Email Marketing Primer
Building Customer Synergy Without Spam
Author: Howard Sherman Article date: September 2, 2008
Repeat after me: SPAM is evil.
Repeat after me: I will never, ever SPAM. NEVER
EVER.
OK, so now that we have firmly established that email
marketing is not SPAM let's move forward and define what email marketing
actually is.
By my definition, email marketing is staying in touch
with present and prospective customers with news and information of value
and/or interest to them that voluntarily choose to receive.
Anything else is not email marketing.
Email marketing is composed of two very simple
steps:
-
Build an email mailing list of qualified,
interested people who voluntarily subscribe to your list.
-
Send the people on your email list relevant, timely,
helpful, informative and/or entertaining email from time to time.
OK, thank you for reading. Now go out there and get
'em, tiger!
Just kidding! It really does sound simple but the steps
and moving parts behind the scenes are a little more involved.
Step 1 is crucial -- make sure that the list of people
you send emails to really, truly want to get emails from you.
How do you build such a list?
Look over to the left side of this page and up a little
bit. See that puffy cloud that says "Free Alerts!"? When people sign
up for the RoyalGeeks mailing list they are receiving value for doing so; I
will send them important computing alerts whenever something critical comes
up. Earlier this year during the first heat wave I sent out a
heat advisory warning customers against leaving laptops in their cars for
fear of permanent damage due to overheating. Another time I sent out a
crucial alert on a vicious strain of virus. Time and time again I give
people true value for their subscription my email list.
So what's in it for me? Building my brand. By
supplying my email list subscribers with a continual flow of quality
information I am constantly building and reinforcing the image of the
RoyalGeeks brand as being the only tech support resource they will turn to
when a need arises.
Make it easy for present and prospective customers to
sign up for your mailing list right from your website by filling out a web
form and then sending them an email asking them to confirm their
subscription (The industry lingo calls this "The Double-Verified Opt-In")
You could also add names and addresses to your email
lists manually just so long as you are making it abundantly clear they are
being added to a mailing list and be sure to obtain their permission and
confirmation that they can do so (The official term is called the Single
Verified Opt-In)
Because of the federal CAN-SPAM law you need to be very
careful that you use legal, legitimate means to building your email
marketing list. Moreover, you can easily tarnish your reputation by
using questionable or unethical means to add people to your email list.
OK so you're list is growing and growing (My company's
list of subscribers is over 10,000 -- hello out there!) so it's time to
start sending them the emailed information they requested.
How much and how often?
One good nugget of information and only when that nugget
is very important and/or very timely.
If you email people too often, you run the risk of
annoying them through inundation of email. Send email too infrequently
and people may forget about you. Don't be afraid of sending three emails
three days in a row if there are truly important, need-to-know items of
importance in those three emails.
Plain text emails or fancy HTML email extravaganzas?
Plain text is read more often but HTML is more
eye-catching and attention-demanding and also allows you to better track
your results. There's no right or wrong answer on this one. I mix and
match using both depending upon how much time I have and what my intention
is.
So how do you put all this together and make it work for
you?
Simple. Use Aweber.
Aweber is the ultimate email tool for businesses looking
to reach out and stay in touch with their current and prospective clients
and customers.
Aweber features dozens of beautiful templates, all the
code you need to add sign-up forms to your website in a number of different
ways, built-in CAN SPAM law compliance every step of the way and fast,
friendly technical support.
Aweber also has dozens of informative, helpful articles
(just like this one) that will help you make the most of your email
marketing efforts.
Check out Aweber now and try it out for free.
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