Category Archives: List Building

Opt-in list building tips, tactics and methods which are still effective – even in the age of Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest and Google Plus.

List Building – Is It Really That Important?

BWMagic’s Internet Marketing News!

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Contents:

o List Building – Is It Really That Important?

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Except for the whole concept of Internet Marketing, no issue
has taken up more of my time and interest than list building.
Since the very beginning, list building has been one of those
subjects that I am constantly coming back to and redefining.

So much so, that it seems to have taken on a life of its own.

At first, I didn’t really understand list building and why it
was so important. So you put out a newsletter and you built up
a list of contacts or subscribers that give you permission to
email them – big deal!

People can actually make money doing this?

That was my main question at the time, I just didn’t understand
how someone could actually make money from sending emails to a list
of contacts? And at first, I didn’t make any sales from my list,
no matter how attractive the products I was pitching.

In the beginning, I made a crucial mistake, one that many
beginning list builders often make, I didn’t realize it is
not getting subscribers which is important, but rather it’s
the whole process of building meaningful relationships with
those contacts that’s the crucial factor.

It’s a lesson I am still learning.

You have to build a connection with your subscribers, you
have to build some kind of meaningful relationship with
someone who is basically a total stranger. You have to first
convince them you’re someone worth listening to so you have
to try and build/have credibility in the eyes of your reader.

Traditionally credibility has two key components: trustworthiness
and expertise. You must use these two things to build a relationship
with your subscribers. Show your readers tangible examples or
successes from your online marketing or sites… if you have
achieved top 10 rankings in Google – show them. Showing
recommendations and testimonials from ordinary people who
have used your site or products is very effective. Video
testimonials are even more effective.

Only when you build that relationship and credibility will you
truly see why list building is so important. Unfortunately,
building that relationship is often the most difficult part
of list building.

To tell you the truth, I didn’t get anywhere with building my list
of contacts until my main site started ranking high in Google and
the other search engines. Which is only logical, someone searching
for information in Google and your site pops up, it is a simple way
of building instant credibility in the eyes of the surfer. Well, up
to a point, your content has to be of high quality and further capture
your potential subscriber’s attention.

Then you must follow-up with informative emails or information which
that subscriber is truly searching for.

Always remember…

Your subscribers are looking for information – first and foremost.
They are not looking for a sales pitch and if you keep trying to
constantly sell to your subscribers – they won’t be on your list
for long.

Put the emphasis on giving helpful quality information first and do
any selling as an afterthought.

Let’s take one of my actual examples of how this list building technique
works so effectively for me. One section of my site deals with laptops
and computers. Visitors can sign-up to my laptop guide to find out more
about business laptops, student laptops… and so on. Just informative
information on laptop computers… included in those mailings I give links
to some pages containing online laptop deals, coupons and offers from
major computer makers such as HP, Dell, Sony, Toshiba, Lenovo… where
consumers can get $100 – $300 or more off their laptop purchases if they
use these online links or coupons.

Those are my most lucrative lists that I have and they have really
shown me why building lists are so important. They can be a simple way
of gathering prospective customers for your own products or for the
affiliate products you’re promoting.

List building is a very effective way of increasing your sales numbers.

Moreover, since I mainly do affiliate marketing, I have surprisingly
learned another somewhat hidden aspect of list building that I knew
nothing about when I first started marketing online.

It has everything to do with the simple “cookie!”

With most affiliate programs when you send a customer to them, these
customers are “cookied” with your affiliate IDs. If that customer makes
a sale in the following days, you get credit and a commission. Now these
cookies can have different lengths – anywhere from a few days up to a
lifetime – however, most are around 30 to 90 days.

Basically, what this means is that you’re building a whole list of
customers cookied with your affiliate IDs. I realize the power of this
a few years back when my main site went down for over a week – but I
was still making daily sales, I couldn’t figure out where these sales
were coming from until I checked and found it had to do with these
cookied customers who had clicked on my affiliate links weeks, even
months before.

This has proven to be such an effective selling technique, I do
certain things to take full advantage of cookies. First, I usually only
join affiliate programs that have 90 day cookies or more, some even
have lifetime cookies. Second, I make sure I cookie my list by sending
them to my affiliate links… this can be done with free videos, ebooks,
informative articles that the affiliate programs supply to you for your
marketing. In the case of my laptop newsletter a direct link to special
online coupons and discounts will cookie these potential customers with
my affiliate IDs.

In the Internet Marketing field, a common marketing tactic is to
produce a valuable report or video which affiliates can use to “cookie”
their customers. That’s why you will often be bombarded with these
offers if an important marketer is launching a major product – everyone
is trying to cookie any potential customers out there. That’s one of
the reasons, Internet Marketing has a handful of heavy hitters who
usually make all the sales… they reach those customers first because
they have enormous lists in the millions. The larger the list numbers,
the larger the number of cookied customers, the more sales they make.
Simple arithmetic.

