Before we get into the discussion of how we are going to collect addresses to build our list, let's take a good at what we are going to use them for. Although many businesses today ask for email address along with telephone number, that doesn't mean you are going to give you one that they check. I have yahoo, hotmail, and gmail email accounts to give to such people. I get around to checking them a couple times of month.
If you want someone to give you an email address that they pay attention to, they you need to offer them something of value. As you already know by now, the best way to do that is to teach. The more you teach, the more contacts you have with your customer, the more trust your customer will have in you, and the greater your chance of selling them additional products or services.
To put together the framework to do this, we are going to be delving into:
- Accounting Statements
- Writing Newsletters
- Writing Reports or 'White Papers'
- Writing an eCourse
- Building a Web Site
- Social Media
- The Tools Needed to Automate These.
You will see how each of these items builds upon the others to create a comprehensive marketing plan.
Accounting Statements
As we discussed, because of the proliferation of spam around the world today, people are reluctant to give out a valid email address. One of the best ways to get your message out to them and to capture their email addresses is when using financial statements or receipts.
If your accounting system is set up to send receipts via email, that is probably the best possible way to get a valid email address from your customers. They will want to receive your receipt, so will make sure to whitelist your domain name in their email system.
If you are using paper statements and receipts, then you need to be including your email address and web site address on the statements/receipts. But you should not stop there. You still want to capture their email address, So, you should also include a special offer for them to check out at your website. When they get to your website, they will see a special offer if they sign up for your monthly newsletter. The special offer can be whatever fits your business. It could be a special report, a free evaluation, a discount coupon, etc.
Now, you may be asking, 'Why not just ask for their email address and manually add it to your list?' Because people are fickle and tend to have short memories. With the automated systems that you'll be using, you'll have a record of them requesting your newsletter, report, or eCourse. This way, in case you are accused of spam, you have proof that they requested your information be sent to them.
The other reason I wanted to mention this way of advertising is to get you thinking how every single part of your business processes can be also used as part of a comprehensive marketing program. Also notice that each step involves giving your customer or prospective customer something of value in exchange for being able to add them to your list.