A Good Autoresponder

How many free autoresponders have you tried? Really how many? And how many emails did you get through using them? How do you know? How many people opened your followup message?

My point here is that if you have no clue for the answers above you probably are not operating a followup campaign successfully. These are crucial element that must be explored when you are choosing an autoresponder.

Some good steps to take to ensure you are getting what you need out of a autoresponder include... Compare your autoresponder with those of top marketers, chances are they are using the best in the business. You can't go wrong with this step!

Other observations you might make are related to spam filters. Have you ever gotten an e-mail and seen something like this..."F`R`E`E"  Yes this is a good way to beat the spam filters as they won't read Free they will read something totally different. However it can be time consuming going through your article and finding which words are "Danger" words. This can go along way in your marketing efforts. So make sure you find an autoresponder that has a spam rating feature... these features will automatically show you where in your article your "Danger" words are.

Another crucial element of e-mail marketing are your statistics. How many e-mails are being opened can tell you if your subject line is any good or if you did a good job branding your name. If you know your e-mail statistics you are one step in the right direction in optimizing your potential sales. Finding an autoresponder that shows in depth analysis with your followups are also key.

What should a followup contain? Good question... My personally experience suggests directing your subscribers to a full article located on the web. There are some good reasons for this. You can create an excitement teaser in the followup e-mail and beg your article to be read on the web. There is also the chance that since you have an article archive on the web many subscribers will often read more than just your original article. Your subscriber might not be interested in one article but they may find what they are looking for browsing through your previous articles.

Broadcasting! So your subscribers are finished receiving their original followup series... now what? Find an auto responder that allows you to broadcast an update or an offer to the entire subscriber list. Don't let your subscribers go to waste, this feature is a must!

Remember not to bore your hard earned subscribers. Present them with a problem and offer them a solution! Its that easy...

Find my recommended autoresponder on my marketing blog!

Balancing Your Promotions

Promotion of your online business may take a variety of directions. Some will bring more success than others. Every one is important to consider when you are trying to open the door to visitors to your site.

This article discusses several of the more useful ways to promote and the necessity of keeping some balance in your promotional efforts.

-- SEARCH ENGINES

Everyone needs to make an effort to get their site indexed to the major search engines. If you have no idea how to do this, here is one of the most important links you will every locate and it comes at no cost.

http://www.Selfpromotion.com/

If you want more people to visit your website, you must know how to create search-engine-friendly web pages, and then submit your URL to all the major search engines. That's what this site is all about.

-- LINKING

Think of links on other websites as road signs that point to your site. That's what links do. They will be useful if they are on high traffic sites that are relevant to your site's content.

Now there are many ways to create and maintain links. Too many for this article to discuss. Here are a couple of pointers about linking.

Avoid "link farms" that create a load of useless, irrelevant links to your site. They may do more harm than good with the search engines.

I recommend that you create a links page and manually add and delete links. Avoid purchasing and installing scripts or other such methods.

If you don't have the skills to do that then, there are some good paid services that will manage your links. A simple search on one of the major search engines will turn up a bunch.

Here are a couple that I can recommend:

http://www.Reciprocalmanager.com/
http://www.linksmanager.com/ and
http://www.websitetoolbox.com/

-- JOINT VENTURES

This is simple. I have something to promote. You have a website or newsletter. I will pay you a portion of my profits to promote it.

It can work well if you can endorse the item with a personal statement and recommendation.

Be careful of jumping on all offers. Make sure they are legitimate.

-- ARTICLES

One of the least expensive and most effective ways to get some exposure for your business or newsletter is to write and distribute articles.

Publishers are looking for good, fresh content for their newsletters and ezines. You provide it with a well-researched article.

The trade off is that they are required to include a short resource box at the end of the article that links back to your site.

It's a Win-Win situation.

One of the ways to let your article gain exposure is to list it in several of the online article directories like:

http://www.ArticleToGo.com/
http://www.BizSiteBiz.com/marketingarticles
http://www.marketing-seek.com and
http://www.articlecentral.com

There are many others. Just search "article directories".

-- AD SWAPS

Great way to get some no-cost exposure. If you have an ezine or newsletter, just locate some similar publications and offer to swap ads with them.

-- EZINE ADVERTISING

Probably the easiest ways to get some exposure quickly is to locate and advertise in some selected publications.

Be sure that the newsletter is likely to reach your target audience. It won't do much good to promote your "Yellow widgets" to an ezine which is made up of readers who are mothers of newborns interested in learning about how to mix baby formula.

You can also spend some serious money quickly with this type of promotion. Be sure and track your ads to make sure you are making money above your advertising expenses.

Depending on the nature of your online business, some of these promotional types may have more or less relevance for you.

Whichever means you use, try and keep a balance in your efforts that will allow you to most effectively reach your target audience.

A Simple Way To Create 7 Effective Autoresponder Messages

Email is the Net's most powerful marketing tool. And autoresponders are the best idea yet for marketing with email.

There is an old saying that the first ad rarely sells. You have to put your product, service, or idea in front of a prospect several times before she buys.

Autoresponders are designed specifically to get your message back to the same prospect over and over. That's why most autoresponder packages come in groups of 7 messages--from the 7 message marketing rule that has been the rule in advertising since our grandparents were in diapers.

But what do you say in your 7 messages? We've written autoresponder series for hundreds of customers. Here is one method that always works.

This method is called REMIND 'EM. People don't read your sales letter as carefully as you think. They tend to skim. They read the first message, but miss the second and third message. The prospect may not tune in again until message five. It's so easy for people to completely miss your main points intended to lead to a sale.

It's important to *repeat* your main message over and over. Say it once, twice, three times in your first message. Say your main message in a different way in the second message. Re-cap your main point again in the third message. That way, people who aren't paying attention still get your important ideas.

Here's an example of how the "remind 'em" formula works for a 7 letter series promoting personal security products.

Message (1) The world is a dangerous place. You need new innovative security products to insure your protection.

Message (2) More details on how and why the world is a dangerous place. List places or situations that are especially threatening.

Message (3) Recap how the world is a dangerous place. Give more details on the key new security products that have come out.

Now start the middle section of messages. Note how they become more instructional telling people how to use the products.

Message (4) Protect yourself from the dangerous world with Product A. Here's how to use Product A. Here's why you would use it. Here's where to use it.

Message (5) Protect yourself with Product B. Here's how to use it. Here's what happy customers say about it. Tell a hair raising story of how Product B saved a customer's life.

Now comes the wrap-up and reminder, especially important for people who never got around to reading your earlier messages.

Message (6) Go back to your main sales letter used in numbers 1 and 2. Start all over reviewing your main points and highlighting your most popular products.

Message (7) This is the final follow-up email. I usually have it come two weeks to one month after message 6. It's designed to scoop up all the people who weren't ready to buy in the beginning, but may be ready to buy now.

It can start with "For the past few weeks I've been sending you important information about how to protect yourself in threatening situations. I know you are busy and may not have had time to consider how these products could improve your life and confidence." At that point, you again review your main points.

Repetition is the key to advertising success. Find creative ways to keep the main message going week after week and you will have as many customers as you can handle. Busy prospects simply need time for your message to sink in. As we used to say when I worked in media, it's just when you and your staff are sick to death of a commercial that the audience is just beginning to notice it.