What do backlinks and signposts have in common?  They point the way; give us direction, showing us the path to take.  Without the proper direction, we would find ourselves going around in circles, never finding our desired destination.

Pointing potential customers to your website is every email marketer’s goal, big or small.  Without website traffic, there can be no conversions, without conversions, there will be no income.  You cannot remain neutral; you must have some definite goals in mind, with specific and carefully researched strategies, with which to carry them out.  Like a wise investor, you need to incorporate a diversified portfolio, knowing that one marketing plan, will never be enough.

Welcome to the World of Backlinks

If you have any knowledge about Search Engine Optimization, you have no doubt come across this term.  Backlinks (also termed Inbound Links) are links that direct traffic back to your website, or a particular landing page on your website.  As more and more people rely on the Internet to promote their business, backlinks are now considered one of the main building blocks for smart SEO website strategies.

Why are backlinks so important?  Because search engines like Google give more relevance and credit to those websites that have more backlinks than the others, when they do a search query.  We need to insert a caution here.  Search Engines also consider the quality of the links.  Inbound links should come from other sites whose content is relevant to yours.  The higher the relevance, the great their quality is considered.  For example, if a website is all about health related issues, and you are promoting travel, that backlink would be assessed as having no relevance.

Don’t try to fool the search engines.   Many webmasters do whatever they consider necessary to influence the search engines with as many external backlinks as possible which has been termed “Link Farms”.  Because of these deceptive practices, a search engine’s criteria for quality inbound links has become even tougher.  Those pages that are determined to be link farms are negated and can put your site in danger of being banned entirely!

Reciprocal Linking.  When web sites link to one another, either directly or indirectly through different website pages, a search engine considers those links to be reciprocal links.  As a person is judged by the company they keep, your backlinks will be judged by your reciprocal partnerships.  In other words, don’t hitch your wagon to a bad apple.  When you apply your personal rules in friendships to your reciprocal links, you will become more cautious and choosy on whose company you want to keep, making sure that webmaster is using white not black-hat SEO techniques.  For further reading on this, please see Google’s explanation on Link Schemes.

Some handy tools for your backlink building campaigns:

• Domain Stats Tool:  Displays the backlinks of domains in Google, Yahoo, and MSN.
• Backlink Builder Tool:  This tool searches for websites that have relevant themes and content related to your site.

Web Directories

Web Directories are like an Internet phone book.  Filling out a web directory, as in a phone book, helps you get found.  You can list your services, information or products for sale.  With each directory, you choose a category under which you want your business to appear.  Another great advantage is that a Web Directory lets you pick your own keywords, also called tags.  These tags are used like search phrases when someone searches a directory for a particular service or product.  This is another way of creating a backlink to your website.  Most directories are free and do not require a reciprocal link (a link back to their site.)

Article Directories

Writing and submitting articles to articles directories are another great source when creating valuable backlinks.  Most article sites are free.  The only drawback is that it can be a tedious process.  While some submission sites just ask you to submit an article, on the fly, the better ones will require a double opt-in sign up, with a required step-by-step article process submission form.  The good news is that you are allowed to put your website and email as a signature in each article.  It is a great way to get your name, company, and personal voice out into cyberspace.  For further reading…

Forums

Forum signatures are an easy way to obtain backlinks from topic related discussions. Adding your backlinks to a forum signature when posting your responses is another way of getting your company noticed.  Make sure that your responses are valuable and real.  Do not try to sell yourself on a forum.  Many forum moderators constantly scan the communications for spammers, and will quickly blacklist you if they see a sell in your response.

Blogs

Blogs are not only a great way to get backlinks, but give you a chance to write about the industry, product, or service that you represent.  They open dialogues with your clients and give prospects the chance to exchange ideas and thoughts with you directly.

This is not an exhaustive discussion.  They are many doors and roads to follow when growing your ROI.  Research, read, check, test and prove what works for you.  Perhaps in your future blog, you will be able to share some valuable information with us.   Understanding and apply SEO is a continual learning process and experience, in which we are all students.

Maybe you have never thought of using a preheader in your e-mail campaigns, but that might be a mistake.  Why?  Preheaders, correctly written, can absolutely impact your click through rates, which after all is your main goal. Knowing a bit more about them and learning how to use them, might just make you a fan.

What is an E-Mail Preheader? A preheader is typically a short line or two of text on the top of an e-mail newsletter, e-mail announcement, or website that appears on top of a logo or graphic.  Normally, it is the first thing that an e-mail subscriber sees and notices.  Many times, other than the subject line, it is the only test displayed in an e-mail’s preview pane, so you can see its power and potential.  There are two main ways that e-mail marketers use preheaders.  They are used as the call to action or as an extra text tease or snippet.

