Why You Would Want to Run a Newsletter An Article by Phil Tanny from OakNet Publishing	Visited: 4250 Not rated Rate: Select 1 - Terrible 2 - Poor 3 - Average 4 - Good 5 - Outstanding
by Phil Tanny

Let's talk about a way to make your online marketing approach a more active and successful one.

OK, so how does that work exactly? First, let's look at how a typical Web business might operate.

You guzzle down various forms of liquid caffeine so you can stay up til 3AM every night (hey, that sounds familiar!) promoting your Web site every way you know how. You read the stats every day hoping that a lot of Web surfers have stopped by to see your site. Visitors arrive, or they don't. It's up to them.

OK, so then what happens?

Well, if you're lucky, a visitor bookmarks your site. If you're really lucky they someday actually remember to click on your bookmark again amongst the hundreds of others they have collected. The frustrating reality is that the Web site visitor you've worked so hard to get still views you as a total stranger and you've probably got one chance to close a sale with them before they impulsively click off to one of a million other Internet destinations never to return again.

You're very active working at your business but the approach could be seen as a passive one in the sense that you're still stuck sitting there waiting on other people to remember you and click on a bookmark or other link.

Is this any way to run a business?

That's what we started to ask ourselves. We stumbled on to the timeless business truth that, whether your business is online or offline, it's crucial to build long term relationships with your prospective customers. Why? Because it takes time for people both to understand what your business really has to offer and to develop confidence that they can trust you to provide your service in a competent and honest manner.

And besides, once you've gone to all the work of getting a customer it's fun to sell them stuff every month!

Web sites are great at presenting an attractive storefront that can create a good first impression. But once you've attracted these frantic, click happy Web window shoppers in to your store the job becomes converting this casual momentary encounter in to a long term friendship and business relationship.

So let's try this.

Suppose you create a good free emailed newsletter that contains useful information relevant to the product or service you're selling from your Web site. Your newsletter doesn't have to be a masterpiece of literature but it should contain content that a typical visitor to your Web site can enjoy and use.

Let's put a couple of lines about your newsletter on all the major pages of your Web site. Let's add a little form that makes it easy for your visitors to subscribe.

Now, when a visitor to your Web site reaches the moment of maximum interest they can, instead of bookmarking, add their name to your mailing list. Hey, while we're on the subject, maybe you'd like to join our list!

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The OakNet News is a free emailed newsletter delivering Web site
construction tips, software reports, Web technology reviews,
Internet marketing info, and more to over 5100 Web site owners.

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Here's the most important thing to remember.

You no longer have to base your online business on the hope that people will visit, and then remember to revisit, your Web site. As your mailing list builds you will be able to employ the most widely used Internet technology, email, to regularly deliver your message directly to the hard drives of a growing self selected audience of hundreds, and then thousands, of people that have voluntarily shown an interest in your services.

Big difference! Now you can initiate the conversation and relationship from your end. You'll have plenty of more chances to make the sale you might not have made today. Now you have what we would call an active marketing strategy!

Hey, that's pretty cool!

You've gone to a lot of work to bring prospective customers to your Web site. After all that, why just let these interested people wander off, maybe never to return? Why not use a fun and useful free emailed newsletter to give these important prospects a reason to remain part of your life.

Sincerely,
Phil

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We specialize in serving Internet
newsletter authors and advertisers.
Phil Tanny
352-376-5822

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