|
 |
These email lists let you update your prospects about new services, security, special offers and specific niche market information. Email can be a very efficient and effective way to tell your prospective clients about the benefits you can provide them, but to get the most from this medium, you need to understand some basics of its use.
Understanding the Key Elements of Email
Successful email campaigning depends on much more than a clever idea. There is a science as well as an art to creating email newsletters that will garner response from the business people you want to reach. Among the most important considerations are:
Email newsletter's primary strength is in generating qualified appointment leads, which it can do at a cost that is much lower than for an unsolicited sales call or various modes of advertising. Your emailing will be most successful if you focus on achieving specific pre-appointment goals rather than on directly generating sales results. Your success will also be greater if you define from the beginning the business people or job functions you wish to reach, the criteria relating to the businesses and individuals within them and the problems you can solve for them with your services. The Mailing List
Most experts agree that the mailing list you use is the single most important factor in the success of an email campaign. The best lists are those that address individuals by name rather than email address alone. Make sure your mailing list contains only those people who have asked to be on it or have given the list compiler opt-in permission to be included. If any prospective client forgets that he or she asked to receive information from your firm or the master list, the best policy is to quickly remove the offending name. Once you've got a list up and running, keep these guidelines in mind:
The Offer
What you offer and the way you offer it are important. Be sure that what you offer has a clear benefit to the person receiving your email and take pains to tell about it in a way that will capture interest. As you develop your email, pay particular attention to the Subject Line. If you don't get your prospective client interested right away, your email will be deleted. The Format
Good email does not have to be fancy. In fact, some of the most effective email is very simple. What is most important is that your email invites the prospective client to look at it. The Call to Action
Be sure that your prospective client clearly understands what it is you want him or her to do by including a clear call to action. Be sure each call to action includes as many ways to reach you as possible (email reply, telephone, physical snail mail or fax). After each Mailing
Your email marketing does not end when you broadcast your campaign. It is important that you follow up with the prospective clients to whom you mailed your newsletters and that you measure your results. You can improve your results significantly by following each emailing with a telephone call to as many prospective clients as practical. This lets you:
Measurement
A typical response rate for business-to-business email is one to three percent. An email newsletter that generates a four percent or better response rate is considered to be successful. Mailings to an up-to-date in-house list of people who you have reason to believe are clearly prospects for the offer can be expected to do better -- often garnering a ten percent rate or better. Keep track of what works with your clients and prospective clients and repeat those techniques in subsequent mailings. Use the information you gain from each email campaign to improve and refine your techniques for the next, and email can become a very effective marketing tool.
* * *
JACK FOX, an author, consultant and speaker, specializing in accounting practice development, is the founder and CEO of The Accounting Guild, a marketing consortium in Las Vegas, Nevada. He is the author of seven accounting and business books, including the third edition of his best selling book, Starting and Building Your Own Accounting Business, and Building a Profitable Online Accounting Practice, published by John Wiley & Sons. Contact Jack at jackfox@accountingguild.com or 702-242-8725
|
|
|
||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||
|
|
|||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||