And it is also another reason why list building is very important,
sometimes it is just a matter of working the numbers. If you have
lists with hundreds of thousands of subscribers… there will always
be a certain percentage who will buy ANY product.

But don’t get fooled by the numbers… you can have very small
numbers and still make plenty of sales. If you have a list of
proven buyers who always buy from you then a small list can be
just as important. If you have built up a solid relationship with
these buyers and they totally trust you, then you can sell to them
time and time again, because they know your recommended products are
worth buying. Moreover, they will recommend their friends and your
list building can take on a life of its own.

These are just a few examples of list building and there thousands
of ways to use lists in your marketing. I just hope the information
covered here has convinced you the importance of building your own lists.
How effective they can be in promoting and selling your site or product
to your potential customers. Most of all, I hope you never ever
underestimate how powerful list building can be to your online marketing.
The money is certainly in your lists.

For more information on building your own lists try here:
List Building

Kind Regards,
Titus

http://www.bizwaremagic.com

Why Twitter Is Becoming So Important

BWMagic’s Internet Marketing News!

…….
Contents:

o Why Twitter Is Becoming So Important
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Perhaps you’re like me and not really into the whole social
networking scene. It is really not “my cup of tea” as they say,
but these social networking sites are becoming so important
you just can’t ignore them if you have a website or do any
type of online marketing.

Social bookmarking sites like Digg, FaceBook, MySpace…
and now Twitter – have become so popular with Internet users
you just can’t ignore them or pretend they don’t exist. They
are a force to be reckoned with and must be dealt with in your
marketing.

Twitter is probably the one you should be paying the closest
attention to at the moment. If you’re not familiar with Twitter
– it’s simply an online messaging/contact system where you send
short messages (tweets) of 140 characters or less, to all your
contacts or people who have subscribed to your Twitter
account and are following you.

These messages can be about what you’re doing, programs you’re
supporting or links that you are promoting and so on. A very simple,
yet extremely powerful system.

Needless to say, it has taken the world by storm and Alexa now
ranks Twitter as 50th of top sites on the web. It just seems
like everyone now has a Twitter account and are following their
most favorite people or companies.

As a social contact and list building tool, Twitter can’t be
beat… some even argue it will bypass email as a way to
contact your list. Mainly because you don’t have to worry
about the “s” word.

Important News Regarding Twitter

Recently, Webpronews has reported Twitter will now be
searchable and the content in the links in your messages
will be indexed and ranked. They will have an algorithmic
ranking system much like the one Google has to rank it’s
index.


“According to CNET, Twitter’s new VP of Operations Santosh
Jayaram says that Twitter Search, which currently searches
only the text of Twitter posts, will soon crawl links included
in tweets, and index content from those pages.”

Basically, what this will mean is that Twitter will
virtually become a search engine – one run by millions
of users who will vote with their subscriptions and usage
of the content. Online democracy in it’s purest form as
users could decide what’s valuable or not.

Of course, this could prove to be a major rival to Google
in the coming years. And if you think Google is too
powerful to be unseated, then you haven’t been on the
web long enough to know everything passes, everyone
has their day and then we move on.

Twitter, if it’s not snatched up by Google, will also
prove to be a major competitor in the valuable search
market. One that offers some interesting options to
the traditional type of search we have now – one that
is more related to sites that let users vote up or down
the content they want to see featured in the index.
Sites like Digg could be the role model for this new
searchable Twitter.

Regardless of how all this plays out – the question
remains – are you using Twitter to promote your site
or business?

Twitter is an excellent way to build your list of
contacts or people interested in the same things
you are – if you do any kind of list building
(and you should be) you will already know the importance
of keeping a list of customers and using follow-up
emails in your marketing.

How big a list can you build?

Well if you have been following the news, you will know
that Ashton Kutcher best out CNN by being the first
person to reach 1 million followers on Twitter.

What does this mean?

When the guy from that 70′ show Tweets – over a million
people get his message. Just imagine him recommending
your website link to his followers… and you will see
how powerful Twitter has become as a marketing and
promotion tool.

Even Google has a twitter account

but it only has a measly 600,000 followers.

Anyway, I hope you can see the potential of Twitter for
your own site promotion and online marketing. It’s a great
system and you should be taking advantage of it.

The least you should do is open a Twitter account to
promote your site or yourself. Place your Twitter
link on all your webpages so that your visitors can
follow you or your site.

Then make regular updates in Twitter announcing all
the important stuff happening to you or your site.
You can use Twitter just for entertainment or for
business. No matter what you do…

Just use it!

Kind Regards,
Titus

http://www.bizwaremagic.com

Twitter - Bizwaremagic

Internet Marketing And Invisible List Building

Internet marketing and list building are two subjects I have
been exploring for over 10 years now. With each passing day
I realize how much I still have to learn about these two
inexhaustible areas of web marketing. While I have fulfilled
my main ambition of working full-time on the net, I have not
as yet achieved my goal of reaching 100,000 subscribers.

When I first started, my goal was getting 1,000 subscribers
which I quickly passed, then it was 10,000 which was much harder
to reach… getting to 100,000 will take much more time
and effort but I believe I will get there eventually.

