Top 5 Ways to Market Yourself Online

Thanks to the Internet, we’re living in a golden age of communication. A person in the most remote part of the world still has the capacity to reach an audience of millions. At the same time, the need to stand out from the crowd heightens and marketing becomes more critical than ever.

The amount of ways that you can market yourself online is almost immeasurable. Of course, each method of marketing comes with its own set of pros and cons.

While no method is going to work universally, these are the top five ways that we’ve found for self-marketing.

Image Source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/rosauraochoa/3256859352/

SEO Through Backlinks

If you’re trying to market yourself online, then you more than likely have a website or some other product that you are trying to promote. The amount of page views that your site gets is a direct result of how well you’ve marketed yourself. When it comes to page views, nothing is more effective than SEO, or search engine optimization. Backlinking refers to inbound links that lead to your website. They boost your site’s overall ranking in major search engines such as Google and Bing.

To put it bluntly, backlinks are a critical part of almost any online and local search marketingcampaign. If you can get other sites to link to your content, you’ll be organically marketing yourself by placing your website right in front of people who are using local search for searching for what you’re offering.

Networking

In real life, one of the most effective ways to market yourself is to know the right people. The same holds true when it comes to online marketing. Knowing the people who can place a valuable link to your website or who can direct traffic through a favorable blog post is critical. Even if you’re not concerned with small business marketing SEO, having a good relationship with people who might review your product can have a tremendous amount of value for your marketing efforts.

Google+

Google has built something interesting through its Google+ social network; they’ve built a network that encourages people to share interests and share content with one another. For the self-marketer, though, there’s a hidden value to Google+.

Google has included a button on its network and now in its search results that lets users give a +1 to a page. The more pluses that a site earns, the higher it ranks. Thus, being active on Google+ and gaining pluses there will give you a boost in search engines, making your marketing efforts on Google+ effective in other areas of the web.

Build an Email List

This is one of the oldest marketing methods on the Internet, but it’s still effective even with email supposedly on the downswing. Having a person’s email address is the 2012 equivalent of having their name and home address a decade ago.

With an email address, you can communicate on an ongoing basis and consistently market towards a base audience. By offering some sort of newsletter or other offer that entices users who visit your site to give you their email address, you’ll be able to build a repeating customer base.

Understand the Power of Social Media

At this point in the Web 2.0 game, social media is known by everybody. It is still worth repeating, however, just how much social networks have become the backbone of the Internet. Facebook has hundreds of millions of active users. Twitter sees users publish one billion tweets per month. There is no doubt that social media is at the core of the Internet now, and if you’re marketing online at all, you need to understand how to use it to your advantage.
Source

How to Present and Sell Yourself Online

I’m constantly amazed by how many people just don’t know how to communicate their own story digitally. They may be okay in a job interview, at a cocktail party, or a run-in in the elevator, but when it comes to personal storytelling online, they become a deer in headlights.

Just look around. Have you ever seen a LinkedIn profile that immediately grabbed your attention, or a visual resume on SlideShare that blew your mind? These gems are very rare and hard to find online. Today, I want to empower you to become of those few who are doing it the right way. Here are 6 steps to presenting and selling yourself online.

Image Source: https://sweetdatings.wordpress.com/how-to-create-dating-profile/

Step 1: Know Thyself

You are never going to be able share your story, if you don’t know yourself. So, I have three suggestions: 1) Take a personality test like theMeyers-Briggs, DISC, or my personal favorite – The Predictive Index. These tests will provide a ton of insight on who you are in your natural state. Are you dominant? Do you get energized by people? Are you impatient? These answers are priceless. 2) Journal. The best way to process your life and experiences is to document them. It will help your capture a better sense of reality. 3) Discover your strengths. I recommend starting with the StrengthsFinder assessment test, since it will allow you to pinpoint your top-five strengths.

