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Collecting names and email addresses
There are
several ways you can do this.
1. Subscribe
form on your website
Include a
“subscribe” form on your website, preferably on the homepage and on as
many other pages as possible. Remember not all your visitors will
come to your website via the homepage. Explain exactly what your
visitors will receive and how often. You also need to assure them you
will never sell their contact details.
2. Add a survey to your website.
Find out what
people think about your products, services and your website. At the
end of the survey ask for their name and email address, again
reassuring them their details will remain confidential.
3. Run a contest.
Contests are a
great way to collect details, as visitors will have to give you the
right information in order to be notified if they’ve won.
4. Offer a giveaway.
The best things
you can give away are free reports, ebooks or information that your
customers will find helpful. If you don’t have anything to give away,
you can easily find something on the internet. Visit the following
websites:
http://www.free-ebooks.net/
http://www.planetpdf.com
5. Pop-ups or
Hover Ads
These are the
little windows that pop up, when you arrive on somebody’s website or
when you are leaving. Unfortunately many people now have pop-up
blockers on their computers, so you may find hover ads much more
effective. For more information about hover ads, go to:
http://www.marketingtips.com/hover/
To find out more
about pop-ups, visit:
http://www.nowsell.com/pop-ups/
6. Ask in your offline correspondence.
Next time you
are sending a postcard, letter, invoice or any other correspondence to
your customers, ask them for their email address. Explain why you
would like it and even offer them a bonus, such as a free report.
7.
Purchase Leads
There are many companies who will provide leads or prospects for your
business. For a fee, they will display your advertisement (similar to
a classified ad) and when someone clicks on it, they will be taken to
your website, where they can be encouraged to subscribe to your
newsletter. Alternatively, instead of advertising your website,
advertise your autoresponder address. This way you will capture
everyone’s email addresses. You can then set up your autoresponder to
automatically deliver your promotion to people that request it.
The
great thing about these targeted leads is that you are only paying for
the people who want to know about your business and products. If you
work out the cost of a lead versus regular advertising, you will no
doubt come out on top. Generally the cost per lead is between $0.50 -
$1.00. If on the other hand you advertise in a newspaper or a
magazine and pay $200 for the advertisement from which you get 20
enquiries, the cost per lead is $10.
Check out:
www.getresponse.com
WARNING: NEVER,
EVER BUY EMAIL ADDRESSES UNLESS YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY SURE THE
SUBSCRIBERS HAVE REQUESTED TO RECEIVE INFORMATION FROM BUSINESSES SUCH
AS YOURS.
Managing Your Email List
There are 2 ways
to manage your mailing list – manually and automatically.
1. Manually.
Whenever you
receive a customer email address you can add it to your email program,
such Outlook Express. Most email programs allow you to create mailing
lists.
If you use
Outlook Express, you can use your Address Book, where you can create
groups of contacts to make it easy to send e-mail to a set of people,
such as business associates, prospects or customers. Any time you want
to send e-mail to everyone in the group, just use the group name
instead of entering each contact individually. Creating groups is also
a good way to organize a large Address Book.
First, you need add your contacts
(a) On the
Outlook Express toolbar, click Tools, and then click Address Book.
(b) In the
Address Book, select the folder to which you want to add a contact.
(c) On the
Address Book toolbar, click New, and then click New Contact.
(d) On the Name
tab, type at least the first and last name of the contact. This is the
display name.
(e) A display
name is required for each contact. If you enter a first, middle, or
last name, it will automatically appear in the Display box. You can
change the display name by typing in a different name or by selecting
from the drop-down list. The drop-down list will contain variations of
the first, middle, and last name, as well as anything you typed in the
Nickname box or the Company box on the Business tab. On each of the
other tabs, add any information you would like to include.
Second, create
Groups or mailing categories
You can create a
single group name (or alias) to use when sending a message to several
contacts at once. Simply create a group name and add individual
contacts to the group. Then, just type the group name in the To box
when you send e-mail.
(a) In the
Address Book, select the folder in which you want to create a group.
Click New on the toolbar, and then click New Group.
(b) The
Properties dialog box opens. In the Group Name box, type the name of
the group.
(c) There are
several ways to add people to the group:
- To add a
person from your Address Book list, click Select Members, and then
click a name from the Address Book list.
- To add a
person directly to the group without adding the name to your Address
Book, type the person's name and e-mail address in the lower half of
the Properties dialog box, and then click Add.
- To add a
person to both the group and your Address Book, click New Contact and
fill in the appropriate information.
You can also
store your contacts in a table in Microsoft Word, in a spreadsheet,
such as Microsoft Excel or in a database, such as Microsoft Access.
Then when you are ready to send out your message, you simply “merge”
the addresses with your newsletter and send the result to your email
program. This is slightly more complex, but allows you to easily
personalise your newsletter.
The advantage of
managing your mailing list manually is that it won’t cost you
anything, except for your time.
The disadvantage
is that you may have to spend a lot of time maintaining your mailing
list – managing the subscriptions, unsubscriptions, bounced messages
etc
2. Automatically
Web-based software
There are many
online services that allow you to manage your mailing list
automatically. They handle the subscriptions, unsubscriptions and
bounced emails without you having to lift a finger. When you wish to
send out a message, it’s as simple as typing your message and pressing
a “Send” button.
One of the best
services I’ve come across is GetResponse –
www.getresponse.com GetResponse is a complete email marketing
service. It provides you with unlimited
autoresponders,
follow-ups, messages, lists, broadcasts and email marketing campaigns,
150+ professionally designed HTML templates, powerful, cost-effective
newsletter
hosting, unparalleled
email
deliverability, click-through, sales and revenue tracking,
top-notch
support and
training. The cost of this service is less than a dollar a
day and saves you hours of work each week.
Other reputable
services include:
Constant Contact
-
http://www.constantcontact.com
Email Manager
Pro -
http://www.email-manager-pro.com
Software on your computer
You can also
purchase software that will help you send out personalised email. The
software works similarly to the web-based software, but the main
difference is that it is installed on your computer.
So if you find:
- sending e-mail
campaigns and newsletters,
- replying to
HUNDREDS of e-mails, filled with questions from potential buyers,
- sending
"customer service" e-mails to NEW customers and subscribers and
- keeping your e-mail list "clean"
a real
challenge, this may be the ideal solution for you. One software that
comes highly recommended to handle all of these tasks is Mailloop. To
check it out visit:
http://www.marketingtips.com/mailloop/t.x/875347
Remember staying
in touch with your prospects and customers should be a number one
priority in your marketing efforts. If you have a website and are not
collecting visitor details and building relationships with them, you
are committing online suicide. It’s that simple.
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