"Why You NEED to Establish Your OWN List of Contacts"
You can buy advertising in multiple ezines, or on multiple sites, and reach a
lot of people, right?
Sure, but unless you buy repeated advertising, how many times do you reach
them?
Once.
Even with repeat advertising, it's still not going to be a long term situation.
The simplest fact of Internet marketing is this:
If you have your own business, You NEED to establish your OWN list of repeat
contacts.
Make no mistake, there is real power here. Having your own list of regular
contacts is THE KEY to Internet Success whether anyone wants to admit it or
not.
You know all those claims you've seen about people making spectacular amounts
of money in short periods of time? What they fail to mention when they tell
you about such claims is that the person already had one of two things set up
for themselves. One, a bunch of proven, effective advertising contacts, and
the
money or position to buy or trade for a huge amount of advertising all at once.
Or two, a large, previously established list of contacts.
Contact lists can be gained either through administering a program that is
based on the collection of email addresses, (opt-in or safelist programs, FFA
posting sites) or through the POWER of Ezines.
While the administrator of the opt-in list or FFA site, and the Publisher of
the Ezine gets EVERYONE'S contact information, no one else that posts, joins,
or subscribes gets this privilege.
The greater advantage, though, goes to the Ezine Publisher. Opt-in lists and
FFA sites are joined by people interested solely in posting their opportunity
or ad. Ezines are read. That is their purpose, to be read. Therefore, the ezine
publisher will have a better response rate from his contacts than the opt-in
list or FFA site administrator.
Ezine subscriber lists are EARNED lists that will continue to be EARNED by
producing useful content, and therefore will have better responses.
So, how do you use that POWER to your advantage?
Retain Contact With Visitors
The simplest advantage is that offering a free ezine subscription makes your
advertising more cost effective. By simply getting your site visitors to leave
you their name and email, you retain their contact instead of losing them after
they leave your site.
Repeat Advertising
By keeping subscribers on your list, you can re-expose them to your opportunity
indefinitely. You don't want to overdo it to the point of annoyance, but you
can at least mention your business, and occasionally promote through business
updates or classified ads.
Attract Offers From Others
As you build your subscriber base, and particularly if you list your ezine
in the ezine directories, you will begin to receive offers from others wanting
to promote to your list.
Often, you will be offered commissions on sales, or free products or services
in exchange for promoting the business or product of the person making the offer.
This can be a good thing. However, in order to maintain a good reputation for
yourself, you must be critical in what you decide to promote. If you promote
everything that comes along, your subscribers will recognize this habit and
tend to not care or even distrust your recommendations. If you study the offers
and only promote the ones that can be beneficial to your readers, you will receive
better responses. It's a matter of building a good reputation.
If you recommend good, you'll get good.
Offer Advertising as an Exchange
You can then make offers to others as well using your list as a bargaining
tool. Place a value on your advertising, and then use that value in trade with
others for things you want or need. Be fair, give good deals, and you can build
powerful relationships with others that can become beneficial to you both now
and in the future.
Create Good Business Relationships
Use your list to build good business relationships, particularly in the beginning.
To start with, while your list is small, you won't really sell ads anyway, so
give them out freely. Most everyone will accept a free ad even if they know
the list is small, and they will remember that you did it for them. This will
put others in a good frame of mind toward you for the future, when you may need
a favor or help with something.
NOT RECOMMENDED
It is possible to 'rent' your subscribers out to other advertisers. I DO NOT
recommend this. This has to potential to make people mad and possibly hit you
with spam charges.
Your subscribers have signed up to receive YOUR ezine, not others ads. If others
want to promote to your list, make them buy an ad or make you an offer to promote
for them through your ezine. Don't just hand over your HARD EARNED list!
Developing your own list has clear advantages over merely promoting to lists
established by others. Not to mention that the sending of email to subscribers
is free whereas effective advertising on other's lists most often is not.
About the Author:
Joe Bingham, Editor of the NetPlay Newsletters Discover the EASY way to Enjoy
Ezine Publishing The NetPlay Publisher Program removes most of the work of Ezine
Publishing by providing Pre-Written All Original Ezine Issues for YOU to Publish,
AND Providing Extensive Resources for help in promoting and managing YOUR Ezine.
See it at: http://www.netplaynewsletters.com/publisher.html |