Step 2: Sharpen Your Knife

Once you determine your behavioral tendencies, find out your IQ and cognitive ability. How can you sell your abilities to someone if you don’t know what you truly bring to the table? My suggestion is to take a simple 12-question test called the Wonderlic. If you don’t like your results, then maybe it’s time to sharpen your skill set and expand your depth of knowledge.

Step 3: Focus on One Big Thing

I have always found that most interesting people are usually really good at 1 or 2 things. That’s what makes them pros, rather than amateurs. They have an insane focus. Find that one thing you are absolutely passionate about and go become an expert. The work, energy and investment you make will give you a storyline worth sharing.

Step 4: Embrace Brevity and Levity

Once you have a solid idea of who you are, and what your abilities and expertise are, you are probably ready to begin the digital storytelling process. If you are going to share your story online via a medium like SlideShare, you must absolutely focus on brevity and levity. No one is going to want to read your longwinded story. If you are that important, someone would have written an autobiography about you by now. So keep it simple in your approach — you only have a couple minutes of their attention, if that. Keep your story brief and to the point, and make sure you embrace a 30,000-foot perspective.

Step 5: Sell Your Problem-Solving Abilities

Here’s an interesting fact: Your pay is based on your ability to solve problems. If your biggest stress is about not burning the fries, then you will get paid according to that skill set. However, if your biggest stress is building and designing an employee incentive program, then you are probably in a whole different pay grade. If you are going to sell yourself online, sell your ability to solve problems.

Step 6: Create a Motto

Make sure you nail your selling points down to three simple takeaways. For instance, let’s say you are putting together a visual resume for your next employer. Your goal should be to condense your message into a slogan, personal statement or three takeaways like: Passionate. Experienced. Driven. Okay…maybe not that cheesy but you get the idea.

Selling and presenting yourself online is not an easy task. It requires an extra sense of awareness, coupled with a creative ability to construct a compelling narrative. With a little bit of practice, you’ll be able to do it in no time.

Read More: 4 Steps to Creating a Visual Resume That Stands Out

Source: https://blog.slideshare.net/2013/10/07/how-to-present-and-sell-yourself-online/

Eight Steps For Successfully Marketing Yourself Online

Now that the Internet is the new "black" and everyone is hopping online in the hopes of finding their gold online, there are a few things that need to be considered before jumping headlong into an online campaign.

We've been doing "online" for a long while now and we've seen many changes, but one thing has remained consistent: regardless of where you go or how you pitch, you must know your market and understand how to effectively reach them and abide by the rules of the online road. Here are a few to consider:

Image credit: http://www.markmontoya.com/OnlinePersonalBrandingSpecialist/2013/01/top-5-ways-to-market-yourself-online/

1) The importance of research: when it comes to marketing online, there's a term I am often reminded of: "spray and pray." What this means essentially is that you spray a whole bunch of stuff out there and hope that it works. Guess what? It doesn't. The Internet is big, there's no argument there. But just throwing stuff out online and hoping it'll work will only waste your time and probably upset a few bloggers you actually don't want to tick off. Do your research. Find the sites appropriate to your market and then get to know what they review, what they don't review and how to pitch them. Most sites have targeted guidelines for submitting pitches and review copies. Abide by them.

2) It's all about relationships: remember that much like offline promotion the Internet is all about relationships. Make them, hone them, and keep them for the life of your career. So how do you go about making and creating relationships? By networking. Online networking or cyber-schmoozing is a way of getting to know who's out there and who you could help with your message. Getting to know topic-related blogs, e-zines and websites and engaging with them is important. Follow your market on Twitter, follow other authors in your genre, follow the trendsetters. Make sure that you're reading their blogs, commenting on their blog entries and offering helpful advice. Which leads me to point #3:

3) Networking online: Want to know the difference between networking online vs. in person? Online you can be in your bathrobe and slippers and no one will know the difference. Lead with helpful information, don't lead with your book. No one (but your mom) cares that you wrote a book. Your audience, whether it's your reader or a blog dedicated to your market, wants to know what the book can do for them. Be helpful. You'd never go to a live networking event, walk up to a group of people and say: "Hi, please read my fabulous book." You shouldn't do it online, either.

