Innovative Ways to Build An Opt-in Email List That Stands Above The Crowd

Innovative Ways to Build an Opt-in Email List

With so many opt-in email lists out there, our list really needs to come up with a hook to attract and subscribers. It needs to have something special or different. It could be something you offer inside every newsletter issue, like interviews with experts. Or the hook could be a unique incentive that website visitors can take advantage of immediately when they sign up.

Here are some ideas that you can incorporate into your own website to entice new subscribers to opt-in to your list.

Build your List by Creating a Private Members Section on your Site

Create a private web site and have people sign up to get free, immediate access. For example, you could say, "Subscribe to our newsletter and get free access to our private membership area”.  You can choose to have them receive a username and password that they will use every time they want to login, or you can just provide a link to the site in your welcome email.

Your private members only site can be as big or as small as you want. Some of the things you can include inside are: reports, software, articles, eBooks, etc. Inside the site, you can market your business, as well. And you can follow-up to let them know about updates, new products they might be interested in, the latest news in your industry, etc.

Build Your List by Giving Subscribers a Free, Tangible Gift

Instead of offering a free eBook (or a whole package of them) like most everybody else, promise to give your visitors something they can hold in their hands if they give you their contact information.

For example, you could say "Subscribe today and get our new report mailed to you via First Class." You could print out your report on standard 8 x 11 sheets of paper, fold it up, put it inside an envelope, and mail it off.

Or you can offer a tips booklet and mail it to new subscribers. Or you can create your own CD full of information targeted toward your market and mail that. Or if you have a wholesale supply of a product of interest to your subscribers, then you can send one to each new subscriber. The possibilities are only limited by your imagination.

Follow-up possibilities include: articles (your own or written by others), tips you pick up, news in your niche, reviews of products or other interested, related websites, etc.

Build your Email List Through a Contest or Sweepstakes

Hold a free contest or sweepstakes at your website where they must give their contact information, including their email address, to enter. Make the prize something that your market will be interested in. Otherwise, they'll never want to enter.

If you already have a newsletter up and running, you could offer free automatic entry for new subscribers. For example, you could say, "Subscribe to our free newsletter and get automatic entry into our contest." You'll also want to retroactively include current subscribers.

You can announce the winner(s) at the end, as well as send any new contest announcements or product announcements. Or you can make this an ongoing contest, where you give away the same thing to one (or more) lucky people every month. That way you'll entice many subscribers to stay on your list.

You can find products to give away through wholesalers or drop shippers. Or you can create it yourself. One of my favorite ways to do this is create a CD-Rom with a guide or report (or sometimes several) that my market will find interesting.

Once again, you can follow-up with tips, articles, news, new product announcements, or just an announcement of each monthly winner(s).

These are just a handful of ideas on how to entice new subscribers to your list.  It is important to be thinking outside of the box and coming up with ideas that you can use to grow your list on a regular basis.

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The Single Best Way to Market Just About Any Business

Of all the many ways you can promote your business today, I want to share with you one of the most effective, most profitable, and least risky ways to market your products or services – email marketing.

Now just to be clear, I’m not in any way talking about buying an email list of people that don’t know you and blasting out a million messages in the hopes of making a few sales. Sending any promotional emails to people who have not given you permission to contact them is clearly spamming and there are rules and regulations that prohibit that in most countries.

What I am talking about is “Permission Based Marketing” – where you offer someone some free, valuable information (like a free special report, audio or video) as an incentive to give you their email address and permission to contact and market to them in the future. Offering a free email newsletter to your prospects gives you the chance to get your name in front of your website visitors on a regular basis and allows you to provide value and develop lasting relationships with them.

What’s so great about email marketing? Perhaps the greatest, is that studies have shown that commercial e-mail marketing returned a whopping $43.62 for every dollar spent on it in 2009, according to the DMA’s (Direct Marketing Association) Power of Direct economic-impact study.

That’s an incredible return on investment of over 4000%!! Most businesses are lucky if they run an advertisement and get a 200% or 300% return, but when you can get $40 back for every $1 you invest, I’m amazed that more businesses don’t take advantage of this marketing method.