As more e-mail marketers are using preheaders, there are many differing opinions on how much or how little should be included.  Here are some helpful suggestions to help you get the most out of this strategy.

Make it Relevant – Right to the Point – Keep your preheader short.  Don’t let it become another paragraph.  Use it for emphasis about a promotion or sale, while having a link on the second line stating: “View online” – that is a live link taking them to a landing page on your website for further reading.  A good preheader should amplify your message giving key information with a precise call to action or announcement.

It is important to note, there are no rights and wrongs here.  You need to read and see what others are doing and what works for you.  Overtime, you will develop your own ideas that will be relevant to your campaigns, e-mails, and website.

How to Use Preheaders

Use your preheaders to:

• Announce a special sale with a link to your landing page

• Link to an online version of your e-mail

• Ask subscribers to add your e-mail address to their address book and   white lists

• Deliver a dynamic one line summary of your content to provoke their curiosity to read further

• Remind your subscribers why they are getting this e-mail and who it is from

• Provide an unsubscribe link; don’t make them search for it

• Provide coupon information for a promotion

• Inform subscribers of a time limited sale

Research the Internet for Creative Ideas
We are all getting loads of e-mail marketing messages.  Take a look at your competitors’ e-mails, and see how they are using preheaders.  Look at website preheaders as well.

Test your Preheaders
As in any marketing campaign, statistical results help you fine tune and optimize your e-mail campaign strategies. The same holds true for a preheader strategy.  You can do some A/B testing as you send one type of preheader to one group and another type to the second half.  By doing this, you can see which one gets the best results.

There are so many important roles every part of your e-campaign plays in a well designed e-mail campaign promotion.  From appearance to content, your goal is to improve your open rates and raise your ROI’s.  No stone is left unturned, all content must be tested.  Success is not an accident, in fact, it is darn hard work.  But at the end, it is worth it.

Preheaders teach us the top matters.  Just a few little lines on the top of your e-mail, graphic, or logo, can make the difference between a click open rate, or the trash bin. That little Preheader has power; make it work for you.

Once considered a luxury, (hey I am dating myself), cell phones are now falling out of everyone’s pockets, including kids.  Having a cell phone is like having a watch; you can’t leave home without it.  How exciting it once was to receive a call outside the home!  You felt important, privileged, and singled out from the crowd.

In 2010, from Nextel to Blackberry to IPhone to Android, the transformation of that little cell phone, coupled with the latest state of the art technology, has overwhelmed and excited even us die hard techies.

Nope, it’s not just for texting and taking pictures anymore.  Cell phones are being used to help people in developing nations, bringing global awareness of their needs, raising their living standards, along with diagnosing their problems!

Mobility and literacy
“A variety of other applications for cell phones in remote areas are also being developed, including some aimed at improving coordination in areas where transportation both for people and goods is often unpredictable. One such system, called Transport Link, also developed in NextLab, is a way for people who rely on infrequent bus service to get timely updates on when the next bus will come through their area or to arrange informal transportation with others in the area who have private vehicles.”  Read Entire Article

Predictions for 2013
“Yet, personal mobile devices with Internet connectivity encompass a broad array of devices and with a wide range of functionality that continues to evolve and expand rapidly.  To put this in perspective, the number of mobile devices accessing the Internet is projected to reach 1 billion by 2013 based on research by IDC.  Say “mobile” to most marketers and they think cell phone, maybe SMS (define).”

Mobile E-Marketing Strategies
From an e-marketing perspective, this leads to increased complexity and expense. In order to integrate a mobile strategy to take advantage of this evolving market, here are some basic suggestions:

Conform your e-marketing campaigns for mobile surfers. Make sure your mobile campaign can be easily read on a mobile smartphone.  Most mobile shoppers are looking for high priority items, quickly scanning the surface in between meetings and travel.  They want to find what they need quickly.  As with any email marketing campaign, use brand name they will recognize, with a visible call to action.  Don’t forget to include your phone number, e-mail address, or Web site on the bottom.

Mobile Demographics

Before starting a mobile-oriented marketing program, gather your demographics.  Survey your customers and prospects, finding out which devices they use and what type of mobile content they’d like to receive from you.  Don’t forget to find out what your competitors are creating and sending.

Create a Mobile Website

“Think of where customers are when they access your information and include critical information like phone number, store hours, location and/or directions,” recommends Microsoft Mobile Solutions Specialist Steve Siegel.

Register and Index your Mobile Site on:

• Yahoo.mobi
• msn.mobi
• Google Mobile
• aol.mobi
• 4info.mobi

Based on Nielsen tracking, mobile search grew 102% in 2009.  Remember you can’t be found if you aren’t there.

