Saturday, September 01, 2012

Importance of Email Marketing

Good afternoon and I hope things are going well for you on your
side of the screen. Life is busy here in Tulsa. The kids are back
to school and life has once again become more hectic and chaotic.
I know once they are grown and on their own I will miss them
terribly, but constantly running from Varsity Pom to Band to
Choir to Tennis and then work 12 hours/day -- help me, Lord! My
wife and I are always exhausted.

This week I want to touch upon the importance of staying in touch
with folks. Folks could be your friends, your subscribers, your
vendors, your prospects, or your customers -- or any combination
of these groups. The key is to touch them and keep touching them
to continuously work at building and strengthening your
relationships with them ... to help cross that invisible border
between acquaintance and friend, from stranger to trusted
authority.

Do you know I have been publishing my newsletters since 1995? I
started on the Internet back before it was commercial. I started
collecting names and email addresses to visitors of my early
sites, and I began to segment them based upon their interests.
And then I started sending out emails weekly. At one point I was
sending out about a half dozen newsletters to over 10,000 people
world-wide.

Why do that, you ask? Simple. I recognized the importance of
communication a long time ago -- back in the 1980s when I first
started my career. I learned that people were more apt to trust
me and buy from me when I provided quality information to them
that they may not get elsewhere. That information demonstrated my
subject matter expertise, and the constant communication built my
relationships.

I actually still maintain friendships with people I grew up with
40-50 years ago. And they are always amazed that I think about
them and make the effort. Effort counts a lot with folks. Are you
making the effort to stay in touch and build relationships?

You have several different ways to do this, but the two most
reliable ways are direct mail and email. Direct mail can be
costly, and if not highly targeted, can be a waste of time and
money. Email, however, is low cost, it is immediate, and your
emails can be personalized.

Email marketing can be managed either through an online Internet
service or through desktop software. I've used both. I first
started out using Infacta's Groupmail. This software is very
powerful and resides on your desktop computer. You can work
offline and manage your email lists and create and write your
campaigns quickly and easily. Then you merely click a button and
your messages can be sent to your lists. You can even schedule
the email blasts for the future. At one time I managed over
10,000 subscribers and 6 different newsletters using this
software. I never had any issues with it and I recommend it
highly. An older review can be found here:

http://www.emailmarketingassistance.com/Group-Mail.html

Of course, many people prefer online email solutions and there
are many to choose from. The three most popular are aWeber,
GetResponse and Constant Contact. I have had accounts with all
three and used them for many of my own newsletters as well as to
manage email campaigns for my customers.

They all share many similar features and interfaces, and the
costs also tend to be fairly similar. Almost all of them offer
the ability to compose messages in plain text or HTML, some form
of template library, the ability to test your email and measure
its spam score, double opt-in, email list importing, social media
links, the ability to embed audio or video, and scheduling of
newsletter publications. Here are links to reviews for the top three:

aWeber:
http://www.emailmarketingassistance.com/aWeber.html

GetResponse:
http://www.emailmarketingassistance.com/Get-Response.html

Constant Contact:
http://www.emailmarketingassistance.com/Constant-Contact.html

I have been a strong proponent of GetResponse. I personally find
their system the easiest to navigate and use, and I like their
support. Your mileage may vary. Every system has its fan base.

Now equally important to choosing an email platform is to
integrate an email capture form to the home page of your web
site. Failure to do this will cost you dearly. I had a client
once who spent $50K on Google AdWords to get 250,000 unique users
to their web site. However, she failed to take my advice to add
an email capture form to the home page of her site, and she was
never able to reach those people again ... without spending
another $50K. Lesson learned?

Most of these email management systems offer you the ability to
copy and paste some code to add a small email form to your web
site. Do it.

How do you encourage people to actually subscribe to your
newsletter when people's email boxes are already exploding with
more crap then they can actually read? The best thing to do is to
offer a free report or discount coupon for your products or
services. Offer value.

You also must make your newsletter appear to be tangible like a
printed newsletter. You need to make it look professional and
worth reading. Product shots of reports and ebooks can really
help ... and you know I offer this service:

Ebook Cover Artist:
http://www.ebookcoverartist.com

Software Box Designer:
http://www.softwareboxdesigner.com

Some people prefer to send messages off the cuff each month while
others prefer to write a series of messages for a full year,
load them into their email systems, and put the entire process
on auto-pilot. I can help you with this, too. I write email
series for $500 for 12 messages.

You can learn more about email marketing by visiting my site:

http://www.emailmarketingassistance.com

Commit to staying in touch with your prospects, friends and
customers. Commit to touching them once a month minimally. Commit
to choosing a platform and adding an email capture form to your
web site. Commit to showing them how you can add value and be
trusted.

Do these things, and your life will be enriched by the
relationships you build, and your bank account will be enriched
by the dollars in time.

All my best,


Steven

PS: Feel free to forward this to a friend or republish elsewhere
so long as you leave the links intact and credit me
appropriately. Click the link below to forward this message now:

https://app.getresponse.com/forward.html?x=a62b&m=kKpD&s=t5IKb&y=T&


Schneiderman Marketing, LLC, 3504 E 99 Street, Tulsa, OK 74137, United States
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