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The Email-Blog Connection.
Email is also one of the most effective methods of increasing traffic to your blog. Next time you want to send a message to your email list, consider blogging about that message, then emailing your list a link to the blog. Blog traffic goes up. Comments hopefully increase. The SEO gods like you more. Everyone's happy.
A Billion Ways (ok, only 25) to Collect Email Addresses for Your Business
You've worked night and day to create the best email campaign possible, yet you're likely still a long way off. Without a
permission-based list of people to receive them, your messages will go
unseen. Fortunately, there are a number of simple ways to build and
maintain your contact list so you can reach the people your business or
organization covets the most: Your loyal customers and members.There are a ton of ways to get people to sign up for your email marketing offers. For instance:* Put an offer on the back of your business cards to get people to sign up for your newsletter.* Tradeshows - Bring a clipboard or sign-up book with you to tradeshows and ask for permission to send email to those who sign up.* Include a newsletter sign-up link in your signature of all of your emails.* Send an opt-in email to your address book asking them to join your list.* Join your local chamber of commerce, email the member list (if it's opt-in) about your services with a link to sign up to your newsletter.* Host your own event - Art galleries, software companies, retail shops, consultants (lunch & learn) can all host an event and request attendees to sign up.* Offer a birthday club where you give something special to people who sign up.Incentivize your employees - Give them $ for collecting VALID email addresses.* Giving something for free like a PDF. Make visitors sign up to your opt-in form before you let them download it.* Referrals - Ask you customers to refer you, and in exchange you'll give them a discount.* Bouncebacks – Get them back! - Send a postcard or call them asking for their updated email address.* Trade newsletter space with a neighboring business, include a link for their opt-in form and ask them to include yours in their newsletter.* SEO - Make sure you optimize your site for your keywords. You need to be at the top of the natural search when people are looking for your products or services.* Giveaways - Send people something physical and ask for their email address as well as their postal address.* Do you have a postal list without emails? Send them a direct mail offer they can only get if they sign up to your email list.* Include opt-in forms on every page on your site.* Popup windows - When someone attempts to leave your site, pop up a window and ask for the email address. (use your judgment here, pop up are not always wise)* Include a forward-to-a-friend link in your emails just in case your recipient wants to forward your content to someone they think will find it interesting.* Include a forward-to-a-friend on every page of your site.* Offer a community - Use Ning as your easy-to-set-up community and have your visitors interact and sign up for your newsletter.* Offer "Email only" discounts and don't use those offers anywhere but email.* Telemarketing - If you've got people on the phone, don't hang up until you ask if you can add them to your newsletter.* Put a fishbowl on your counter and do a weekly prize giveaway of your product - then announce it to your newsletter. Add everyone who put their card in on to your newsletter list.* Include an opt-in form inside your emails for those people who get your email forwarded to them.* Use Facebook - Host your own group and invite people to it, then post new links often. From time to time, post a link to sign up for your newsletter. And... Post the hosted link from your newsletter into Linked Items to spread the word. And... Include an opt-in form on your Facebook Fan page.* Use Twitter - Twitter the hosted link of your email campaign every time you launch.AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST:Ask. when you encounter a client or customer in your place of business or elsewhere, don't be afraid to ask. If you have employees, incentivize them to gather as many addresses as they can.
And Here are a few more...
Ask in person
When
your customers or members come into your place of business or attend
one of your events, are you asking for their email address? Letting
them walk out the door without asking is equivalent to losing a
valuable asset. Why not ask?
You'll be surprised that customers will give you their address more often than not. You just have to ask for it.
There
are multiple ways to do so. One way is to give your team an incentive
to ask. I recommend making it a contest to see how many email address
one can collect over a given shift or time period. Everyone likes to
win, so make a game of collecting email addresses.
You should also advertise the availability
of your newsletter throughout your establishment or event venue. Put
placards on tables, a signup book by the register, and signs on the
walls. At your event, ask people when they check-in or register if they
would like to be added to your email list.
Ask online
Asking
online might be a little easier for some, since it removes the human
fear of rejection. And there are multiple touch points where you can
solicit your customers for their email address on the Web.
Add a Join My Mailing List (JMML) box:
Make the Join My Mailing List tab a key feature in your website's
template so that it appears prominently on just about every page.
Through search engine queries, you never know where people will land on
your site. Adding the JMML box to every page ensures that no matter how
a visitor finds you, he or she will have an opportunity to join your
list.
And for those who have a Constant Contact account and a Facebook account, there's an application available to put a Join My Mailing List tab on your Fan Page.
Link to your signup page:
Going beyond your website, email marketers should put links to their
newsletter signup page in their emails, both those sent through an
email service provider such as Constant Contact and the signature of
their personal email accounts. This way, every message a customer or
member gets from you will have a subtle reminder to join your email
list if they haven't done so already. Also, add a join my mailing list
link to your newsletter to help capture those folks that get your email
forwarded to them from a friend, associate or other trusted source.
Promote upcoming issues of your newsletters via social media:
Another way to get people to sign up for your mailing list is to
provide a teaser for an upcoming mailing on your Twitter, Facebook, and
LinkedIn accounts. A quick "Want to know more about Topic X? Sign up
for our newsletter" with a link to your signup page will lure people in.
Partner up
A
neighboring or complimentary businesses can be a great resource for
list building. You can advertise other people's list to your own and
recommend that people sign up for them, while your partners can make
the same offer to their subscriber base about signing up for your list.
It's a great way to cross-promote like-minded businesses and
organizations to a wider audience. Doing so also shows that you're a
part of a greater community and not just your own business or
organization's bottom line.
(Note
that outright swapping of lists with a partner and other complimentary
businesses is a no-no and will be flagged by companies like Constant Contact. It's
problematic because the recipient will question how you got their email
address, so having your partner send a message on your behalf is the
best approach.)