Skyrocket Your
Online Sales

Search Engine Ranking Secrets

Submit Your Site to Over 400 Free-For-All Sites

Quickly Submit to 1,000's of
Classified Sites

The Best Software For Producing and Promoting Your Site

Promote Your Business With an Online Newsletter

Promote Your Products With An Associate Program

Tips To Boost
Your Production

About The Author

Home

This article is reprinted here with permission from Link-O-Matic.© 1998 Link-O-Matic. Why And How To Start Publishing An Email Newsletter No matter what it is that you're marketing online, developing a mailing list is critical. Forget about sending unsolicited email or spam, building your own "opt-in" list is the best way to boost web site traffic, generate leads, and make more sales online. Keep reading and we'll show you why and how. Perhaps you've thought of starting a web-based newsletter? While we do suggest that you maintain an archive on your web site, we don't suggest running a web-only newsletter because you'll have to depend on your subscribers to visit your site and read it. And that sort of defeats the purpose. Plus, an email newsletter is easier to read than a web newsletter. If sent by email, subscribers can read your newsletter at their leisure. And once they have received it, they don't have to worry about being connected to the Internet anymore. On top of that, just about everyone has an email address. We can't teach you everything about publishing an email newsletter in just one sitting, but you'll be able to launch one today using the proven strategies we're about to share with you. And no matter what you're marketing online, it will ultimately make you more money. We guarantee it. As the online community strikes out against spammers, an opt-in email newsletter is the most effective way to keep in touch with your prospects and customers. First we'll explain why, then we'll show you how to set one up, next we'll detail the art of getting subscribers, and finally we'll talk about content. The Important Differences Between "Opt-In" And Spam Email marketing can be extremely lucrative, but most people who try it really have no idea what they're doing. And rather than making lots of money they find that after their first big mailing, their web site has been shut down and their dialup account has been cancelled for "spamming." Sound familiar? The bottom line is that for most, it's simply not worth the hassle of sending unsolicited commercial email. On the other hand anyone can start an "opt-in" newsletter and ethically, responsibly, and legally send out all the email they want, through any ISP in the world, without getting into any trouble at all. You see, an "opt-in" email newsletter is one which people ask to receive because they are interested in the content that it provides. And because people have requested it, there are no complaints to your ISP and you don't need expensive "bulk-friendly" service providers to conduct your business. You won't have to stealth, cloak, forge, or relay your messages through an unauthorized server. You won't be violating any laws, breaking the rules of Netiquette, or offending the anti-spammers. You won't be hacked, blocked, mail bombed, or the least bit offensive to anyone on the Internet. Yes, even spam-hating hackers approve of the opt-in strategy of email marketing. And best of all, you'll be able to spend your time on your message, your market, and creating the highest quality products possible. And as if that wasn't enough, there's another important reason to embrace this strategy. People buy things they want from people they know and trust. And there's no better way to get people to trust you than to show them that you are an expert at what you do. Publishing an email newsletter will allow you to keep in touch with your prospects and customers and do just that. With it you can keep them informed of web site updates and new products. You will never have to worry about them forgetting you because your name will always be in front of them. And as your subscriber base grows, you can even sell advertising. But most importantly, you will build trust. Think about it. If you wanted to become a real estate investor, would you purchase a home-study course from a door-to-door salesman or someone who had been sending you a free newsletter for the past year? Don't forget that people buy things from those they know and trust, and no one trusts a spammer. How To Set Up, Maintain, And Send Out Your Newsletter There are a few different ways to administer and send out your newsletter, and the one that's right for you depends mostly on your technical expertise and/or your budget. As your subscriber base grows, efficiency will become important. But if you can send an email you can get started right now. Sending out an email newsletter is really not much different than sending a single email to a friend. The only difference is that you'll be sending your message to hundreds or thousands of people, and you will need a way to maintain and mail to the database of email addresses that you build up. To get started, all you really need is a good email program. We just love Qualcomm's Eudora Pro, it's one of the best email programs on the market at any price. If you're using your web browser for email now, go to http://eudora.qualcomm.com/pro_email/demos and download the free demo. Basically, you need an email program that will allow you to easily send a message to multiple recipients. Eudora's address book feature allows you to enter an unlimited number of recipient email addresses per entry, but you can actually use the BCC feature of just about any email program on the market. BCC stands for blind carbon copy, and that means the addresses you enter won't be shown in the headers of the email you