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Click on a tip for the details:
Use email to drive prospects to your Web
site
Creating an email marketing campaign is, hands down, the best
way to build credibility and keep your visibility high. And
although finding and creating the content for a regular email
message is a bit of work (that no one is paying you to do),
it doesn't have to be a daunting task. Try these 3 ideas:
- Offer simple tips on a topic of interest to your network.
They are easy to write, easy to read, and will also position
you as a specialist in that area.
- Give real-life examples. Describe a problem you've solved
for a client/customer, and use that as a springboard to
offer more general advice. Showing your readers how you've
helped customers address challenges will more effectively
position you as the expert than saying, "I'm an expert."
- Pass along something what you find, any gems of advice
you've learned through an email newsletter or at an industry
conference, workshop, seminar, or insightful article. (Just
be sure to give full attribution.)
As much as they say about search engines, the best way to
drive traffic — qualified leads for your business —
to your site is via email, one message at a time.
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Five Easy List-Building Tips
Growing your email list is simple: always be in list-growing
mode. Here's how:
- Mention your email campaign everywhere you can, including
in your signature file and in any publicity you get.
- When talking to anyone about your work, whether in person,
on the phone or via email, offer to keep in touch by adding
them to your email list.
- Make it easy to sign up on your Web site and encourage
visitors to subscribe in as many places as makes sense,
but especially on your homepage.
- Send out a one-time e-mail message to everyone you know,
inviting them to be on your list. You don't need permission
to do that, providing they know you.
- At the bottom of every message in your campaign, include
an easy way for people to forward the message to others
who would benefit (and may want to sign up). Be sure to
also include an easy way to get off the list, if they want
to.
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Start Conversations
If you want to get deep about it, I believe that isolation
is the core obstacle to self promotion. We stop making contact,
avoid people we don't feel like talking to, and then wonder
why the phone isn't ringing.
To turn that trend on its ear, go out of your way to get into
conversations with anyone and everyone you can — in person,
on the phone or via email. Cross the street, cross the room,
cross the train, to talk to someone.
All it takes to start a conversation is a question, any question.
Find out what they're working on and tell them what you're
working on.
If you are more comfortable on email than in person, initiate
dialogues by thanking people when you don't have to, or by
acknowledging receipt of a message that doesn't necessarily
ask for a response.
Most important, follow up absolutely every single lead that
comes your way, every person whose card you get, everyone
who expresses even the slightest interest in your work or
says they know someone who… Don't worry about response.
Just keep planting seeds and initiating conversations.
Because anything, absolutely anything, can come out of a simple
conversation: ideas, alliances, connections, referrals, new
clients, new opportunities.
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Follow up as soon as you hang up!
After an initial conversation with a prospect, whether you
called them or they called you, don't wait to start your follow
up. Right away, build on the momentum of your freshness in
their mind by sending an email message in which you:
- Thank them for their interest, for taking the time to
speak with you, for visiting your web site or anything else
they went out of their way to do.
- Express what you understand to be the challenge they face.
Use as many of the words they used as you can.
- Refer to an experience or project in your background
that supports your claim that you are the right resource
to help them.
- Provide a link to your web site and, in particular, a
case study or article that is most relevant, based on what
you know so far about their challenge.
If too much time passes before you follow up, sometimes even
a day or two, the conversation may slip into the recesses
of their mind, or blur with that of others like you, and therefore
won't make as strong of an impact.
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Use your voice to get your email messages read
My email inbox is out of control. Some days I can barely skim
the list before another deluge arrives. It makes me wonder
if my email messages are getting lost in someone else's flood.
Whether you're sending out a marketing message or simply corresponding
with a client, your email has to rise to the top of the inbox
in order to get read. But how?
It's your voice.
Most of the email (and web copy) I read is full of jargon
and devoid of warmth. It doesn't pull me in or engage me,
so I don't read very far. In fact, text that is meant to describe
a person's services often leaves the person out completely.
The messages I take time to read have a different tone to
them. That difference is the clarity of the person's voice.
What moves me, what makes me stop and listen, no matter what
the subject, is a genuine voice talking.
Here are a couple ideas for bringing your voice through your
email:
- Use your own voice to speak to your prospect. Speak casually
and don't try to impress anyone. Use simple words, rather
than fancy ones. Use the words you would use if you had
nothing at stake in the conversation.
- Speak directly to your recipient. Imagine you're sitting
next to this person and they've just asked you a question.
Tell them, don't sell them. Frame everything from their
perspective. (Hint: Use the word you.)
- Say something unexpected or in an unexpected way. Instead
of using clichˇs or saying the same thing you always say,
take a moment to be creative with your words.
- Talk about something you care about. When a graphic designer
recently sent a message to her email list about how the
movie, Frida, has inspired her, she got lots of enthusiastic
response, and an opportunity to expand her ideas for a trade
association newsletter that will go to her target market.
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Make sure the search engines can find your Website
Do you know whether the search engines, whose crawlers and
spiders scour the web for text to index, can find your site?
Recently, I was consulting on the creation of a web site for
a visual artist. The Web designer wanted the text to be rendered
in a beautiful font but the only way to control that was by
setting the text in a graphic, essentially turning it into
a picture. That means all the text throughout the site would
be perceived by the computer as an image, even if users see
actual text.
What my client didn't know was that text rendered as a graphic
is both unsearchable (by users who may want to search a page
for a particular word or topic) and unindexable (by search
engines that control where you come up in the rankings). And
although the designer knew these things, his goal was to create
a good-looking site. He was ready to sacrifice function (usability
and findability) for form.
After much debate, we decided to err on the side of function
and chose one of the Web-friendly fonts (Times New Roman,
Arial, Verdana and Helvetica are a few).
So here's the tip: For optimum usability, make sure the majority
of your text is rendered as html text, not as graphics. Graphics
are fine for headlines, but don't use them for entire blocks
of text.
If you're not sure what all this means, the question to ask
your designer is this: is there enough html text on my site
(especially the homepage) to make it searchable and indexable?
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For more about this and other usability issues,
read Designing
Web Sites for Every Audience. More info here:
Sign up for her Quick Online Marketing Tips here: www.artofselfpromotion.com/tips.html
©2003, Ilise Benun
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