Mobile Metrics
* Count the number of impressions from mobile Web sites.
* Track your mobile marketing advertising results.
*  Monitor social media stats related to mobile communications.

As the variety and power of mobile devices continue to grow, marketing strategies need to evolve as well.  Remember, whether or not you have a mobile strategy, your prospects and customers are already receiving your competitor’s marketing messages via these devices.  Don’t be left behind.  Your ROI is depending on it.

Whether for your own company or the one you work for, beginning your adventure in the social media world of digital communications is a good decision.

Social Media has become one of the most aggressive ways to promote your site or business, increasing back  links, resulting in additional website traffic.  For any business counting their costs, while weathering a bad economy, social media has become a lifesaving path.

Social media is all about conversation.  It is a very appealing way to create relationships online – giving a face and voice to small and large businesses.  This strategy can easily add to an email marketing campaign, whose name and brand begin to take on a more personal and widespread public recognition.

Beginning your SM Campaign Strategy – Before jumping in head first, you need to know what tools you will be using, as well as the information you want to share.  As with any email marketing campaign, research, time, and strategy must always come first.  Here are a few tips:

Preparation and Research

• Create an audience persona. What does your target audience look like?  As an email marketer, demographics is a survival word.  Get an image of your audience, age, gender, spending and surfing habits, what sites they visit, and how they use the Web.  This forms your foundation.

• Check out your competition. Find out what your competition is doing in the social media arena.  What are they talking about, what are they writing about.  See what kind of responses they are getting.

• Policy Guidelines. Make sure your company has a social media policy in place.  Guidelines are needed for any employee that engages online conversations representing your organization.

• The Designated Blogger. It is very important to designate a blogger.  Whether you hire a freelance blogger, or give someone in your organization this opportunity, this is a serious commitment.  Blogging needs to be consistent, live conversations need to be monitored.  Give this serious thought – you need the right person creating the right voice and conversations.

• Goals and Meetings. Have your plans and strategies clearly defined.  Make time for follow-up meetings on the outcome and results.  This is a learning process.  You can easily modify ideas and content along the way.

• Interesting and Relevant. Whatever message you put out there, cannot be taken back.  People are stressed, quickly skimming through titles and bits of conversations, as they surf.  Take the time to surf around at what your target audience is talking about on YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter.  Do not let stress or urgency make your efforts sloppy.

Don’t forget to have fun. Social conversations should have some lightness about them.  We are not engaging in metrics or behavioral sciences.  Bring a bit of fun into this.   The very fact of the enormous proliferation of social media, proves that people want a more personal relationship and voice with those they do business with or buy from.

Here are some of the top SM sites in which to get started – Click Me!

As great as a value added email marketing campaign can be, planning its content, timing, and target is just as important to its success.  The proper approach to any email campaign should start with a well thought-out plan, which requires a little more time and effort then most e-marketers realize.  Here are some points that you need to cover when planning your email campaigns:

1.   Permission-based mailing list. Unless you have the recipient’s permission (op-in), you are trespassing and may be considered sending spam, which is against the CAN-SPAM Act.  Know the spam laws.  Stay out of trouble.

2.    Content is still king.  Your content should be relevant and directed at an intelligent audience.  Your message should be clear, sharing the essential facts in carefully thought out wording.  The structure of your message should be easy to parse.  Remember to give your message a personal voice.  You need to provide them with something that they desire.  Your content should hold their attention long enough for you to market yourself successfully.

3.    Grammatical errors. The amount of errors found within many emails can be quite surprising.  Misspelled words and poor grammar convey a lack of professionalism.  Rushing to get a campaign out, may cost you the loss of clients.  Take the time to read your email campaign over several times.  Have someone else read it as well.  Don’t let pressure cause you to be sloppy.

4.   Are your graphics in overdrive? Too many cooks spoil the soup; too many graphics spoil your message.  Your graphics should compliment not overshadow your text.  Keep your message simple and easy to parse.  Oversized graphics can cause a slow download, causing impatience in the recipient

5.    A clear and precise call to action. Don’t make your clients perform and jump through hoops.  If you want someone to subscribe to an e-mail newsletter or sign up for updates about your product or service, do not make it difficult for them.  Filling out endless online forms, clicking through multiple pages, is annoying.  Even if someone wants your product, you may push them over to your competitor.

6.    Your “from” and “subject” lines are crucial to your email campaign.   Why?  Because that is what your recipient will see in their in-box before opening your email.  If you are not recognized in the “from” line, recycle bin or spam here you come.  The “from” line should represent your company or newsletter name that they signed up with.

