AutoResponder Service – why your business needs an e-mail marketing campaign?

March 03, 2010 By: Claire Morawski Category: Marketing

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What is an AutoResponder?

It is a service which automatically sends e-mails or newsletters to your subscribers. You would have an opt-in box (or web form) tied to your auto-responder, and when someone leaves their e-mail address, the auto-responder immediately starts sending this person e-mails from the list that you have in the back-office of your auto-responder. The e-mails would have been written by you or your team, and would have been uploaded to your auto-responder in a form of a list. In addition, you usually get to choose how far apart you want your e-mails to be sent to your subscribers. And, you can have multiple lists of e-mails targeting different clients.

Why would you need an AutoResponder?

The simple answer is, to build a relationship with your customers. We all know the benefit of having a list of subscribers – apart from the fact that it reflects positively on the value of your company, it also gives you power since it is the subscriber who asked for information in the first place. The key here is to respect that trust, and focus on building a relationship with your subscribers, so you will be viewed as a person or business with valuable information which your customer will benefit from, which would in turn reflect on the percentage of your e-mails opened. So no spamming, and no hard selling. Follow the 80-20 rule – 80% valuable information 20% soft selling.

Who can Benefit from having an AutoResponder?

It works both ways…
 For the entrepreneur who wants to build a relationship with his / her customers
 For the subscribers who want to be more informed about a particular business or a particular niche or a particular topic. The advantage for the customer is that they can unsubscribe at any time – giving them some form of autonomy.

What are the Benefits of having an AutoResponder?

 You can build a list of subscribers from an opt-in box (web form) – we all know that the gold is in the list
 You can link your opt-in box to your auto-responder, so that once someone signs in, she or he would start receiving the e-mails that you uploaded to that list.
 You can focus on building a strong relationship of trust with your subscribers – so that you will be seen as an expert in your niche and the person-to-go-to when they need help in a particular topic of your expertise.
 Because you will be sending an e-mail often, your subscribers are used to it. And then, when, once in a while you send about some product or affiliate link, they don’t find it offensive, and it won’t jeopardize your relationship of trust.
 An auto-responder sends e-mails automatically – sending e-mails manually is not an option as it will take you forever.
 People who opt-in are sent an e-mail immediately. We all know how nowadays everyone is surfing the net, but because of the nature of the internet, everyone seems to have a short attention span, and you would be forgotten immediately unless you capture their attention, and then focus on building a relationship. So an auto-responder will keep building a relationship with the subscribers for you. (The key would be to have an enticing offer which would make your readers subscribe.)
 When you upload a list of e-mails in your auto-responder, you usually give them the order you want them to be sent out, and usually you also get to choose how far apart you want the e-mails to be sent out. So, technically, this relationship-building with your customers is being done on auto-pilot while you are focusing on other stuff in your business, … and it is even working 24 hours for you (even while you sleep)!
 Sometimes you would need to send an e-mail (broadcast) to all your subscribers, irrelevant of how long they have been on your list. This can easily be done through your auto-responder.
 Usually the auto-responder’s e-mail address is white-listed, which means that your e-mails are actually being delivered to your subscribers.
 Through your auto-responder, you are also able to monitor your campaign statistics, such as how many e-mails sent were delivered, how many of them were actually opened and you can also track every single link click in the e-mail. With this information, you are wiser, and you are able to tweak your campaigns to get better response rates.

At what stage in your business (When) should you have an auto-responder?

My answer to this is ‘Today before Tomorrow’. As any business owner knows, it is essential to build lists of one’s customers and prospective customers to be able to keep in touch and soft-sell one’s services. In the long term, your customer list is one of the most valuable assets your business will have. So you need to start collecting your e-mail addresses of your target market from today.

Where should you place your opt-in form?

Your opt-in form should be enticing and in a prominent place. The purpose of this web form is to ‘make’ the reader input their e-mail address to start receiving information from you. So, essentially the opt-in form is a source of lead generation – it is where you start building your list. Once you have them onto your list, you start focusing on building a relationship with your subscribers. So your web form is very powerful.

You can have your web form anywhere where you have a web presence – can be on your website, your blog, your social media accounts, at the end of your articles, and so on. Anywhere where HTML is allowed.

Another idea is to give people an incentive to opt-in. For example, give them a free e-book, or a chance to be in a monthly raffle for a free treatment or a free dinner, in return for their e-mail address.

What to Write in the E-mails?

Keep in mind the 80-20 rule. 80% valuable information that usually offers a solution to your subscribers’ would-be problems, and 20% a soft-sell e-mail. Never hard sell, or just write e-mails where you are selling your services, products, affiliates, etc. As otherwise, this will lead to your subscribers wanting to unsubscribe.

So here are ideas of what you could write:-
 Newsletters
 Tips
 A link to an article that you have posted on your blog
 Any Information that your subscriber would benefit from – example a new video that they should watch, or a book they should read
 Updates on what is happening in your business, and how this can help the subscriber

How Often Should I E-mail?

This is entirely up to you. I would recommend once a week minimum. More often might be too much, while less frequently might not be often enough to do the job of building a relationship of trust.

You might also want to split the lists. Example once a month would be a newsletter, and once a week would be something like ‘Weekly Tips’.

What not to do?

 Don’t spam
 Don’t sell your subscribers information
 Don’t send one off e-mails – be consistent
 Don’t send one off e-mails, which would be just on your product
 Don’t just send e-mails pitching your products – follow the 80-20 rule

I personally use Aweber – it is my preferred auto-responder. Click here, if you would like to check it out.
I would also be writing a Review of Aweber in a future post. Subscribe to the feed so you’ll be the first to know when it is posted.

To Your Success

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Tags: autoresponder, aweber, building relationship with customers, email marketing

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