send. No one wants their email address broadcasted over the Internet, so be sure to send the message to yourself with the subscriber addresses in the BCC field if using this method. Occasionally people will ask to be removed from your mailing list and you must honor their requests in a timely manner. The better email programs allow you to filter your incoming mail which will enable you to keep things organized and running smoothly until your list becomes rather large. A more sophisticated method of managing your newsletter is to use CGI scripts and a web-based interface. Fortunately, there are many good CGI scripts that you can use and lots of them are free. If you can run CGI scripts on your server, find one you like at http://www.cgi-resources.com. Currently there are over 20 mailing list scripts available at the above site, so take a look and see which one looks like it will work best for you and your newsletter. Using this type of a system allows people to subscribe or unsubscribe directly from your web site, and this makes your job a whole lot easier. Going one step further, if everything goes as planned you'll eventually need to use professional mailing list software like Majordomo at http://www.greatcircle.com/majordomo. If you publish a quality newsletter, it won't be long before there are many thousands of people who look forward to receiving it. Lately, a few free mailing list services such as http://www.listbot.com have popped up as well. These allow you to setup your mailing list via a web-based interface without actually having to know anything about CGI scripts. On the down side, they are limited and most attach an ad to your mailing. Our suggestion? Start small and learn as you go along, but start using a web-based CGI script as soon as you can. These days you can get web space with CGI access for under $20 a month, and any of the CGI scripts we've referred to will suffice until you have many thousands of people on your list. There are a few important points to remember in order to use an opt-in mailing list effectively, and by far the most critical part of the process is your confirmation letter. If at all possible it should be put on an autoresonder so that your users receive it immediately upon subscribing to your newsletter. Your confirmation letter should remind the user that the newsletter they are receiving was requested by them and is not unsolicited. Be sure to give explicit instructions for unsubscribing from your list, and make it easy to do so. This important step will increase your newsletter's perceived value enormously. The confirmation letter should also repeat the benefits of subscribing to your wonderful newsletter. Reiterate what you are going to be sending them, and the benefits of their participation. Also, be sure to state the frequency of your newsletter so people know how often to expect it. It also wouldn't be a bad idea to call your ISP and let them know what you're doing. We haven't found one that won't allow you to run an opt-in mailing list, but they may want you to keep all subscription requests on file in case of a complaint, etc. As they say, it's better to be safe than sorry. Anyone Can Build A Subscriber Base In The Thousands Now that you're ready to launch your newsletter you need to begin building your subscriber base. It may be tempting to add addresses to your database any way you can, but do not ever send your newsletter to someone who hasn't requested it. That's spamming, a definite no-no. Rather, just let everyone you come into contact with know that you are now publishing an email newsletter and offer to give them a free subscription. Ultimately you are looking for people who are interested in and able to purchase what you're selling, but at this point you just want a few subscribers. Add a brief description of your newsletter and subscription instructions to your web site. Be sure to mention it in the signature at the end of your daily emails. Advertise your newsletter in other related newsletters. In short, promote your newsletter in the same ways you now advertise your web site. Be sure to announce the launch of your new newsletter in the appropriate newsgroups as well, starting with news://alt.zines. If it's an ASCII newsletter you can also post it to news://alt.ezines and news://alt.etext. There are also a handful of web sites which allow you to advertise your newsletter: http://listserv.nodak.edu/archives/new-list.html http://www.meer.net/~johnl/e-zine-list/submit.html http://www.dominis.com/zines/add-howto.shtml http://www.diysearch.com/addurl.cfm http://www.inkpot.com/submit http://gort.ucsd.edu/newjour/submit.html http://www.sleazefest.com/sleaze/forms/newzine.html http://www.edoc.com/jrl-bin/wilma http://www.zinerack.com/search/enterurl.html http://www.oblivion.net/zineworld/add.html http://www.arl.org/scomm/edir/template.html http://www.coalliance.org/forms/ej.suggest.shtml http://www.asphyxia.com/ezm/AddURL.htm http://propagandist.com/tkemzl/howto.htm http://www.apex.net/users/jyoung/e3/addzine.htm Just like anything else, it will take some time and a bit of work to build up your subscriber base. But before long you'll be the publisher of a thriving newsletter and all of your hard work will be rewarded tenfold. The database of prospects you're building will be an invaluable asset for years to come. Your goal is to entice every single one of your web site visitors to subscribe to your newsletter. Aside from the great free information they will receive, stress that you won't give their email address to anyone else and that it's easy to unsubscribe at any time. If you can, offer other benefits as well. People love just about anything that's free. Perhaps you can hold a weekly drawing, giving your product or service