Posted by arlene

E-mail is the most popular application on the Internet. More people want e-mail than want access to the Web. E-mail packs real power, both as a communications medium and a promotional tool. You can prompt users to pop in to your site frequently by delivering to them regular, compelling e-mail newsletters filled with juicy teasers, rich content, and especially links back to the pages on your site.

One e-commerce venture, for example, reports a 25 percent rate of click- through from its e-mail newsletter, along with a 6 to 7 percent rate of conversion to sales. Another produces newsletters containing how-to advice, current tech news, and feature articles. That enterprise reports that it has 70,000 unique users who get their e-mail newsletters weekly. Half of those recipients click through from the newsletter to the site within 16 hours of receiving the newsletter.

Send newsletters on Mondays or Tuesdays, as early in the day as possible, to achieve the best response. Sending newsletters at regular intervals is also a good idea: You risk losing your users‘ attention if you don’t contact them at least once every 21 days, according to some experts. But spamming users with too frequent marketing messages turns them off. Send newsletters no more often than once or twice a week, and make sure your newsletters include some value (not just advertising).

Give heavy discounts to first-time buyers, with follow-up marketing of more expensive, “back-end” items. Think of cellular phone service companies that offer free or cheap cell phones but get your repeat business by selling you a year-long service plan.

Post Internet-only exclusives that customers can’t get anywhere else. Also
offer special online events like live chats, games, contests, or premieres.

Shell out free goodies. Offer users tchotchkes such as software, screen savers, games, or Internet postcards.

Talk, talk, talk. Scout around for discussion groups, chats, or message boards that are relevant to the topic of your site. There (assuming the culture of the group allows for it) you can offer sterling advice or commentary and pepper your remarks with discreet, wisely placed references to your site and its various features and services. Use care: Frequent or blatant evangelizing of your own site can disrupt the community spirit and make you seem like some sleazy self promoter. As always in the online world, valuable comments inspire interest and even loyalty.

Two basic types of newsletters are in this world:

Announcement newsletters announce products, specials, features, and the like. They often include a quick, snappy promotional blurb with a link (in HTML-format newsletters) or a URL (in text-only newsletters) that entices users to visit some portion of the Web site for more information or to make a purchase. To get better results with announcement newsletters, include added value in them. A tip for using the product, a truly bargain price, or some other special angle will make friends and win visitors.

A content-driven newsletter contains content that is a product in its own right and isn’t promotional in nature. It may include tips, news, details about industry trends, or other information that’s of interest to the user. Although content-driven newsletters sometimes carry ads and sponsor messages as a source of revenue, these newsletters do not directly promote a product, service, or company per se.

Of course, you can create a hybrid of the two types, if that suits your site’s goals. For example, a content-driven newsletter can include announcements of your own products or services as well as ads promoting someone else’s.

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