Free
Information about autoresponders
The good news is an
autoresponder is an inexpensive - or even free - method of quickly
responding to emails. What these programs do is automatically respond
to incoming emails as soon as they are received.
Emails are essential to your business for many different reasons. Most
importantly, these invisible email voices give you their feedback about
your website - for free! However, if you spend all your working hours
answering these emails, how are you supposed to run your business? The
answer is simple: use autoresponders. Autoresponders are programs that
automatically respond to your emails without you so much as having to
click on your mouse.
There are a number of good reasons why you need an autoresponder
besides just answering your email. For example, autoresponders can be
used if you need a way to send information about your services or
products, price lists, or if there are repeated questions asked across
large numbers of emails. Maybe you want to offer your site visitors a
special bonus of some kind, such as advice or relevant articles. All of
this can be handled by an autoresponder. Additionally, you can
advertise your business and then build stable relationships with your
customers by using autoresponders.
Autoresponder programs vary from software that runs with your email
program to a specialized script that runs on your web hosting company's
server. This kind of script may use a web page form or simply operate
with your email account. This kind of script is programmed to send out
a standardized message whenever an email is received. The message is
sent to a particular script or email address.
Some autoresponders can do more than simply send out standardized
messages. They can send out an unlimited number of follow-up messages
sent at predetermined interval of time. For example, you can set your
autoresponder to send out a new message every day for as long a period
as you desire.
There are numerous companies who offer autoresponders free of charge.
Your website hosting company often provides autoresponders as a free
service. If this is not the case with your web hosting company, there
are numerous companies who offer this service for a small fee, or free
of charge, providing you attach an advertisement for their company to
your emails.
To personalize your autoresponder messages, you can attach a signature.
Signatures in this case are much like business cards. You can include
your name, company, all your contact numbers and addresses, and a brief
message.
It's a good idea to attach a signature to every email that is sent out.
This works as a repeated reminder of your business identity every time
a customer sees it. The more they look at your signature, the more
likely your company will spring to mind when your particular service or
product is needed.
You can create a standardized signature that every employee in your
business uses, or you can go wild, and let every staff member create
their own personal signature. Of course, like everything in life, there
are some rules and guidelines to creating a personal signature.
Keep the length of your signature between four to six lines of text,
with no more than 70 characters in a single line. Make sure that your
email program does not cut off your text! The content should include
your name, your company name, your email address, fax number, and any
other contact details, such as 800 numbers. Lastly, always include a
short personal message about your company. It should be a subtle sell
of your services or your products, and possibly your company's
reliability and longevity.
Another specialized use of autoresponders is to create courses that you
can then offer your site visitors for free. You must choose a topic in
which you are an expert and that precisely targets your potential
customers.
Once you have carefully chosen your subject, divide it into a number of
different sub-topics. Then offer your site visitor a free 10 or 15 day
course, each day offering a different sub-topic. The first topic should
always be a welcome message to your site visitor and an explanation
about what is to follow. Your explanation should be enticing, getting
the point across that you are offering free, quality information that
your target audience will find of great value.
With every lesson, include the number of the lesson, the topic title,
information about your company and its services or products. At the
end, include a few blurbs about the next lesson to entice the
subscriber to continue on.
Make sure each topic is packed with essential and valuable information,
and leaves the visitor lusting to know more. Otherwise, you may lose
them in the very beginning.
Of course, you have to write up your course before you can offer it.
Once you have done this, and gone over the material carefully,
employing a professional writer or editor if necessary, you must
transfer your text to your autoresponder.
There are a number of free autoresponders you can use. Try
http:/www.getresponse.com, or http://www.fastfacts.net. Or go onto
Google and you will find a long list of free autoresponder companies.
Then sign-up for your chosen autoresponder. Once you do, you will
receive instructions as to how to set it up and transfer your text.
Email is an excellent marketing tool; it is inexpensive and it is fast.
Use it to advertise your business by choosing your email address
carefully. Your website should contain different email addresses for
different contact requests. For example, use info@yourdomain.com for
information requests, or sales@yourdomain.com for questions about
sales. It's a good idea to set up one for the owner, such as
president@yourdomain.com. This presents your company in a personal,
approachable light and insures that direct contact is provided.
Autoresponders are an effective and powerful marketing tool, allowing
you to make contact with thousands of potential customers. This is an
invaluable asset considering how many potential customers you usually
have contact with before you make an actual sale. Essentially, an
autoresponser allows you to automate part of your marketing campaign.
Creative
and Profitable Ways to Use Autoreponders
If you have installed an
autoresponder, you can then follow-up with her, and in all probability,
make the sale when the poor woman has finished repotting her precious
bonsai.