Maybe that number is a bit foolish, mainly because I learned
long ago it is not the size of your list that counts,
but how responsive it is. Still, it helps to have a goal
set for yourself… and a 100k subscriber list is not
an unreachable number especially when you’re talking
about the Internet. There are probably more than a few
pimply-faced teenagers out there who have gotten triple
that number of subscribers just by placing some silly videos
on YouTube.

When I first started online marketing I kept hearing the
so-called gurus shouting “The Money Is In Your List!” Up
until that time the only list that meant anything to me
was probably my grocery list. However, as I quickly
became familiar with web marketing, list building became
one of my key goals.

Mainly because list building is one of the vital elements to
your Internet marketing success. It can play an important role
in increasing your sales, getting repeat targeted traffic to
your sites and a perfect vehicle for branding your product
or company. Moreover, your list can be a primary source of
business relationships which will help you build your online
business since these contacts can be the cornerstones
of your online marketing.

Many marketers make the mistake that list building is all
about sales and forget that your list is much more than just
for monetary gain. It can be the basis for a whole wealth
of ideas and interaction that goes well beyond how many sales
you can squeeze out of your list. The really savvy marketers
use their lists for market research, product development
and treat their lists as a knowledge resource they can tap into,
time and time again.

Your list building can also be the foundation of your own
vibrant online community. A community that’s interactive
and a great source of both ideas and business contacts.
Probably the best example of this type of community building
would be those communities that spring up through social networking media sites… Twitter would be a
good example of this type of list building.

Invisible List Building

In studying and using lists over the years, some things have
really surprised me. As an affiliate marketer, I quickly
realized most of my list building was invisible! This happened
when I was fairly new at the marketing game, I had trouble
with one of my site’s WebHost and I had to move the whole
site to a different server and my site was down for several
days… but the strange thing was my online sales from
this site still kept coming even though my site was down.

I was totally puzzled (I can be rather slow sometimes!) until
I realized or rather learned the marketing power of cookies.
Almost all of the affiliate programs I was promoting on my site
were using cookies to mark the traffic or clicks coming from
my site as my referrals. If anyone of these referrals made
a purchase in the next 30, 60, 90 or more days – I would get
credit for the sale.

My site was down, but because I had a whole list of cookied
buyers lined up to purchase these affiliate products, my
sales still kept coming. I was fairly new at this web stuff
then and this was a real eye-opener for me. I started joining
those affiliate programs that gave me the longest time-frame
with their cookies. Most are around 30 days but there are quite
a few that will give 365 days. Some affiliate programs such
as Ken Evoy’s Site Build It and Marlon Sanders’s products
even give you a life-time cookie.

In affiliate marketing using these “cookies” to build up hundreds
of lists of “invisible customers” can be a very effective marketing
strategy. You might not see these lists, but they’re quietly working
for you in the background, bringing in sales even if your site is
down or even when you have stopped a particular campaign.

Of course, the key here again, is how targeted is your marketing.
You could have a million cookied customers lined up but if they
have no real interest in your product – they won’t turn into buying
customers. You must get the potential customer who has shown
an interest in your product, onto your invisible cookie list.
That’s why ranking high in organic search results for your chosen
keywords plays a vital role in how much you earn online, especially
if you’re into affiliate marketing. Going the PPC (Pay Per Click)
route can also work but the profit margins are much closer.

Nor should you ignore building an actual opt-in list of
customers to your autoresponder system in this whole process.
Many marketers also try to “cookie” their actual opt-in lists
as soon as possible in order to boost their sales. Your invisible
cookie lists can work in conjunction with your so-called real lists.

Along those same lines, one of my most effective marketing
strategies is to use “micro” list building which is building
hundreds of small lists of customers for each affiliate
product that I promote. In the process of building these
lists of potential customers, my first goal is to get
these customers “cookied” with my affiliate ID. Then
no matter if they buy directly from you or from some
other link on the web; you still get credit for the
sale.

Another effective marketing technique to use with your
lists is to promote a whole group of related brand name
products and MAKE SURE you cookie your list with ALL these
different products so that no matter which one they eventually
choose to purchase, you will still get credit for the sale.
This way as a marketer you can come across as a neutral
third party pointing out the benefits and disadvantages
of each product rather than a pushy salesperson pushing
one product at your list. Nobody likes a pushy salesperson,
so be a sneaky friend instead.

Don’t ignore the effectiveness of these cookies or invisible
lists in your online marketing. Used properly they can
increase your sales dramatically. You can have hundreds
of these invisible cookied lists working for you on the
web. When you get down to the actual numbers, a list
of 100,000 subscribers can pale in comparison. So next time
anyone mentions list building to you, just remember you
can always go incognito!

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The author is a full-time online marketer who has numerous
niche sites. If you want to learn how to make your online
marketing much more effective by building your lists try here:
list building
Or you can try our popular: list building ecourse
Copyright 2006 Titus Hoskins.