Subject lines should be catchy and short. Keeping your subject line down to 50 characters or less is the general rule.  If your subject line is too long or cut off, it may quickly end in the trash bin.  Shorter lines help optimize your open rates.  Remember, subject lines need to be relevant to the content.

7.    Do you have a landing page? Are you sending people to your homepage?  Not good.  A targeted direct email campaign needs an accompanying landing page.  Creating key pages that people land on when they click a link from your e-mail campaign is very important.  Make sure that page has all the relevant information pertaining to the product or service you are marketing.  Giving a prospect all the information needed, on that page, enables them to be able to make a quick response.

8.    What’s in it for them? Don’t focus on telling your readers how great your business is, and the fabulous products you sell.  All they want to know is how does this benefit them?  Focus on what they want and need.  It’s all about them, not you.

9.    Using Social Media. If you have a Twitter or Facebook account, you can let clients know to join and follow you, as you use that media to announce your specials and discounted pricing.  That makes you cool, and gets your name out there as well.

10.   The Three T’s – Test – Test – Test. Before you send out your campaign, do a sampling on a small number of people.  See what the response is.  How well was it received?  Better to delay a campaign, than to court a disaster.

There is still an important point to add.  Make sure that your e-campaign is targeted to the right audience.  An email campaign can only be effective when the right campaign, goes to the right people, with the right message.  Don’t let all your hard work go down the drain.  Make each campaign work for you.

Creating a professionally targeted campaign is not easy.  It takes planning, thought, and strategy.  Don’t let time pressure you.  Your campaign needs to be professional and relevant.  Do you have everything covered?

Behavioral marketing gives the e-marketer the ability to accurately segment and target your audience by present and past online behavior.  Utilizing this method when creating your email campaigns, can significantly change the way you plan and send your emails in the future.

“eMarketer projects that behaviorally targeted ad spending will reach $4.4 billion by the end of 2012.”

Behavioral targeting is predicated to become more widespread, resulting in better customer experiences, as they are targeted with more relevant information.

“Using behavioral targeting with email is not a new idea,” says Shar VanBoskirk, senior analyst with Forrester Research in Cambridge, MA. “It is something that good, smart marketers have been tuned into for several years: understanding that the activities within an email are good clues to the types of offers that would be useful to send in a subsequent message. In fact, email used BT even before other types of online advertising did.”

E-mail campaigns need to evolve.  Irrelevant email campaigns must change focus and deliver messages that their recipients want to see, hear, and read.  What does this mean?  Direct email marketing campaigns need to make use of behaviorally triggered e-mail in response to customer actions.  Content needs to be more personalized and much more dynamic.  E-newsletters need to have more valuable and interesting content, not becoming a replacement for an autoresponder type message.  All e-newsletter content needs planning and purpose.

Implementing Behavioral Marketing in our Email Targeted Campaigns:

Broadcast email:  According to Jupiter Research “when marketers actively target their email campaigns to specific behavioral and demographic characteristics, they can produce more than 18 times the profits that broadcast messages produce.  Think of the effect on your ROI?

Re-marketing: Marketers can easily track when an email is opened, what specific pages are explored, what links are clicked on, or any combination of actions and responses.  This important and recorded data can then used to create dynamic and strategic behaviorally targeted email.

Email Address Lists:
By collecting and utilizing specific and accurate information from your email address lists, you can send relevant offers and information based on a user’s preferences and prior purchases.  Instead of just depending upon your demographic data, you can now deliver unique offers and information that they want, according to their behavioral patterns.  This is differentiating the differences in specific actions that have happened, opposed to behavioral, demographical theory.

Actions are Key – Don’t Assume

Demographics are important but cannot be relied upon as the sole means to understanding your audience.  For instance, if you are selling perfume, and have targeted just women, within a certain age range, and location, you have automatically left out the all the men who buy perfume for their wives or girlfriends.  When the holidays come, men buy perfume, flowers, chocolate for various reasons and various people.  You can now see the implications and importance of targeting behavior and actions.

Up-selling to the Full Person

Combine past and present behavior.  Using the above approach let the actions speak louder than statistics.  Using past purchase behavior coupled with recent purchase activity, gives you a better and wider scope of understanding the entire person.  The more you know about the interests and overall purchases of anyone, the better chance you have of sending them a campaign that speaks directly to them.

Behavioral targeting is an ongoing process.  Remember, the more accurate the campaign, the better chance you have to convert browsers to clients.

