Want a couple thousand names to sell to?
Well don’t rent them, not when you can easily create your own list of hungry buyers.
As I wrote previously, you can have the best product or service in the world, but if you don’t have a house list, one that’s eager to receive your emails-you’ve got no one to sell to.
Conversely, if you don’t have a product or service to sell, you can still sell other people’s products and services-if you’ve got a house list.
Now you can always rent a list, of course. But then you’ve got to introduce yourself, prove yourself, sell yourself. In short, you have to work a lot harder to sell these people-because they don’t know you, don’t trust you and don’t care about you.
But if they know you, have experience with you, through multiple contacts and sales-you can get right down to the business of selling your, or someone else’s, product.
Admittedly, there are times when you might need to rent a list. For example, when you want to mount a quick strike campaign to a new niche market (but never rent a compiled list-only rent a subscription list, one with attractive Recency, Frequency and Amount stats.)
So how do you build your own house list-a list of customers and prospects willing to consider your offer?
Lots of ways. And to get you started, here’s my short list of list-building ideas:
- Write, publish and promote a subscription-based, free or not, ezine (an online newsletter).
- Write, publish and promote a subscription-based, free or not, newsletter (an offline ezine).
- Write a blog and offer to notify readers of new posts if they provide their email address.
- Collect names and addresses at the point of sale-to notify buyers of upgrades, special announcements, etc.
- Conduct a seminar and collect names and addresses for a free, or not, CD/DVD recording of the seminar, bonus report, etc.
- Conduct a Webinar or Teleseminar (see above).
- Write a special report or white-paper, deliver it through a squeeze page (after name and email address are provided).
- Write articles, and place your email address and sign-up link in the resource box at the bottom, in order to receive comments and subscribers to your advertised ezine.
- Participate in trade shows and offer a chance to win a free-gift to those attendees who drop their business card in the fish bowl.
- Joint Venture (JV), with a complementary business-provide or contribute your “something” to a joint marketing endeavor-in order to access their list of names (you’ll therefore be introduced to the target market by someone they already know and trust.)
- Co-Registration (Co-Reg), hitch a ride with an offer on someone else’s marketing platform (e.g., on an order or thank you page)-it’s an implied endorsement by that marketer to his sphere of influence.
Remember though, these names and addresses that you collect are the key to your business’s continuing success-so treat them with all due respect and reverence.
Always promise, and keep your promise, not to abuse their privacy. Fully disclose, clearly, that you will be contacting them for various reasons, promotional and informational, in the near future.
And then ask them to confirm (and whenever possible, to double opt-in) their desire to receive communication from you.
You’ll then be on your way to marketing heaven.
–Barry
www.WritingWithPersonality.com
Popularity: 100% [?]
