Online marketing solutions

If you have chosen to try email marketing, you have chosen a good path.  Email marketing is still one of the most cost-effective ways to promote any business.  While balancing your business and life in a tough economy, the tough need to be creative and resourceful.  Using email marketing campaigns enable you to be creative, while learning who your niche market is.  As you know, with any serious investment risk, planning and strategy need to be included to achieve successful results.

How do you Get Started?
There is a learning curve when it comes to sending out direct email marketing campaigns.  You may find yourself having difficulty trying to figure out your first step.  We have anticipated that question and hope that this article will help provide you with good basic starters to get you up and running.  There are no pat answers, so you need to see what will work for you within your budget and time frame.

Mailing Lists for Targeted Email Campaigns

Without a mailing list, you have no one to send your e-campaigns to.  But how do you start?  Normally, there are three options:  Buying a list, renting a list, or creating your own.  If you are a new business, the last choice may be impossible, even though it is the best one.  You may not have time to wait, and need to start somewhere.  Here are your options:

1.    Renting an Email Address List
Renting an email address for direct email campaigns can be very cost-effective.  Whether obtained from email campaigns, direct bulk email marketing, or an email newsletter subscription, these email address lists are a valuable source of sales and leads.

2.    Buying an email address list
The alternative to renting an email list is to buy the list.  Once bought, you have full control over your list sending out your own promotions, whenever you want.

3.    Building your own mailing lists
Building your own mailings lists takes time.  Your reward is the fact that you have managed to create a list of prospects who want to receive your information and e-newsletters.

An Optimized Website:

Getting on board with SEO: How do get started?  Here are some of the key things to know:

Keywords and key phrases: Know the right key phrases or key phrase optimization.  These are the words and phrases that will be picked up by the search engines when someone does a query.

You need the specific key phrases that describe your services or products, strategically placed within your content, thus allowing your site to show up on the first results page, of a search query commonly referred to as the (SERPs).  If you are not sure what those words are, go to Google AdWords – this site will help you determine what words come up in a search.  You can also put your competitor’s website URL in the search to see what keywords they are using.

Back links: Back links are links on one website that lead back to another.  Creating back links to your site is another way to be found.  Here are some suggestions:

1.    Articles: Write articles – get them published with your website and name as a signature.  There are at least 100 websites called Social News and Social Book Marking.  Write an interesting article about your field or something you feel strongly about.  Once published, your article will be parsed in the Search Engines and come up under the right keywords, as well.

2.    Press Release: If you are new and have newsworthy information to share, write a press release about your company or product and get it published on as many press release submission sites as possible.  Remember, it must have a common interest to your targeted audience.

3.    Reciprocal Relationships. Find products that compliment what you do and agree to put their link on your site, with a reciprocal back link to yours.

Networking and Sales Leads: Join Yahoo Groups that align with your goals and business objectives.  Answer questions poised by other members.  Show your knowledge and get your name out there.  Attend different events that partner with other organizations.  Make contacts as you create new leads.  Do not let them grow cold.  Reach out in someway.  Keep your name and company in the front of their minds.

Company Blog: Not only is this a great way to share information about your company or service, but you are communicating to your audience in a person voice.  Blogging is huge, and people love to share their opinions.  Start a conversation with your clients and prospects.  Let them know you are a person, not just a company.

Landing Pages: Before sending out any email marketing campaign, you must have a matching landing page.  This is page will have a specific and clear call to action.  Your page should match your campaign and create a strong sales pitch to the prospect upon landing.

Communication and Permission Email
Before sending any of your leads any email newsletters or campaigns, reach out to them in a personal email or phone call, asking them if they would be interested in joining your newsletter or reading your blog.  Don’t be labeled as a spammer.  Your reputation represents your company, product, and service.

Get informed. Any email campaign marketer needs to become familiar with The federal CAN-SPAM Act protects consumers against unwanted e-mail.

Becoming an email marketer is easy.  Becoming a successful one takes research, time, and planning.  Before taking the plunge, make sure you know how to swim.

Whether you create targeted direct email campaigns or are the recipient of them, there is one point on which we can all agree, we want and demand our freedom of choice.  This passion for options and choosing is instilled within all of us.  That is why the opt-in plays such an integral part of our HTML or e-newsletter email campaigns.

Opt-In Email Marketing is a powerful marketing tool when we want to reach a very specific and centered audience of possible purchasers.  If understood and implemented correctly, you will be building a top quality client base to interact with, while rewarding them with valuable offers and service.

The Right Attitude Attracts the Right Client

What are your goals when you send out your e-campaigns and e-newsletters?  Your two primary goals need to focus on building your opt-in subscriber list which in turn, is building a solid client database.  This will be the most valuable resource you will own, as this list will represent those clients that are waiting for and anticipating your email on a somewhat regular basis.  These are not lists bought and rented; they are yours and yours alone.  Clients that opt-in are exhibiting trust and a willingness to see what you are offering.  A client base built on opt-ins opens up the door for honest and open communication and a future list of loyal subscribers and buyers.

What’s in it For Me? – Where’s the Beef?
Do you remember that great TV commercial by Wendy’s?  People advertise value, but what they receive is not what was promised.  Going into a restaurant anticipating a large and juicy hamburger, then receiving one that can hardly be seen, creates distrust while pushing away a possible loyal patron.  What a great parallel example to your e-mail campaigns.  What valuable offer have you promised your recipients?  When your e-mail is opened, will they be disappointed having expected much more?

According to MarketingSherpa, “consumers want special treatment. They are giving up their precious time in exchange for the benefit of content – so that content should convey some real benefits.”  In a sampling of over 1,400 nationally representative consumers, most wanted to opt in if there was a worthwhile exchange.”

Value Added Tips

•    Sell to help – not just to make money: Your service or product should answer a need.
•    Offer valuable information or tips your recipients can use
•    “How To” instructional type tips are very well received
•    Offer discounts to first time subscribers
•    Offer special sales and discounts to repeat buyers
•    Create interesting content that appeals to your entire target audience
•    Always encourage feedback.  This creates an ongoing dialogue with your customers.
•    Follow up is a Must!  Once a sale happens, that is just the beginning.  Communicate with your client.  Let them now they are valuable and you are standing behind your product or service.  We all appreciate the personal touch.  You can’t communicate with an office or building.  Let them know that you are a real person and can be trusted.

Lastly, use all communication and feedback received to help you continue gathering a more accurate and detailed personal demographic profile for your email database.  This gives you the ability to create a more targeted future campaign, helping you become more successful; one campaign at a time.

Using these techniques effectively will increase your sales and opt in subscribers.  With the power of the internet and viral marketing, word of mouth will spread quickly from one happy customer to another.

What are you waiting for?  Get out there and build some long term trusted relationships right now.

We are living in a tech savvy existence.  Our day-to-day activities revolve and depend upon our ever-growing digital world.  This is a perfect setting for increasing our email campaigns.

From the very onset of the first email campaign, email marketing is and continues to be one of the most important tools for B2B and B2C email marketers in the arena today.  It is still the fastest and most cost effective strategy, sending out hundreds of messages to our lead databases in today’s global market.

The Internet is a main source of survival, not only for the seller, but for the consumer, as well.  Worldwide communication, for the most part, emanates from the Internet.  Our correspondence, conversations, and documentation seem to be headed towards a paperless society.  Every area of our life is affected.  The digital innovators of this age continue creating more tools and applications, with a focused dependency upon technology, not only for business, but for our pleasures and enjoyments, as well.

One Size Does Not Fit All

I am sure you have seen this famous tag (One Size Fits All) on many items of clothing.  Whether you are a size 4, 6, 8 or 12, they are telling you, one size fits all.  It denies our physical uniqueness, size, and preference in one’s appearance and choices.

This type of thinking may have crept into our email marketing campaigns.  Demographic studies show this just can’t be true.  Our target segments are constantly changing in age, marital status, preferences, physical locations, and professions.  Sending out generic mass emails is ineffective and may cause the loss of subscribers in the process.

I remember joining a cable company.  Spoke to and met the representative.  Long conversations and then we closed the sale.  Many times after that, I kept receiving mass  notifications under my door to buy their plan and get better deals.   They were generic advertisements absolutely nullifying my being a client and having met with and reached out to their client representative.  It really made me angry.

Generic Emails do not Differentiate between Clients and Prospects

•    Generic emails give a strong disconnect message to the recipient of any prior buying or contact history.  It is as if it never happened.  They are impersonal.
•    Generic emails discount the tracking history and stat results of prior campaigns.  You are shooting in the dark.
•    Generic emails fail to create value and interest, since they are not based on demographics or history.
•    Generic emails do not create, nurture or encourage a personal dialogue or feedback.
•    Generic emails show a lack of appreciation and value to your clients.
•    Generic emails make everyone a prospect, never acknowledging the client.
•    Generic emails create irrelevant messages which can lead to unsubscribers, spam, complaints or inactivity.

As smart marketers, we need to follow the formulas that work – sending the right message to the right subscriber at the right time.  Our clients are the reason we exist.  They need to feel special, and more importantly, acknowledged and appreciated.

This type of parsing can only come from demographics, stats, and history.  Without careful segmentation, you can push away good customers, who just might take their purchase potential with them somewhere else.

Remember: Prospects and clients need different email campaign strategies.  Generic email campaigns tend to make everyone a prospect, resulting in ineffective and irrelevant messages and unwanted results.

According to marketingterms.com,  “viral marketing is a marketing phenomenon that facilitates and encourages people to pass along a marketing message.”

This type of marketing depends upon  passionate  individuals – passing on your marketing message,  increasing its potential of exposure and influence within seconds.  Like a virus, its ripple effect is passed on quickly, infecting hundreds and possibly thousands, in a relatively short space of time.

Of course, there was a time the expression “word of mouth” was sort of the same thing.  In a way, viral marketing is the Internet parallel, since most of us will be blogging, emailing, using SMS and Skype, to share and announce our latest and most exciting discoveries of products, resources, and specials.  With just the multiplicity of email, a company’s ROI can skyrocket within a matter of weeks.  With all this potential and power at our fingertips, we need to make our campaigns as effective as possible.

Viral Market Strategies:  Here are some effective components to include in your next Viral Marketing Campaign:

1.    Free is good: Free has a powerful pull, but free should never represent poor quality.  The free approach draws people in, after that; there are more opportunities for a sale, according to Dr. Ralph F. Wilson, E-commerce Consultant.

2.   Easily transmitted:   As a virus spreads quickly and rapidly from person to person in the right conditions, you need create and use the fastest and most seamless vehicle that will spread your message without delay.  Using email marketing campaigns to your targeted lists will help expedite that process.

3.   Backlinks and Affiliates: Network with different affiliates.  Get your links, ads and logos out there.  The more back links pointing to your site, the greater importance your site is deemed by the search engines, thus, giving you a higher standing in the Search Engine Results Pages known as the SERPs.

4.  Evoke Reactions: Your message needs to be a catalyst of emotions and opinions from your audience, piquing their interest and curiosity to read further, and know more.  Why not do something unexpected or different.  Catching people off guard with the unexpected is great marketing.

5.  Market the Social Internet Communities: The more accessible information can be shared, the more rapidly it will be spread.  submit your news on the social networking and bookmarking sites such as StumbleUpon and Digg.  They have established niche communities.  Find yours.  Submit articles, make comments on other stories, be seen, be heard, and be out there!

Have you signed up with Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, or LinkedIn?  What are you waiting for?  With thousands of people registering per day, it would be foolish to pass up such a lucrative marketplace.

The tables have turned with the evolution of the Internet.  The power has shifted from the marketer to the consumer.  Within a matter of seconds, their opinions and voice are spread rapidly throughout the world by one single email.

So don’t be a viral marketing casualty as Laura Lake reminds us to:

1.    Mean what you say and say what you mean.
2.    Stand behind your product or service.
3.    Under promise and over deliver … always!

One of the best ways to increase traffic to your website is to combine email campaigns with SEO, by using the same keywords on your email campaigns as you use on your site. Now WordStream have released a new free keyword tool that can help you find the best keywords for your website. According to WordStream, “The Free Keyword Tool is continuously updating a database of over a billion of the world’s most popular keywords, aggregating over a trillion unique searches”.

57% of consumers feel more positive about companies who send them email campaigns, according to a survey by Epsilon. The survey, which includes 1517 consumers, also say that 50% of recipients are more likely to buy products from companies who send them email, whether their purchases are online or at a place of business. Epsylon says that “Email builds loyalty and brand awareness and drives on- and off-line behavior”.

It used to be that everyone that had a Gmail account was considered an internet savvy, with geeky friends that sent out an invitation for the member-based service. But times have changed: Gmail became open for all and other trends took over the email world. But it appears that Gmail users still have their uniqueness: they are more interested in email campaigns. According to a new report by MailChimp, analyzing 184 million emails sent from their platform, the average open rate among Gmail users stands on 30.94%, compare to 24.54% with Yahoo users and 23.79% among Hotmail users.

Spam volumes increased  by 400 percent compare to February 2009, to 94.6 percent of all emails, thus reached its highest pick ever, according to August 2009 Threat Forecast & Report, by MX Logic. According to the report, spam volumes increased by 27 percent since June, and the hottest spam topic among email campaigns is still health-related spam.

Aol will no longer send report cards to companies engaged in feedback loop with AOL, says AOL postmaster blog. the report card was used  to notify email campaign senders that their complaint rate crosses a certain threshold (.30%). AOL says that companies need to “make sure you are monitoring your spam complaints and not relying on the report card to alert you to complaint issues.”

Spammers will not pay tens of thousands of dollars to send their email campaigns, that is the notion behind Yahoo new service, which aims at fighting spam. With the new service, dubbed CentMail, senders will pay about one cent for each mail they’ll send. The money will go to a charity organization for their choice. And their email will benefit from “This is not spam” digital stamp. Yahoo says that “CentMail will essentially be free for the majority of users who already give yearly charitable donations. 89% of U.S. households already make annual donations, with an average contribution of $1620 and a median on the order of $100. By making these donations through CentMail (as opposed to directly to the charity), users will spend no additional money, but will be provided with CentMail’s service”.