Mailing list how to manage

[Mark Turner]

Hello,
I am new to IM and JVpro. Everybody is saying that mailing lists are key to IM. My question is, how do you manage mailing lists when you market so many products? Whether you are selling IM or solar DIY, do you ever put all your lists together for a mailing or do you always just do focused mailings from lists that match the product? How often do you contact people off the list?
Thank you,
Mark

[Neil Robins]

We use the autoresponder Aweber which has the facility to send the one mailing to multiple lists at the one time.

[Ed Walters33]

Aweber is good for managing email lists - you have to pay around $20 per month for an account. The only problem is sometimes broadcast emails sent to your list from aweber don't go out on time -so beware if you have a time sensitiv promotion.

Infusionsoft is now the big one which has a lot more functions than aweber - i.e for splitting lists etc. - but it's more expensive.

Your mailing list is your KEY asset - build rapport and nurture your list. Never join up different unrelated lists as effectively you will be spamming some subscribers if you send them an email some are not interested in.

Instead send out specific well crafted content to your lists. DON'T just send out promotions - they want good quality free content such as a weekly newsletter. then when you do occasionally promote your list will be responsive.

[Barry Johnson]

We use Aweber and have never had a problem getting it to do whatever we need as far as mailing list management and automated emails. I highly recommend them.

[glasshalffull]

Starting out, just use Aweber. They got everything you need. How often to send to your list will depend on your specific relationship to them and what you're sending in your messages. So the answer is test and watch the percentage of opens you get in Aweber. I send messages usually 3-4 times/week otherwise I see the percentage of "opens"" go down.

I can say that you don't want to spread out your messages too far (week or longer) as your lists will become less responsive to you.

[Mark Turner]

Thank you all for the good advice.

I will check into aweber to start and then look at infusion later.

I assume that to nurture your lists you need to email your clients with useful information in between sales mailings.

I liked learning that you can see how many of your emails you sent were actually opened.

Thanks,
Mark

[allsuccess]

Hi Mark,

With Aweber not only you can track your open rates but even the links clicked.

I usually like spreading my followup emails within 3-4 days difference. It is suggested that first you send out the emails to the list that is most closely associated with the product and then to the other lists.

You can always change the body and subject when open rates are very low and then you can also save that list segment who did not open your email.

Hope this helps. Please let me know if you need any additional info.

[Rob Toth]

>> DIY, do you ever put all your lists together for a mailing or do you always just do focused mailings from lists that match the product?

Definitely!

There's no reason to annoy 95% of a "weight loss" (for example) leads list with a "make money" promo. You're message will not be congruent with what they signed up to hear more about, you'll piss off plenty and you'll simply be pushing a message that doesn't match your crowd.

As often as possible, think about your email marketing as if it were costing you 50 cents to mail to every email address. With THAT in mind (vs. the "just press Send cause it's free!" mentality)... you'll find that you give a lot more thought to which promotion goes to which targetted list and how that message is crafted.

Idealy though, you should be building your leads lists for one industry. but if you ARE in multi niches, do NOT mail every offer to every lead.

[Ed Walters33]

Yes send them lots of weekly great quality useful content - then you'll achieve high conversions when you promote

[mark coble]

Yes I agree with Rob. If you have multiple niche lists stay specific to that niche. you'll always be able to market to demographics of that list as well. Say for instance your marketing to the baby niche and your marketing baby toys, and baby clothes or something like that. A question may be, "What other products might people that have baby's be interested in?" they may be interested in baby food coupons, saving on diapers or baby health information product or services as well. The important thing I think is to stay in the niche and market to demographics and that opens up many more products/services within that niche :)

Having the statistics for your campaigns is very important. Aweber or Get Response are good. Having a complete suite of services is better if you can find it.

One last thing, I believe that it is a great thing to give helpful information like articles that you set up on Google so that you're giving useful information to your list members. They will appreciate the help--I know that I would

[Mark Turner]

Thank all of you for the great information.
I have one more question pertaining to lists. What is everyone using on their website to gather the names and email addresses that turn them into a list. Do you all make up your own scripts for when the form gets processed or is there a module you can put on your webserver?
Thanks again,
Mark

[John Ellis]

If you use AWeber, here's how it works. You set up what details you want to capture (Name, Email Address, Phone Number etc) and then they give you a simple HTML code that you just insert into your website. You can specify which page you want it to redirect to, so you're in full control. Hope that answers your question. If you check out AWeber you'll be able to get everything set up pretty quickly.

[Mark Turner]

Thanks for the info John I will go check out aweber.
Thanks,
Mark

[glasshalffull]

Thank you all for the good advice.

I will check into aweber to start and then look at infusion later.

I assume that to nurture your lists you need to email your clients with useful information in between sales mailings.

I liked learning that you can see how many of your emails you sent were actually opened.

Thanks,
Mark


instead of Confusionsoft, you might want to consider Josh Anderson's Nanacast at Nanacast.com.

I've heard a lot of grumblings about infusion soft, that it can be a nightmare to work with. I use Nana cast and it has some very powerful features such as one click upsells and enhanced security options just to name a couple. I think it offers many added benefits to the growth of my business.

[Matt Haslem]

lol @ marks play on words
yeh you need a degree to run it

[Garland Coulson]

If you want an open source, free mailing list management system you can check out phpList. (http://www.phplist.com/)

I use it for many of my lists and it works very well.