Creating Email Lists for Marketing Campaigns
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If you plan to do some Internet marketing to promote your business endeavor, you should seriously consider email marketing as at least one tier of your Internet marketing campaign. Many business owners shy away from email marketing because they believe all email marketing campaigns are purely spam.
However, this is not true and not partaking in this type of marketing can cause your business to lose out on a great deal of business. By not appealing to potential customers via email, your business may lose a great deal of business to competitors who are using email marketing campaigns to reach customers around the world.
However, the first step of an email marketing campaign should be creating an email distribution list. This article will discuss some popular options for doing this and should help to the reader to learn more about what is acceptable and what is not when it comes to email marketing.
Once you have made the decision to start using email marketing to promote your business you are likely facing the dilemma of compiling an email distribution list. This is essentially a list of email addresses to which you will email your advertising and promotional materials. One common way to gain a list of email addresses is to purchase a list from distributors.
However, this method is not very effective at all and we do not recommend it. The problem with purchasing an email list if you have no way of knowing whether or not the members of the list would have any interest at all in your products or services. This is very important because while you want to reach a large audience with your email marketing you also want this audience to be members of your overall target audience.
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When you purchase an email list you may be sending your email messages to some users who might be interested but this is largely coincidental and is not likely to be well received because the message was not solicited.
Internet users are very quick to delete materials they believe to be spam without even opening or reading the emails. In fact some Internet service providers include spam filters which may automatically delete your emails if your messages are deemed to be spam.
These filters run complex algorithms on the subject heading and content of the message to determine whether or not it is spam and are quite adept at weeding out spam.
Therefore you run the risk of having your email marketing effort turn out to be a complete waste if the majority of recipients never even read or receive the message.
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A far better way to create an email distribution list for your email marketing campaign is to ask current customers as well as interested potential customers to register with your website to receive additional information and periodic updates about your products and services as well as other information which might be of interest to them.
This provides you with a database of email addresses from current customers as well as potential customers who have a genuine interest in your products and services and who are interested in learning more about these products and services.
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Once you have a list of interested customers or potential customers you can send emails or create e-newsletter for distribution to the members of your email list. These documents should contain a wealth of valuable information as well as a soft sell pitch for your products and services.
This information will be valued by the readers and may help to persuade them to try your products and services. You might also want to include useful links to either your website as well as other websites which may be of interest to your readers.
Your content should also contain a portion which urges the reader to take a specific action such as making a purchase or at least investigating a product further.
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Getting Help with Your Email Marketing Campaign
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Savvy business owners realize the importance of email marketing even if they do not know how to run an effective email marketing campaign.
Simply stated this means a business owner may realize it is imperative for him to run an email marketing campaign to help him meet the needs and expectations of his target audience but he may not know how to orchestrate an email marketing campaign which is truly effective.
Fortunately for these business owners they do not have to know a great deal about email marketing because there are plenty of Internet marketing consultants who can assist them in planning and running an effective email marketing campaign. This article will provide some tips for finding a consultant to assist you in orchestrating an email marketing campaign.
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One of the most important criteria in seeking a consultant to assist you with our email marketing campaign is experience. Specifically it is experience which has resulted in past success.
This is important because one of the best indicators of how well a consultant will perform for you is how well they performed in the past. This means if a consultant was able to help a variety of past clients to attain their goals through email marketing, the consultant will likely be able to assist you in the same way.
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Another important criterion when hiring a consultant to assist you with your email marketing campaign is the opinions of past clients. Before committing to work with a particular consultant you should request references from past clients.
You should not only request these references but also contact each of the past clients provided and question them about their experiences with the consultant. It is important to keep in mind the consultant will likely only provide reference he is confident will offer a positive opinion of his services.
However, you can still learn a great deal about the consultant’s style, personality and techniques through these references. This is important because the consultant’s personality as well as his skill and abilities is also very important.
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If you do not get along with the consultant and have difficulty talking to him, it can be difficult to work with him. Additionally, it might be hard for you to meet your business related goals because you are likely not providing the consultant with enough information or offering feedback which could help him to adjust his strategies to better meet your expectations.
While it is true that skill, knowledge and ability are all important sometimes none of these matter if personality conflicts prevent you and the consultant from communicating adequately. Therefore your personal opinion of the consultant should always be carefully considered before making hiring a consultant.
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Although consulting references is a good idea, you should also consider contacting the Better Business Bureau (BBB) as well and also seeking out independent reviews of the consultant you are considering hiring to assist you in your email marketing campaign.
The BBB can provide you with a great deal of information regarding the past performance of the consultant. If the consultant has been in business for a number of years and does not have any unresolved complaints with the BBB, this is a good indication the consultant performs adequately and treats clients fairly. Conversely a consultant with a number of unresolved complaints against him is not likely going to be a good choice.
Similarly a consultant who has a number of independent reviews raving about the quality of his service is likely a good choice to assist you in your email marketing campaign while a consultant who has a number of poor reviews on the Internet is not really a good choice for assisting you with your email marketing campaign.
