gets into the age-old question of how much content versus how much sales material in the first 10 emails or so.

If I were to answer this question outside of the scope of this book and the obvious topic of this book, maximizing your total income, and I were just focusing on subscriber loyalty, I would give you a recipe for the content versus sales pages concept that would look a lot like this:

Send content the first 3 emails, then send a free gift, then send 2 content emails, then send a sales offer, then some more content, then a free gift, then a sales letter…and so on.

I think that is a perfectly good email campaign, especially for some one who is just getting started online and is likely to make lots of mistakes with their email copy. (Not that experts don’t make mistakes too, just that as you gain experience, and you test, your mistake propensity should go down).

However, through intense testing using my autoresponder service, I have discovered that even with that formula (or at least a campaign very similar to that in nature), email open rates and click through rates go down significantly after the first 5 or so emails.

So the problem with that is that just when I am beginning to offer the sales material, people are not opening as many of my emails!