4) Understanding page rank: Page rank is important, more so than most people realize. Whether you're marketing yourself online or you've hired a company to do this for you, make sure that you are targeting sites with decent page rank. So, what's page rank? Well, it's a number between 1-10 that Google assigns a site to indicate its "importance" online. By importance I mean sites that have a lot of (quality) sites linking to them and sites that are getting a significant amount of traffic. If you or the company you hired is pitching you to smallish page rank sites (i.e. 0, 1, 2) you should consider it a wasted effort. Generally speaking we won't go after sites that are below a 3 page rank unless it's a niche topic/smaller market. Our company website sits between a 5 and a 6. The lower the site's page rank, the less exposure you're going to get. It's that simple.

5) How to manage the prize vault: to some book bloggers books are boring. Well, not boring exactly, but if you're giving away a prize you might want to consider pairing your book with someone else. Consider the partnerships you have and see what you can pair with your book. We recently paired a title we worked on with a Brita water pitcher because the author had a relationship with the company. When I called Brita to arrange this they jumped all over it and sent us more pitchers than we knew what to do with. Prize packs are a great idea if you can pull together some fun giveaways. But don't bribe bloggers to review your book. Offer them the prize packs for their readers. Bribing and reviews aren't kosher, especially online (yes, we've seen it done, it's not pretty).

6) Touring on blogs: there are a lot of blog "tours" that will take you on a tour online for two weeks, then you're done. Guess what? Another waste of time. Online marketing isn't done lickety split, it's done over a long (or at least longer than two weeks) period of time. A short two-week tour is fine and fun, but trust me, you'll need more to create a buzz online - which leads me to #7

7) Slow growth over time: despite all the hype, the Internet doesn't respond well to quickie, instant success, in fact most online folks really dislike this type of marketing. The key to a really successful campaign that has legs (meaning buzz) is a slow growth. Now, I don't mean years of growing an online campaign, but definitely longer than 48 hours as some online companies may want you to believe. The objective is to create a presence online and to dig into your market. Relationships, whether offline or on, take time. Grow them, nurture them, and they will repay you back over months and years to come. So how do you grow slowly? Well dig into Facebook, start a Fan Page and add friends, network, engage. Start a Twitter page and really work the Twitter-sphere. Engage, entertain, enlighten and always, always, always be helpful.

8) The big Internet secret: Understanding backlinks: I will write a separate blog on this topic, but for now understand that the importance of backlinks is significant. So what's a backlink? Well, it's a link going from a site appropriate to your topic back to your site. And how many of these do you want? As many as you can get. The biggest and best push with online marketing is the link building, but again, this needs to be grown slowly over time. Adding thousands of links in a week or a month will only get you in trouble with the governing body of the Internet: Google. I mean let's face it, 78% of us use Google as our default search engine and if Google pulls your site for overly aggressive link building, your online marketing campaign will come to a screeching halt.

9) Your website: I'm really surprised at how many Internet marketers overlook this important point, but many do. Your website, the place your online world calls "home", is very important. If you're working so hard online via networking and link building and then sending your readers to a site that's sending them into "surf shock" (i.e. the kind of shock you go into when you land on a ghastly site), then what's the point of marketing yourself online? Sending readers/buyers/fans to a website that is repelling them instead of attracting them is like advertising and bringing visitors to your beautiful store then locking the doors and not letting them in. I will address the importance of a good website in a separate blog post in the coming weeks, but for now know this: if your site isn't converting the traffic you're sending it then what's the point in sending people there? By converting, I mean getting readers/fans to do something, whether it's sign up for your ezine, your blog RSS Feed or follow you on Twitter. Studies have shown that less than 7% of web visitors are prompted to buy the first time they land on a site so don't expect immediate sales to correlate with your traffic. Getting them to come back is the key to making the sale. And how do you get them to come back? By getting them to sign up for something (permission-based marketing) and then keeping them in your loop or inner circle.

