Product category:
Email marketing
News Release from: Shortburst | Subject: Email list building
Edited by the Marketingservicestalk Editorial
Team on 05 June 2007
Building firm foundations for email
lists
Nick Pauley, managing director of Shortburst, gives guidance on building a comprehensive email list to improve your email marketing efforts.
FIRM FOUNDATIONS FOR EMAIL LISTS Nick Pauley, managing director of Shortburst gives guidance on email list building Before you even think about designing you first e-newsletter you will be considering who is going to be on the email list
This article was originally published on Marketingservicestalk on 5 Mar 2007 at 8.00am (UK)
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You probably have an existing list, but how are you going build this to improve the results of your campaigns and grow your audience? I am not going to concentrate here on the legalities but do make sure you read and understand all the latest legislation first.
You won't want to ruin you reputation by doing something which is illegal or annoying.
Make sure that everyone you send your newsletter to is happy to receive it and that they have actively 'opted in'.
Further reading
Email Generator aids production of e-newsletters
Internet design company Shortburst has launched Email Generator and Email Broadcaster, tools to simplify the creation and distribution of e-newletters and bulletins.
Bad email marketing can be harmful to health
Ill-considered email marketing campaigns can do serious damage to an organisation, says e-marketing guru Nick Pauley of Shortburst.
Shortburst delivers Lottery Fund emails
Email communications specialist Shortburst is using its emailGenerator and emailBroadcaster to help the Big Lottery Fund to deliver email newsletters to more than 10,000 UK subscribers.
Any other approach - whether legal or not - is just bad manners and won't do you any good in the long term.
Building lists of potential recipients and collecting their email addresses is something which should be at the centre of what you do all day and every day - whatever organisation you represent.
There are lots of methods and not all these ideas will be relevant to you however many can be adapted to be appropriate to your circumstances.
The most obvious place to collect email addresses is on your website.
Invite people to sign up to receive your newsletter and give them a taste of what they will receive.
Maximise this opportunity by putting your sign-up invitation high up, on every single page.
In your invitation say that you'll send just one newsletter and they can unsubscribe if they don't like it.
Make the offer so reassuring that there can be no objection and refer them to your privacy policy.
If it is appropriate, have a 'sign off' window which pops up when a visitor leaves your website, inviting them to sign up to the newsletter.
Remember to include back issues of your newsletters in an archive section on your website so that other sites can link to them.
Make archive material easy to find and include a sign-up invitation there too.
Incentives - like a special offer or a competition - are the sorts of hooks which cause people to offer their email address.
Think of something that you can give away, free, in exchange for the information.
It's never wise to make an email sign-up a condition of obtaining information from your website, unless of course you run a subscription service.
At least allow a visitor to glean some knowledge from your site, to enter, to explore it thoroughly before you hit them with a sign-up box that enables navigation.
However such forced sign-ups do have their own problems.
Many people use free email for these using email accounts which they rarely view.
So consider including in such sign-up procedures the necessity for a further action on the part of the visitor, so they are compelled to give a valid and current email address.
Invite newsletter recipients to recommend a friend either by forwarding the newsletter or by providing their friend's email address.
You might give a special money-off voucher for those whose friends subsequently agree to receive the newsletter.
One of the most obvious ways to publicise your newsletter is to use the signature feature in your day-to-day emails and put a link there to your sign-up page.
Identify other newsletters which may complement yours and offer a reciprocal arrangement where each newsletter includes a link to a sign-up invitation to the other one.
Much is being written about web 2.0 - that's the new generation of internet communication which relies far more on users contributing their own knowledge to the world wide web.
Website visitors are getting used to playing an active internet role so invite participation to your website by asking for contributions or comment.
This is a great way to build your online community but also to build your mailing list.
Make submission of a valid email address a condition for submitting content.
Not all list building needs to take place online.
We sometimes forget those tried and tested marketing methods that existed before the internet and are still most persuasive.
There are meetings you may go to, seminars or perhaps exhibitions and it's quite acceptable to ask for a business card and say that in return you will send your e-newsletter.
At events try to collect every delegate's email address for this purpose.
You can use direct mail for publicity.
When combined with a competition or special offer this tactic can be very effective in both building your list but also driving traffic to your website.
Invite new recipients in every piece of promotional literature that you produce, on exhibition banners and even perhaps on your invoices or notepaper.
Of course you should always ask new and potential customers when you call them if they would like to be included in your mailing list as well as inviting sign-ups on your voicemail and any telephone holding messages.
Straight advertising too may provide a rich harvest of email addresses so try all the relevant media but also consider other more inventive ways, such as on vehicles or on billboards.
Above all, think constantly about building your lists and don't miss any opportunity, however small, to invite people to sign up to receive your newsletters.
It's this data which will form your audience and will shape the content, frequency and effectiveness of your future online campaigns.
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