Here are some important points to keep in mind as you consider using email marketing in your business, and next time I’ll introduce you to some of the best online services available to help you with your email marketing efforts.

1. You must always ASK for permission to email someone first, and once it’s granted to you, you must respect and honor the responsibility that you’ve been entrusted with. You must never sell or give your list of addresses and names to anyone and you must maintain control of your list at all times.
2. If someone doesn’t want to be on your mailing list, you must respect their wishes and make it easy for them to be removed from your list.
3. If you don’t already have one, create a Privacy Policy that states exactly what you do with the information you collect from your visitors – and honor it! Just posting a link to a privacy policy can increase the likelihood that a prospect will sign up for your list.
4. If you’re a marketer in the U.S. you must be certain your email marketing efforts comply with the CAN-SPAM act. It’s not difficult to do, especially if you use a reputable email service provider to handle your mailings for you,
   but the penalties for violating it can be steep.

 

SourceOne Technologies Offers Email Marketing services to help every business.  Find out more about our Email Marketing Services Here.

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Increase your Creditability and Make them Want to Open your Email Every Time

Email marketing is one of the top strategies when it comes to marketing online.  Unfortunately, however there is a lot so SPAM or unwanted email that hits everyone’s inboxes on a regular basis.  This is why it is critical that you work on gaining the trust and respect from your target market so that when you send them email they want to know what you have to say.

One great way to help develop your credibility and gain the respect of your target market so they want to receive email from you is to have a professional image.  One component of this is having a functioning professional website that showcases who you are and what you offer, and maybe even has some of your previous newsletters displayed.

The content you provide in your emails is also very important for gaining the respect of your subscribers and getting them to want to open everything you send to them.  You will want to keep your messages pretty short and to the point.  The goal is to share the information and hopefully make them take action by asking for more information, clicking on a link and in some cases calling you pr coming into your shop or restaurant.

Always try to make your subscribers feel that they would miss out if they didn’t get your emails and newsletters.  This can be done by always providing great content, coupons and specials and making it known that they get this because they are on your list.

There are several ways to gain subscribers to your email list.  One method you can use is to connect and communicate with your target market on social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.  You could also contribute to forums that are of interest to your target market.  The goal is to have a link back to your website and email opt-in form without selling on these tools.

Once you have a subscriber base it is important to be consistent with your emails and newsletters that you send to them.  You will also need to be patient because it will take time to build up trust and recognition with your subscriber base.

SourceOne Technologies offers serveral plans to help you get started with Email Marketing.  To find out more compelte the form below

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Christmas is Coming – Begin your Marketing Now

The holidays can be a very lucrative time for many businesses, however in order to capture this opportunity you must be ready.

This means that starting the end of August you must begin to plan and start to implement your holiday marketing.  Your holiday marketing can consist of many components, however for now we are going to focus on Email Marketing.

In August you need to start thinking about the different promotions you can offer as you head into the holiday season.  If you plan in advance you can offer several promotions and hit on the following holidays or events; fall, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years as well as you plan out far enough you can plan for Valentine’s Day and the other holidays.

Once you have your promotions it is time to create your messages that you will use to send to your list via email.  The goal of these messages will be for your list to take action – and hopefully this will mean revenue for your business. 

These messages can contain coupons, links to products they can purchase online, a special promotion they can call you for or visit your store for, etc.  The goal is to tie in with the holiday, offer something and close the sale by having an enticing message that your list will take action on.

SourceOne Technologies has several Email Marketing Plans available and we would be happy to discuss these further with you so that your business can be sure to take advantage of the holiday promotion window.  For more information just complete the form below or visit our page on Email Marketing .

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Increase your Email list with these Tips

Email Marketing is a very effective tool to use in your business.  One key however to using Email Marketing successfully is to build your list of subscribers.  Without an active list of subscribers your Email Marketing efforts may not produce the results you are hoping for.

Here are a few tips to help you increase your list of subscribers:

Make it easy for subscribers to sign-up for your list–  Make it easy for people to sign-up for your email list by placing your subscribe form above the fold on your website.  This will help make sure that it is seen by visitors.

Offer multiple ways to subscribe to your list – Provide your prospects and clients several ways to subscribe to your email list.  Provide a link in your email signature, add it to your facebook pages, add it to your print material and always as them for their email address when you do business with them.