Wondering why I said eight tips in the article title and offered nine? Well, that's another piece of advice: always, always, always over-deliver online. There are too many people short selling their consumer with faulty or misrepresented ads, low quality product or promises they don't deliver on. While it may sometimes seem tempting, don't subscribe to shortcuts. Not only will they not get you anywhere, but they can damage your reputation. Often permanently. 

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/penny-c-sansevieri/eight-steps-for-successfu_b_371191.html?

How to EFFECTIVELY market yourself on Facebook!

What do you think of this?

How to Make Money on Pinterest: 24 Tips

If you think Pinterest is just a place to post pictures of wedding dresses and baby photo ideas, think again. Pinterest is a great network to tap into to sell to people who prefer the more visual side of things. We know you’ve read plenty about how to set up your Pinterest profile, create boards, and build followers. So we’re going to skip all of that and dive right into ways you can monetize your Pinterest account by using it to grow your mailing list, sell products, offer services, increase book sales, and promote affiliate products. 

Grow Your Mailing List

Want to build your mailing list through Pinterest? While you can’t put an opt-in form directly on your Pinterest boards, you can encourage people to subscribe. Here are some tips to transition Pinterest users to your mailing list.

1. Pin an image of where people can go to subscribe. If you have a well-designed opt-in page, take a screenshot of it, upload it to Pinterest, edit the link to point back to your opt-in page, and tell people why they should describe in the description. This way, people who only follow you on Pinterest will know where to go for more information.
2. Focus on making the giveaway. If you have an incentive for signups, make sure you have some great images to represent it. This could include quotes from inside an e-book, stats from a whitepaper, or a sample of a free video training course.
3. Go with eye-catching stock photography. If you don’t have a giveaway or fancy opt-in page, find an image that gets people’s attention. Then make the description for the image count and, of course, link it to your opt-in page.
4. See what other businesses are doing to encourage signups from Pinterest by searching for call-to-action words like “sign up” and “join our mailing list.” You’ll get a lot of great ideas by checking out what others are doing.

Sell Digital Products

Whether you are selling an information course, app, or software, you have several options to promote it on Pinterest.

5. Share some statistics in an image. If there’s a great stat that would encourage people to buy your product, put it in a visually-appealing image, and pin it. For example, if you sell a mobile app that helps people get fit, share some statistics about fitness.
6. Turn your sales page into an infographic. Infographics are popular on Pinterest. Create a stunning infographic that takes people through a specific problem and how your product will help them. Then link the infographic to your real sales page.
7. Create an explainer video. This is a video that walks potential customers through identifying a specific problem and showing how your product will help them solve it. Remember that people’s attention spans are short; so you’ll need to make your points clearly, but also quickly. Include a link to your sales page in both the video and in the pin itself. That way, even if someone repins the video, your link will be with it regardless.
8. Offer a preview on Pinterest. If you have a video course, share one of the videos from the course on Pinterest, and link the video and your pin back to your sales page so people can learn more.

Sell Physical Products

Physical products are the best sellers on Pinterest. Here’s how to photograph yours to increase the likelihood of click-throughs and sales.

9. Show your product in use. In addition to traditional product images, show your product in use. If it’s home decor, photograph it in an appropriately decorated room. If it’s a makeup product, show someone applying it. If it’s clothing, show someone wearing it in a real-life situation, like a business suit in a meeting. Show people what it would be like to own the product.
10. Repin your customer’s photos of how they use your products. Get additional content for your Pinterest boards that work like testimonials. Offer customers an incentive if they share a pin they have posted of them using your product. This will show potential customers visiting your profile even more real-life applications of your product.
11. Take advantage of Pinterest’s rich pins functionality. This will help your product — and your business — stand out on Pinterest.
12. Offer a discount with a product photo. This way, people will not just see the product, but will also get excited about the discount, potentially generating more sales.

Offer Services

Do you have a service-based business? If the answer is yes, you can promote it on Pinterest in the following ways.

13. