In order to benefit from email marketing, you must first have prospects who receive your email messages. Generally speaking, it doesn't work to just email people out of the blue, using a list you have rented or bought. This is because people are very spam-aware, and tend to look with great suspician on unsolicited email messages from unknown sources.
The key is to have a system for acquiring email contacts with whom you can start building a relationship, so they will see your email communications as a source of value, and not as an inconvenience.
Eric Groves, of Constant Contact, in The Constant Contact Guide to Email Marketing, shares the four steps of what he calls the Constant Contact Cycle:
-Acquire
-Connect
-Inform
-Grow
The first step in this cycle, Acquire, is all about getting new prospects.
Groves recommends using other forms of online and in-person marketing (such as "online advertisements, search engine marketing, and traiditonal advertising") to reach prospects who may not currently know about your business. Once you have "earned a potential customer's attention," you can focus on "[making] a connection that's strong enough that they will be willing to give you their contact information."
Tomorrow, we will discuss Grove's suggestions for building that connection.
PerAspera Consulting, LLC is a Constant Contact Business Partner. Sign up for a free 60-day trial, or get a copy of The Constant Contact Guide to Email Marketing at amazon.com.
You can also follow The Critical Edge on Facebook or Twitter.
Subscribe to this comment's feed