Make your subscribe form simple – If your subscribe form is simple in most cases you will have a better response rate.  To get started in most cases you will want a name and an email address.  You can always ask for an address and phone number later in the process.

Give your prospect or customer a reason to subscribe –Often in order to capture interest and trust of your client of prospect you must offer something in exchange for them providing their name and email address.  Provide an incentive.  This incentive can be a coupon, free report, teleconference, or even just a newsletter packed full of information.

Ask for referrals –When you do send email out to your list add a line in there asking them to forward it to others that may benefit from your information.  In a lot of cases this will prompt the person receiving the information to also sign up for your list.

Remember that effective Email Marketing starts with your list.  Using these tips will help increase the size of your list and make it more effective.

SourceOne Technologies offers Email Marketing assistance with various programs available from the do it yourself system to a full service system.  To find out more please use the form below.

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Tips for Using Email Marketing Effectively in your Business

 

Using Email Marketing as part of your marketing mix is a great way to stay in contact with your prospects and current customers and in most cases generate more revenue on a regular basis.

One key to using email marketing successfully is to be consistent.  Being consistent with your email marketing will keep you in front of your market and help build a connection.  Consistency being key you should market to your email list approximately 2 – 4 times a month. 

Here are a few additional tips to help you use email marketing effectively in your business:

Provide something of value to members of your list when you send them email.  Coupons are great to send out to your list and are often shared with others.

Track your results.  It is important that you know what emails are effective and which ones are not.  This can be achieved by using a system that shows you who opens the emails and if they click on any links included in the email or not.

Personalize the emails you send.  Use a tool that will allow you to personalize the email you send to each prospect and you will see an increase in your open rate.  Everyone likes to be addressed by name.

Respect your list. It is critical that you respect your list and never spam them with email they do not want.  To prevent this a system should be used that allows subscribers to un-subscribe if they no longer wish to receive your email marketing.

Make it easy to share.  Make it easy for your list to share any email you send with someone else.  This will help you grow your list over time.

These tips will help you effectively use email marketing to reach your prospects and customers and stay in front of them on a regular basis, ultimately generating more revenue.

About the author: Stefanie Blackburn is an Internet Consultant with SourceOne Technologies. SourceOne Technologies currently offers assistance to business owners in establishing a complete online presence by offer their services as an Online Marketing Consultant.

 

If your business is ready to capture the benefits of Email Marketing SourceOne Technologies can assist you in getting started.  We offer several plans that range from the do it yourself to the everything done for you plans.  Click here to find more about our Email Marketing plans.

 

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Implementing an Automated Email Marketing Campaign for your Business

Businesses that are run online have been using a strategy for years for selling products and services; email marketing.  This is a marketing tool however that many businesses with a store front or office overlooked and did not include into the marketing mix.  Email marketing however, can no longer be overlooked and should be incorporated into every businesses marketing mix.

Email marketing will allow a business to build a list of customers or prospects and keep in touch with them on a regular basis.  In most cases staying in contact with your list of prospects and customers will increase revenue.

There are several benefits to using email marketing in your business.  Here are a few of those benefits:

• Low Cost
• Offers Unlimited follow-up with your prospects and customers
• Offers increased opportunity for more sales
• Is a great customer retention tool
• Can be automated
• Implementing Email Marketing typically increased revenue

There are also several ways that you can use email marketing with communicating with your prospects and customers.  Here are just a few:

• Thank them for their purchase
• Provide a coupon
• Send information on a sale or special promotion
• Promote an event
• Send a newsletter
• Share information on new products or services
• Profile the customer of the month

As you can see using email marketing has many benefits and uses for every business. Email marketing should no longer be an overlooked item in any business marketing mix.

Stefanie Blackburn is an Internet Consultant with SourceOne Technologies. SourceOne Technologies currently offers assistance to business owners in establishing a complete online presence by offer their services as an Online Marketing Consultant.

 

If your business is ready to capture the benefits of Email Marketing SourceOne Technologies can assist you in getting started.  We offer several plans that range from the do it yourself to the everything done for you plans.  Click here to find more about our Email Marketing plans.

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