"Cutting Edge Training, Tips, Tricks, Tools, and Much More for our SFI Downline"

"Email Marketing 101, Part III: Let's Tweak Your Promotional System" by Linda J Bruton

If you've read and followed the first 2 articles in this series, you should now have your email marketing system completely set up and running.

If you haven't, please go to our member support site and read those 2 articles first:

http://www.mlmmillionaire.com/SFI/members.htm

You should be buying leads on a regular basis and inputting them into your followup autoresponder as you get them. You can use the leads you buy from our SFI co-op advertising program - your cheapest and most effective source. Plus leads from any other sources you have, such as lead programs like Traffic Oasis and Leaders Club.

As people sign up, you should be removing them from your promotional autoresponder and adding them to the autoresponder you use to email your downline.

You should have this routine all set up for yourself and you should be doing the necessary work every day.

Now that you have the basics of the system down, let's talk about how to make it EVEN MORE EFFECTIVE. One of the first things to realize in online promotion is that you can't just do the same old thing forever and expect it to work. You have to constantly evaluate it's effectiveness and tweak what you are doing.

Here are some things you should incorporate right now:

1- Most basic of all, make sure you are using a good autoresponder system, such as Rapid Reply, that allows you to import your leads and that gives you the capability of sending out a LOT of followup letters.

There are many older systems that only allow you to send out 8-10 followup letters. Plus they only give you ONE autoresponder. Why pay more for these old, inadequate systems, as you would have for Rapid Reply - which allows you to send up to 52 letters?

Even more important - DON'T use a free system. Always keep in mind that you get what you pay for. Free systems add their ad to the top of every one of your messages. Not only does this look unprofessional, but it could be taking away your hits! Free systems invariably COST YOU MORE than paid systems in lost sales and signups. Plus, they don't allow you to import leads. So they're basically worthless to a serious marketer.

2-Use the autoresponder's codes to PERSONALIZE the subject line and greeting in every email followup letter in your series.

For instance, Rapid Reply allows you to insert the code [FIRSTNAME] into your subject lines and emails. Then, each email has the person's first name inserted. That will make it 100 times more effective, since people are MUCH MORE apt to open an email with their name on it.

You should realize that the average person gets over 100 emails per day. Most of those are advertising emails. Few of us read all those emails. In fact, we delete most of them without doing more than looking at the subject line.

By inserting your prospect's first name in the subject line, you'll definitely get their attention. Plus, they are far more apt to recall requesting information from you and less likely to accuse you of spam. And this is very easy to do.

In all my own followup messages, I simply insert [FIRSTNAME] right before the beginning of the subject line. I also add it to the greeting in the letter.

3-Max out the number of followups you send.

You will note that our member support site gives you 8-10 sample followup letters. But you should NOT just send out 10 followup letters to your prospects.

Rapid Reply allows you to send out 52. I send out the same series over and over and over again. I just put a 15-30 day delay between each series. That way, if someone isn't interested right now, in a month or two they may be.

You should realize that many people will have other things going on in their life when they get your first series. Perhaps they are having family problems. Or they just got laid off from their job. Or they are on vacation. Or they are in a program they just joined and like.

Whatever the reason, they may be too distracted when they get your first series to pay attention to your message. But 2 or 3 months down the line, your letter may be exactly what they've been waiting for!

Another thing to keep in mind: we are all inundated with advertising messages every day of our lives, both online and offline. Statistics show that your prospect needs to hear your message more than 8 times before they start getting interested and think about responding.

That certainly doesn't mean you won't get responses from your first letter. We're talking about averages here. And you don't know how many other people have already contacted your prospect in the past.

If you set up your system this way and just keep inputting more and more leads into your autoreponder - you're going to find that over time you get more and more signups per month. Some of them will be people you first contacted many months before!

4-If you work another primary program, you can also put a series of their followup messages into your 52-message capacity.

I have other autoresponders I use to promote my primary program. Some of the prospects I get won't be interested in that program. Or it will conflict with what they are doing. But I also belong to a couple of LEADS programs. No matter WHAT program they are working, they will need leads. So I add a series of letters about my lead programs to those autoresponders as well.

With a 52-message capacity, you really have a lot of room to sell to every one of your prospects! But it doesn't do you much good if you are only sending out 10 messages. Be sure to max out ALL your promotional autoresponders. It will pay off for you big time.

5-Constantly change the subject lines of your emails. This is one of the MOST IMPORTANT things you can do to improve the effectiveness of your followup series.

Don't just use the suggested ones that come with our sample followup letters.

Remember, hundreds of other people are using those same subject lines. Your prospect may have already seen them many times. Subject lines can get old very fast.

I suggest that you write MANY subject lines and keep rotating them through your followup series. If you have your series input a number of times in your autoresponder, use different subject lines for each series.

A good subject line is what actually gets your email opened. Remember, your prospects are getting over a hundred emails a day. Your subject line MUST JUMP OUT AT THEM if you want to get your email opened.

It doesn't matter HOW GREAT your letter is if your prospect doesn't open it. The subject line is like a great headline in an ad.

Now please don't email me back and ask me to give you some more subject lines. :-) Remember, I have thousands of people in my downlines. If everyone is using the same ones, they quickly lose their effectiveness.

So how do you write great subject lines?

Constantly read the subject lines of the emails you receive every day. Pay attention to which subject lines actually make you open an email. Try to emulate those subject lines.

I don't mean copy them word for word, since they are very likely for a totally different program. Rewrite them so they work with what you are promoting. Or use them to get your own ideas.

6-Remember that just promoting isn't all you need to do.

Once someone joins SFI, you need to immediately start working with them, get them trained, and work to get them to upgrade. We want more than free members, after all - we want working members and partners!

This is the secret to making money in a network marketing program. NOT sponsoring hundreds of people, then do nothing more. You want to sponsor people THEN help THEM build THEIR business.

7-Don't just buy leads once, decide it doesn't work, and go on to something else.

There will always be the possibility that a certain group of leads just doesn't respond. Or they won't respond for a month or two. But the next group you get will have a huge response.

Statistically, mail order experts know that you can't predict response until you've mailed to about 5,000 leads. Then you'll get an accurate rate for the place you're buying the leads from.

50-75 names won't give you any kind of feel for your response rate. There are just too many factors to consider.

For instance, you may have bought and mailed to those leads around a holiday. Your response will be a LOT lower during those times.

Or, think about what happened after Sept. 11. I know from my own marketing that everything just about stopped altogether for over 3 months. No one joined anything or paid a bit of attention to their email.

There can be all kinds of reasons why leads don't do well at certain times. That's another reason why it's so effective to send the same email series over and over and over again with a 15-30 day delay between. The next time the series goes out, everyone may be paying more attention.

8-In every letter you send, use your personal email address after your signature at the bottom of the letter.

And please, don't use some junk email address that you never check! Use the email address that you check every day. You will get questions from prospects. And as a general rule, any prospect that is interested enough to ask you a question is going to join!

9-Remove people from your autoresponder after they signup.

With the Rapid Reply system, just login and click on "Delete a Recipient" from the Client Menu. Then just enter their email address. They will now be taken out of the autoresponder series.

If you don't remove these signups, they will continue to get email after email trying to sign them up. Many of them are going to get confused, wondering why they are still getting these emails after they've already signed up. Others will decide that you just aren't paying attention, and therefore aren't a good sponsor! :-) It just takes a minute to delete people, so don't forget to add this to your daily routine.

Once you've done that, ADD them to the autoresponder you use to email your downline. And start working to get them upgraded!