Likewise, you can assume if past clients were not happy with the services he provided, you will likely also not be happy with these services.
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Organizing Your Email Marketing Campaign
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If you have recently decided to try implementing an email marketing campaign, you can congratulate yourself on becoming involved in one of the most effective types of online marketing for your business.
While many business owners tend to shy away from email marketing campaigns because they believe these campaigns are always viewed as spam, others realize the importance of this type of advertising and are willing to spend a great deal of time and effort into organizing their email marketing campaign.
These business owners will likely find they are able to enjoy an advantage over their competitors who do not take the time to implement an email marketing campaign. This article will describe the steps necessary to organize an effective email marketing campaign.
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One of the first elements you should consider when you make the decision to start an email marketing campaign is the type of information you wish to include in your emails to potential clients.
This is very important because the information you provide will help your email recipients to determine whether or not they think your products or services are worthwhile. You can include a variety of information in marketing emails.
This may include, but is not limited to, full length informative articles, short articles enticing readers to visit your website for more information, links to other websites which may be of interest to your readers, links to your own website and even advertisements for your products or services as well as other products or services your customers may appreciate.
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Once you determine the type of content you wish to incorporate into your email marketing, it is time to consider how you want to structure your email marketing efforts. Two of the most common structures include an informative email with subtle advertising or an in depth e-newsletter with a wealth of information as well as some subtle advertising and even some graphics.
Deciding on the format of the emails you will be sending out are important because they will dictate the staff you will need to assist you in your email marketing effort.
You will require the assistance of a professional writer to assist you with the content in either emails or e-newsletters but if you opt for an e-newsletter you should also consider hiring a graphic artist to assist you in designing an attractive layout and creating graphics as needed to create an appealing layout for your e-newsletter.
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Next you should consider how you plan to create an email distribution list. This is important because simply purchasing an email list is not likely to be effective. You may reach hundreds, thousands or even millions of Internet users by sending emails to all of the members of this email list but there is no guarantee any of them will have an interest in your products or services.
However, if you build your own email list of previous customers who have specifically requested additional information as well as potential customer who have also requested additional information you will have a well formulated list which includes mostly members of your target audience.
This is ideal because you are much more likely to sell products or services to members of your target audience than you are to sell products or services to members of an email group which is not filled with those who might be interested in the products or services you offer.
Once all of these preliminary decisions have been made, you can begin to create the actual emails themselves and can begin to distribute these emails. Once you have sent out your first batch of emails, you can take some time to evaluate the effectiveness of the first email before you send out the second batch.
This will be useful because if you determine the first batch was not very successful you can solicit feedback and make changes to the second email before sending it out. If the second email is more successful than the first, you can conclude the changes you made were beneficial.
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When to End Your Email Marketing Campaign
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Deciding when to end an email marketing campaign is one subject which many business owners may struggle with on a regular basis. This decision can be difficult both in situations in which the email marketing campaign is enjoying a great deal of success and in situations in which the email marketing campaign is failing.
In general business owners will have to evaluate a number of different criteria to make this decision and there is no one specific formula which will work for all business owners. In this article we will examine three different scenarios including a successful email marketing campaign which is approaching a logical conclusion, an email marketing campaign which is failing and a successful email marketing campaign which may be able to run indefinitely.
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First we will examine the case of a successful email marketing campaign which is approaching a logical conclusion. In some cases it may be logical for a business owner to conclude his email marketing efforts. The most obvious example is an email marketing campaign which is focused on achieving a specific goal and not selling products or services.
For example an email marketing campaign which is political in nature may start off slowly, peak during a time when voters are most interested in obtaining information about the issues and then begin to wane as the voting process begins and the majority of voters have already made their decision.
Similarly an email marketing campaign which is focused on collecting donations for a specific charity will logically end as the goal is reached. These email marketing campaigns may be highly successful but there is simply no reason to continue them beyond when the goals is reached.
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Next we will consider the case of an email marketing campaign which is not achieving its goal. Deciding when to end an email marketing campaign of this nature can be difficult because it will involve a number of different factors.
For example if the business owner is investing a
great deal of time and money into email marketing and not generating results despite an honest effort it may be time to end this marketing campaign.
However, if the business owner has not invested a great deal in the email marketing campaign and has a few remaining ideas for turning the campaign into a success, it might be worthwhile to continue the email campaign for a little longer to see if the desired goals can be met.
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Finally, it is important to note that email marketing campaigns do not always have to come to an end. Consider a niche topic such as search engine optimization (SEO). A business owner who has been producing and distributing monthly e-newsletters on this subject and receiving a positive response to these email marketing tools, there is not reason for him to discontinue the email marketing as long as he is still capable of producing the e-newsletters.
Similarly to the way many magazines have been in publication for years and years it is possible for an e-newsletter to remain active for as long s there is a need and an interest in the information being provided.
In our example of a business owner publishing an SEO newsletter, the need for this product remains because SEO is continually evolving and recipients of the e-newsletter may anticipate receiving the e-newsletter each month to get more information on current trends in the industry.
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