The Building Blocks of a Successful Internet Business Part III: You have e-mail!
Executive Summary
Regardless of how exclusive your online niche is, the overtly competitive nature of Internet commerce dictates that you promote it continuously to gain that winning edge. Our cover story for this month illustrates the power of e-mail marketing through newsletter distribution and list-building and provides an overview about how e-mail marketing can drive results if used correctly.
Hotmail Junk Mail and e-mail
If you go down memory lane and recall the early days of the Internet, You will probably remember how easy it was to cold-call with e-mail campaigns. Because of the highly unregulated nature of this marketing activity, it was a real jungle out there. e-mail solicitation today is governed by many rules and regulations all of which have to be followed to the letter. To put it in a nutshell, you can solicit through e-mail only when you have the written permission to do so. This permission is granted by prospective customers through a system called “opt-in.” Since a functional opt-in system is the corner stone of any e-mail marketing campaign, you should set up the system carefully after thorough testing. Remember, this activity has legal implications and is dictated in most part by the US CAN-SPAM Act of 2003. This statute continues to receive support either directly or indirectly from governments all over the world. What follows is a brief analysis of your legal rights and responsibilities with respect to e-mail marketing under the US CAN-SPAM Act:
- No misleading or false header information
- Accuracy of the originating e-mail address, routing data and domain names
- Correct name of the solicitor and a PHYSICAL postal address clearly mentioned in message body
- Subject line that is authentic and not deceptive in nature
- Mandatory requirement of an opt-out mechanism such as auto-unsubscribe or any other mechanism including written instructions via postal mail
- Clearly defined restriction on selling, renting or giving away opt-out e-mail addresses under penalty
As you can tell, e-mail marketing is most certainly under the government radar. Ironically, the law has made this approach to online marketing all the more effective because it has weeded out most if not all those unscrupulous marketers who were either trying to sell adult content or were trying to operate programs that were at best dubious.
Reaching Out and Touching your Prospects
The most effective way to harness the power of e-mail marketing is to first build a list of prospective customers. This process is called list building. To start with, consider offering a free newsletter or e-zine subscription to your prospects and existing customers directly from your web site’s home page. Your newsletter sign up mechanism qualifies as an opt-in process too. Your newsletter should have the following attributes in order to generate sales on your web site:
Frequency…
Publish your e-zine or newsletter at least once a month on a regular schedule. Sporadic mailings of your newsletter will not create credibility and goodwill.
Clear focus and innovative content…
The newsletter should address the informational needs of your customer base. It should address a specific niche, a knowledge domain that is relevant to your online business so that there is a sense of synergy between your prospective customers and the products or services you are promoting on your web site. You will be amazed to see how many prospects will sign up for your newsletter and help you build your e-mail marketing list through integrated SEO and search marketing which you should implement at the outset.
Archiving your content…
In order to gain maximum mileage out of your list building efforts, create an archive of your past newsletter issues. Your customers should be able to access your newsletter archives while researching a topic or seeking information. Remember to optimize your archived newsletter pages for the search engines so that they can double as landing pages and drive traffic to your web site.
The Value of Long-lasting Customer Relationships
Building customer relationships is all about building loyalty. Once you are able to win their trust and confidence, you are all set to initiate your e-mail marketing campaign. You should be ready to send out e-mail solicitations after the third or fourth issue of your newsletter. Unlike your newsletter which should be devoid of advertising content, your e-mail solicitation can promote your product line and announce special promotions. Since your customer base is already in place and your online commerce venture is a known entity in your readership community, your response and closure rates will be higher than that of acold call e-mail campaign assuming it was legal.
Formulating a Killer e-mail Marketing Strategy
The launch of your e-mail marketing campaign is the next step after list building. Spell out your promotional offers clearly, describe the product’s features and the associated benefits to your customers. Whether it is a Christmas promotion you are orchestrating or a Memorial Day sale you are promoting, your e-mail marketing message should be precise, direct and to the point. Use simple, informal and easy-to-understand language and identify yourself clearly both in the sender and the subject line so that your customers know that they are receiving the communication from a reliable and trusted source .
Reliable e-mail Management and Auto-Responder Services
If your support team does not include a technical person, please consider using a paid e-mail management service. These companies provide a bewildering range of useful services. For pennies a day You can streamline and fully automate your e-mail marketing campaigns, use their click tracking services to measure results and scrutinize their analytics-style data to plan future e-mail campaigns. All paid e-mail management services come with auto-responders which will send out your subscription confirmations, welcome and introductory messages without human intervention at preset intervals. You can use their list hosting and list management solutions so that you can focus entirely on your campaign. The ones we believe are the most reliable services are as follows:
Aweber:
http://www.aweber.com
ProSender:
http://prosender.com
MailerMailer:
http://m1e.net
e-mail marketing isn’t a one-time shot in the dark. As long as you serve up fresh content to your prospects with your newsletters and e-zines and follow them up with hard-hitting and value-pack e-mail offers with strong CTAs, your e-mail marketing campaigns are sure to shine.
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