E-Newsletters are a Great Way to Build Contacts

Marketing in today’s economy is all about gathering contacts and building relationships with those connections. Not to worry, there are more ways to making connections than going to 7 a.m. networking events or happy hour socials. E-newsletter campaigns are a great way to build and maintain your email lists. If done well and consistently, you may acquire new business and establish customer loyalty.

Neil Anuskiewicz and SmartBiz.com have outlined six strategies your small business should utilize in order to build and maintain your email list through e-newsletters.

1. Make your e-newsletter sign-up forms easy to find. If you made the effort to create an e-newsletter and to install sign-up buttons on your Web site, be sure they are not hidden. If a unique visitor comes to your site and bounces off without realizing you had an e-newsletter, then you have missed out on a valuable prospect for your product or service. Be sure to put your sign-up buttons in prominent places and on as many pages as you find appropriate.

2. Build trust, have a privacy policy. In a spam age, people are hesitant to dole out their email addresses. Make sure you have a clearly stated privacy policy positioned in a noticeable area on the e-newsletter. By taking this extra step, you are building trust with your clientele.

3. Provide incentives to subscribers. Hopefully the prospect of receiving valuable information through your e-newsletter will be enough to entice visitors to subscribe. But, if in the off chance it isn’t, try offering special discounts that are exclusive to e-newsletter subscribers.

4. Ask for the right amount of information. Essentially, you have created an e-newsletter to garner contact information from current and prospective clients. That being said, you need more information than a simple email address in order to build a relationship with that contact. However, if you make the form too long, people are likely to bounce off of your page. Stick with the basics – name, company, phone number and email address.

5. Use the Forward to a Friend feature of your ESP. Most Email Service Providers (EPS) have a forward to a friend feature. If your subscribers like your content or know of someone who would benefit from the information, most will forward to a friend yielding you more subscribers and contacts. To make it easier to the receiver of a forwarded email to subscribe to the list, you might want to put a link to the subscription form in the email.

6. Share your Knowledge. Sharing your industry knowledge in articles, blog posts, etc. can drive more traffic to your website and get more email list subscribers. By creating the image that you are an expert in your field, people will be more likely to subscribe to your e-newsletter.

Gathering email addresses for email campaigns like e-newsletters is only the first step. Next, you will need to build a relationship with those contacts. Creative and consistent e-newsletters is one means of establishing that relationship. However, don’t feel shy about personally contacting new subscribers. You may be surprised in the potential behind those contacts!

For more on this article, be sure to check out http://www.smartbiz.com/article/articleview/2510/2/53/.

Want to create an e-newsletter for your business and start building your email lists? ProMoter Inc. can help. Contact us at 502-562-1969 or promoter@promoterinc.com.

The Sophistication of Public Relations: Uncovering the Latest Trends – Social Media

Public relations has grown up or matured, rather, with the dawning of the social media age. With the emergence of blogs, Twitter and social media networks, PR practitioners are looking at online communities as new and credible media for consumer dialog. Think keeping your eyes on your local newspaper or trade magazines is sufficient to stay on top of the conversation being generated about your business or product? Think again! Social media has opened the door for consumer-driven conversations online, which should be monitored and even fueled by your public relations efforts!

For years, public relations has been defined as the management of the flow of information between an organization and its target audiences with successful practitioners relying upon their established relationships with (or at least a list of) media contacts in your area or industry. However, in today’s virtual world, managing this flow of information has become increasingly more complex as new blogs, tweets and social networking sites emerge daily. Nevertheless, Web sites and applications exist to bring you into the new generation of public relations, reducing the growing pains your small business might be experiencing.

Be sure to check out the March issue of Kentuckiana Business Forum for the complete version of this article. If you do not receive KBF, visit them online at www.kentuckianabusinessforum.com.

If you or your company are in need of sophisticated public relation services, contact ProMoter Inc. at 502-562-1969 or email at promoter@promoterinc.com.

Year of the Ox Should Give Hope to Small Businesses

The Chinese New Year* began January 26 and with it we welcome a bit of hope for small businesses in 2009 as we celebrate the year of the ox. Rhonda Abrams of USA Today recently wrote that businesses can learn a lot from the ox, which is characterized by prosperity through hard work – an auspicious sign for entrepreneurs and small business owners.

Prosperity through hard work sounds too good to be true in today’s economy where we have become discouraged to think prosperity is possible. I say nonsense! Think like an ox! Even in such dire economic times, prosperity can be had if we commit ourselves to working hard for the results.

Abrams suggests that 2009 will be a good year to:

• Start a company – sound lofty? According to Abrams, 16 of the 30 companies that make up the Dow Jones industrial average started during recessions or the Great Depression.
• Hire people – we’ve all seen the job loss numbers and they seem to keep growing. Amazing people are out there, and they want a job now! They are more likely to be willing to come in at a lower salary with opportunities to negotiate three months down the road.
• Rent or lease new space – according to Abrams, with high vacancy rates and plummeting commercial rents landlords are willing to deal, even offering months of free rent.
• Negotiate – now is the time to drive a bargain on just about anything!
• Gain market share – your competitors are cutting back on their advertising and marketing budgets; however, customers are still out there. Take over the market share and go get them!

To see what 2009 is not a good year for, check out the rest of the article at www.usatoday.com/money/smallbusiness/columnist/abrams/2009-01-30-year-of-the-ox_N.htm.

*In the Chinese calendar, each year is identified by one of the 12 animals in the Chinese zodiac. Predictions for the year as well as for people born during that year are based on the characteristics of the animal.

ProMoter Inc. can help you find success through the lean times. Give us a call (502-562-1969) or drop us an email (promoter@promoterinc.com) to see how we can help your small business.