Autoresponders are remarkable, versatile programs that do so much more
than just automatically answer your email. Here are a few ideas that
will help you to creatively and productively use your autoresponder to
transform the casual visitor into a profitable customer. Use your
autoresponder to:
1. Publish a newsletter. Certain quality autoresponders will manage
subscriptions and follow-up with interested prospects. Your newsletter
can keep your visitors informed about your services or products, while
building your reputation as a credible expert in your particular
business.
2. Publish a newsletter only for your affiliates. Inform them of
current sales you are running and of promotional material that your
affiliates can use themselves to increase their commissions. Include
tips, advice, and techniques that your affiliates can use to
successfully go out and promote your business.
3. Write reviews. Cover books, software, music, e-books, movies, etc.,
and put each review in an autoresponder. Review your affiliate
programs, using a link to your affiliate's page in your autoresponder.
4. Distribute your articles. Writing and distributing targeted articles
is a powerful tool to build your business credibility, bring traffic to
your site, and increase your sales potential. If your articles contain
valuable information, many editors will print what is known as a
resource box for you. A resource box contains your bio and a brief
description of your service or product. It can also contain your
autoresponder address. Let's say you've written fifty articles. Put
them on separate autoresponder accounts and create a master list that
contains the titles of each article, the autoresponder address, and a
brief abstract. Then promote your master list. Additionally, include
your publishing guidelines so your affiliates can add their articles to
your list, increasing the number of writers who are represented in your
article list.
5. Create mailing lists. Inform subscribers to your articles when
you've written new ones that they may want to publish in their own
newsletter or website.
6. Automate your sales process. Use an ad to insure repeated exposure
of your message, which has been proven to effectively increase sales.
In your ad, put your autoresponder address where a visitor will be
exposed to numerous marketing materials. This multiplies the chances of
converting visitors into customers. For example, if you're selling a
particular product, put testimonials about how spectacular it is on
your autoresponder, and add a detailed, enticing description of your
product.
7. Distribute advertising. Let's say you sell advertising on your
website or in your newsletter or e-zine. Set your autoresponder to send
the information about rates and how to place an ad automatically to all
prospects' email addresses. Then have your autoresponder follow-up. It
can also send notification of any special deals you are currently
offering.
8. Distribute an email course. Each day, have your autoresponder send
out another lesson. Just be sure that each lesson has quality content -
not a sales pitch. Your content will do the selling for you, and will
do it much more effectively. You can include tips centered on a
different topic for each lesson, illustrating how your product will
benefit the reader. Include the tangible benefits the visitor will reap
by purchasing your product. Make sure to include a paragraph or two at
the end of each lesson enticing your prospect to consider making a
purchase.
9. Automate a reminder about your service or product after a visitor
has completed your course. This will increase the possibility of sales
from visitors who have taken your course but are dragging their feet
about actually making a purchase. You can also use these reminders to
promote new products or services, and the products and services of your
affiliate programs.
10. Distribute free reports. This gives your visitor an idea of the
type of information you can provide and the quality of your product or
service. Make sure these reports are not sales letters or you will more
than likely lose a potential customer than gain a sale.
11. Create trivia quizzes on your site and place the answers in an
autoresponder. Your visitor will then be motivated to request your
autoresponder, and you will have a record of the visitors' email
addresses who took your quiz. Or create a contest and have any visitors
that enter send their responses to your autoresponder. Your
autoresponder can be set-up to send them a confirmation of their entry.
12. Offer a trial version of your product. Give your prospects a sample
of your ebook, course, software, membership, etc. People who are
exposed to a little taste often end up wanting the whole pie. You can
also capture their email addresses when you offer them a free trial
from your website. Set up your autoresponder to give instructions on
how to obtain their free trial, and then make sure to follow-up to try
and close the sale.
13. Link to hidden pages on your autoresponder. For example, a hidden
page could be your affiliate page that contains graphics, promotional
articles, and text links that interested affiliates can make use of.
Inform visitors that they may have free access to your affiliate page
by simply requesting your autoresponder. You will then gather a list of
visitors who may be interested in becoming your affiliates.
14. Use an autoresponder on your order page. Post a request form for
visitors to be notified of special offers or discounts in the future.
This creates a very effective mailing list that contains the names of
people who are already your customers.
15. Put your links page on your autoresponder. It should contain up to
fifty links that would be of particular interest to your visitors. Make
sure to add your own promotional copy at the top or bottom of this page.
Now that you have proof that autoresponders can be used creatively, see
if you can come up with some brilliant ideas of your own!
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