away for free to a randomly selected winner from your mailing list. Or maybe you can offer a 10% discount on future purchases to anyone who subscribes to your newsletter? Another great way to build up your database is to offer a free service, with the condition that users will be added to your mailing list. It's a fair trade if you offer something valuable. Offer free classifieds at your site? Inform users that by submitting an ad they will be subscribed to your newsletter. To give you a real-world example, take a look at http://www.linkomatic.com. This is another of our web sites and it's only purpose is to sell a web-based, automated links page submission service. At the bottom of the main page every visitor sees that he or she can win a free membership on Fridays. Here's how it works, and boy does it work very well. In order to be eligible to win, a person must place our little banner on their site. We make this easy for them by sending the necessary HTML code via email. All they have to do is enter their email address to receive the code and instructions. You guessed it, they are now added to our contest mailing list. Once a week we randomly select a winner and send an email to the entire list announcing the lucky soul and anything else we want to say. Everyone wants to know if they've won so they look forward to it -- we've yet to receive a complaint. You would not believe the number of additional sales we have cultivated from this contest mailing list. We don't give people a chance to forget about us, and even if they aren't ready to join Link-O-Matic today they will remember us when they do need the valuable benefits that it provides. Ensuring That Your Subscribers Remain Your Subscribers Most people already get a lot of email and are quite busy, so don't get the idea that you can just whip together your newsletter five minutes before you need to send it out. Unless people have a reason to read it, they won't. They will unsubscribe and you'll probably never see them again. That's bad. So what should you write about in your newsletter? Easy. You write about what your readers are interested in. If you ever get stumped, just go through all of the emails you receive from prospects and customers for ideas. Or, scan a few related mailing lists for article ideas that you can expand on, etc. You will need to incorporate your newsletter into your routine. If you don't have a lot of extra time at the moment, keep it short and sweet. It's no accident that each issue of CheckMate! contains one concise article, and the entire process takes just a few hours each week. The key is quality, not quantity. We find it useful to plan several issues in advance and work on writing the CheckMate! articles a little at a time. We've also found that a weekly newsletter works very well for both us and our readers. In our opinion once a month isn't often enough, and a daily newsletter is just too much for anyone. Because your newsletter will be unique, there's no way we can tell you what to write about. Just remember that it needs to be good, quality information that is of interest to your readers. And It wouldn't be a bad idea to ask your subscribers for their opinions once in a while. Quality control is critical. People won't take you seriously unless you take yourself seriously first. If you want to compete with the big guys, get a good virtual host, set up your own domain, and be sure to go through each issue with a fine-toothed comb before publishing. Keep it neat and free of grammatical errors. If subscribers like what they see, you can bet that they'll tell their friends about it. And everyone knows there's no better advertisement than word of mouth, right? And try to be personal. While it may be a pain in the butt, be sure to answer every email you receive. You never know what it might lead to. At some point you'll want to decide if you are going to sell advertising in your newsletter. After all, your subscribers are a pretty targeted group of individuals and anyone who is marketing a related product or service would just love to present their offer to your established mailing list. It's entirely up to you. Most people won't mind ads as long as they are somehow related to the content of your newsletter. Just don't go overboard, and don't be foolish enough to think that you can trick people into subscribing to your newsletter just so you can send them ads. If you want to start an ad list that's fine, but be upfront. Final Thoughts One last thing to keep in mind. While this should be common sense, take good care of your subscriber list. Don't give or sell your list to anyone unless all of your subscribers have agreed to it. Also be sure to remove subscribers from any unsolicited lists you have if you insist on sending unsolicited email too. If you haven't learned it yet, believe it when we say that making money online is a long-term venture. The most important thing you have is your reputation, and you don't want to do anything to tarnish it. All of this might sound like a lot of work, but if you aren't willing to work you can't expect success. While you will definitely continue to learn as you go along, what we've just shared with you is more than enough to get your email newsletter started on the right foot. We're absolutely positive when we say that whatever it is you're marketing online, an opt-in mailing list is worth it's weight in gold. Do yourself a huge favor and get started right now. In the not too distant future you'll find that you have a valuable asset that you can take advantage of almost as often as you want, while others are frantically searching for the latest solution to a problem that's getting more and more difficult each day. Copyright © 2001 ThunderLink All Rights Reserved.