Make it Great

Anyone and everyone who has an email address has received SPAM. I can’t stand email spam or canned spam and when either one is placed in front of me, I have to say a prayer on the givers behalf. Seriously.

It didn’t take me long to learn what was appropriate and inappropriate when finding leads and prospects.

Here are some do’s and don’ts:

• Always ask yourself, did this person give me their email address for this purpose?

If you are a part of a forum, Yahoo! group or any other community, where you interact with others, you will receive various emails for various things. If someone in that Yahoo! group is asking about children’s clothing and you sell candles, why would you email them about your candle business opportunity? Its like going to a store and asking for the shoe section and someone sends you to a coat rack. You would wonder about the saleman’s mental state, I would.

• Did they ask you for that information?

If the answer to these 2 questions is NO, then don’t email them. You will end up either being reported for SPAMMING or leave a bad impression of yourself on them, usually both.

What impression are you leaving when you spam? You look desperate. Even if you are hoping and praying that someone will please sign up for your business this instant so that you can finally move up director of the month, don’t act like it. People can tell when someone is successful in a business, why would someone who is successful have to throw themselves at people? They don’t.

You don’t see rich people picking up pennies off the sidewalk. Why? Because they don’t need them.

You have something to offer that will change people’s lives. Either your product or your business opportunity will make someones day better, you have to convince people of this. But, there is a way to do it.

Ways to advertise on the “low key”:

• In your email signature. You can put links, pictures, basically whatever you want in your email signature and it goes out with every email.
• In your profiles. Wherever you register online they usually ask for a (WWW) or homepage, put your website address in it. Nosey people will click it, I know I do…..
• In you signature in forums and message boards. Goes under every post you make. Same as email signature.
• On your car. Goes everywhere you go, duh!
• In blog comments. When you leave a comment on a blog, it usually asks for a (URL) put your website address.

What should you link to?

Link to a page on your website that gives people something to do. People do click on links, but that won’t get you sales. You have to capture their information. I have a free candle drawing page I link to: Here.

In order to qualify for the drawing participants have to give: Name, email, phone number, mailing address and how they found my page. Great marketing  tool. I’ll tell what I do with them later.

You can link to newsletter subscription forms, Splash pages, your online store, etc. Link to pages that get people to take action. No one wants to read about your company history just yet, you have to “Woo and Ahhh” them first and then they will want to know more. Just tell them what your business is about, what you sell and how they can earn an income doing what you do. Short and sweet, but informative.

Splash pages- I like them a little, I am still trying to get used to them. I personally get mad when someone has a link that says: “Learn about my business!” and sends me to a page with very little information about said business but want all of my information or else I can’t learn more. I feel violated…. So, I usually Google in the company name and go from there. I do my research before I give them information. I don’t want people calling me about something I have no idea about. This is just my opinion, but I think most can agree on this.

I had a Splash page and out of about 10 leads, 1 answered my phone calls. You have to be getting hundreds of leads to your Splash page in order to see much progress. If you get hundreds of leads a day or week, then a Splash page may work for you.

What do I say in my link? It depends on what you link to. I usually say “Win a free candle!” or “Free candle here” or something along those lines. If you are advertising your business opportuntiy, I usually put “Work from home selling candles” or a nice quote like “Everyone is on a path, where it leads is up to us”.

If you don’t have a “lead capture” page. You can usually get one for about $20 a month. I have heard great things about Aweber, but there are more out there. Just Google in “autoresponders” and “splash pages”.

Make sure you provide the leads with enough business information on your capture page. Don’t lead them along blindly. Because if they find out what you have to offer is not right for them, they will ignore your emails, phone calls and trash your letters. Wasted money and time which could have been avoided if they had known what your business was in the first place.

Disclaimer- all views and opinions expressed on this blog are just that, opinions.

Next post

~What to do with lead information?