Google has given us a brand new toy, Google Buzz.  Google Buzz is a brand new way to have conversations about things that interest you, while enabling you to share updates such as photos and videos with family and friends.  There is no installation.  You simply open up your Gmail account, and there it is.  At least, that was my experience.  No warning, just a cute little colorful icon waiting to be pushed.  Sharing information is faster than ever.   A possible new email marketing tool?

All responses will be sent by Buzz directly to your inbox – in actual real-time.  Buzz is also available on certain cellphones and smartphones, so you don’t have to be in front of your computer to create or read a Buzz.

Google Buzz  seems to be Google’s strongest and boldest attempt to get into and build a strong and popular social network.  They have taken and implemented the best of the most powerful social media programs like Twitter and other social services, combining the most popular elements together into one aggressive package.

Importing into Buzz
Do you use Flickr, Picasa, or Twitter?  Now you can automatically have those items imported into your stream.  Buzz will even recommend items you might like based on your friends’ preferences based on their activities.  Instead of building their own social network from the beginning, Buzz is now an integrated key part of their Gmail, with its own distinct icon tab underneath the inbox.

Even though thousands use Gmail, there are still plenty of people without Gmail accounts.  Will Buzz be enough to entice new users to sign up and start using an email service just because of Buzz?

A Bit more Complicated
Twitter is so simple.  If you have created a public account, anyone can see and follow your tweets if they have decided to follow you. It’s as simple as that.  With Buzz, it is not that simple because there are public and private buzzes.  Buzz will create plans for business and educational users.  So public buzzes may only be available within your particular organization or school.  You will have the option for a private buzz to designated individuals within your network.  Remaining flexible, it becomes a bit more complicated.

When users were asked why they are using Buzz, here are some of their reasons:
1.    Easy to use
2.    Simple interface
3.    No setup – Automatically embedded into Gmail.
4.    Users feel they get a wider and quicker global connection

How will G-mailers respond?  Will we buy into this quick sharing of information and brand new communication tool for social media?  Google believes we will.

If you would like to see a video introduction, along with a more detailed explanation of Google Buzz, please go to Google’s Official Blog about Google Buzz

What is Email Harvesting? Email harvesting is the process Where your email address lists are obtained, without your permission or knowledge.  They are used in various bulk and direct email marketing campaigns, usually labeled as spam.  Through spiders, spammers have obtained programs which look through web pages for email addresses, as well.

How does this affect you?

Email address harvesting is not a good thing.  Once your client’s email address is stolen and is now in the hands of a spammer,  your client will get flooded with spam and trash – almost immediately.

You could even be held liable, especially if your email address is displayed somewhere in that spammer’s email.  Your client will think it is from you and soon you may be trashed, and spammed.  The implications and results will be chilling.  Imagine  having to cancel and create a brand  new business email address?  Think of all the clients, associates, and prospects who are already signed up and linked with an email address taken years to build!

Why are they doing this?
Their one goal – to sell something or to conduct some illegal activity benefiting them with some monetary gain, all at your expense.  You have inadvertently become a target of their bad intentions now that they have your your email address list.  Some, just collect email address lists and sell them to marketing companies.  Pretty upsetting don’t you agree?

Reunion.com – Reunion.com dupes new members into signing up by sending them an email that pretends to be from an acquaintance who’s been looking for them (on Reunion.com, naturally). After signing up, the site extracts your contacts and immediately begins spamming them to join by sending out a similar email.

More and more companies have been considering engaging in marketing campaigns that involve “address book scraping, (address book harvesting)”  in which a user is asked to import his contacts (i.e., the e-mail addresses he has stored in his e-mail account address book) into his social networking Web site or other online service so that a message can be sent to those contacts inviting them to join the social network or to participate in a joint offering of the company and its partner.  In some cases, the user is asked to provide the username and password for his e-mail account so that the import can be done transparently.  Read Full Article

Legitimate sites use deceptive email marketing tactics as well.
Upon my research, I came across an article about a site known worldwide called “Classmates.com” which promises to hook you up with former classmates who just might be looking for you, if you upgrade to their gold membership.

Classmates.com Agrees to $9.5 Million False Advertising Settlement
Classmates.com — the website that promises to reunite people with their mullet-haired friends of youth — has agreed to pay out a $9.5 million settlement for a lawsuit dating back to 2008 accusing the company of “false advertising” through “deceptive” marketing e-mails.

OK – You  have convinced me – What should I do?
First, for those of you who want all the technical ways to protect your email lists online, please see:  Effect Methods of Protection.

As for me, I am a simple kind of gal living by the rules of  “make it simple – PLEASE!”.  After my research in this topic, one thing is for sure.  I will never import my address list anywhere, on any website, EVER AGAIN!

If you know a better way, please share.

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.