Bringing Back Your Visitors in 5 Steps

Many people hit your site once never to be seen again.
What if there was a way to bring them back?

Fortunately there is, and it is something every web site can do FOR FREE!

All you need to do is offer an e-mail newsletter or send e-mail updates from your web site.

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I know, you've heard it before!
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You may have but are you doing it and doing it effectively? Most web sites we analyze aren't, yet ANY WEB SITE can add this to their marketing arsenal.

Opt in e-mail campaigns can have results of 5-30% depending on the quality of the newsletter and field you are in. 
So what are you waiting for?

There isn't a single better form of advertising available to webmasters today yet many still ignore it!

Here are the basic steps to get started:


1. Plan Your Newsletter

Will you send it on a fixed schedule (i.e. daily, weekly, monthly, etc...) or will it be sporadic, as new promotions become available, etc...

What will the content be? Unique content related to your site, articles from yourself or other authors? Even if you don't like to write there is a wealth of articles available in ezine directories across the Internet that are available for free re-distribution.

What format will you choose? Plain text, HTML or both?
Plain text looks like an ordinary e-mail while HTML looks like a web page but not all e-mail programs can correctly interpret an HTML newsletter so your readers may get a garbled e-mail. 
RISK ALERT!

If you absolutely feel the need to go with an HTML newsletter let your readers choose which type they receive before hand!


2. Add an e-mail sign up form to your site.

Other marketing gurus say to use the top right hand corner of your index page, the "visual hot spot". 
I've had more success putting it on the left with my navigation. Since I use a standard navigation consistent to every page, my sign up form is consistent and visible on every page and no matter where people come in from they can sign up!

Give people a reason to sign up, don't expect them to drop their e-mail address because there is a box for it.

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"Because" is powerful
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Use blurbs like:

"Sign up for our free monthly newsletter because you want to make more money online"

or

"Sign up to be updated by e-mail about new promotions because our specials are available to limited numbers on a first come, first serve basis"

You can also offer something free in exchange, an ebook (there are hundreds you can give away free), more information, or anything else that relates to your site!


3. Manage e-mail addresses

Depending on your budget there is a variety of automated software you can use. If you are just getting started there is no reason you can't simply maintain the list yourself in a spreadsheet although once you pass your first hundred names or so you will start to find this time consuming, especially as you will need to manage bad e-mail addresses and unsubscribe requests manually.

If you are technically inclined you can install a free script or purchase a more powerful script and run it yourself, just make sure your web host supports it first. There are lots of options:

Free lists include:

http://www.bravenet.com
http://www.pmail.com
http://www.topica.com
http://groups.yahoo.com

Most free services do add ads to your newsletters so do your
research first!

Paid Services/Software:

http://www.sparklist.com
http://www.mailloop.com/
http://www.coloradosoft.com/worldmrg/index.htm

And there are many more if you search online.

Questions to ask:

1. Advertising, can you run your own ads?

2. How many ads do they force on you?

3. Are you limited in the number of subscribers?

Keep in mind free servers like Listbot have been closing causing all kinds of headaches for list managers.

Also check with your host or ISP to see if they include some kind of mailing list software first.

For example www.surf22hosting.com include a minimum of 5 mailing lists with their most basic web hosting packages.

4. Promote Your Ezine

This is a separate article in itself but there are numerous
directories online you can submit to, here are three to get you
started:

http://list-a-day.com/
http://ezine-universe.com/
http://www.cumuli.com/


5. Send your newsletter

Once you have your first subscriber you have to prepare your
first issue!

I use a free piece of software TextPad (www.textpad.com) to write
our newsletters, the main purpose being it allows me to set the
word wrap.

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By setting my articles to 65 characters I know it
won't look like
this, as different e-mail programs wrap differently!
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You can then choose a basic format, there are templates available
online or you get ideas from other newsletters

You need to include quality content, if your newsletter isn't a
valuable resource that people read, it is a waste of your time.

Make sure you include a link back to your site and give people a
reason to return.

Keep building your subscriber base and you can even start to sell
advertising in your newsletter!


While all this may seem like a lot of work to get off the ground
as you start generating more business from it there is software
to automate much of the process.

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How important is this?
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We always recommend this as the best long term marketing strategy
available to webmasters! If your business is designed to generate
money for you long term, start building your subscriber base
today!

Happy Marketing!

Questions?
Send me an email: mike@surf22.com

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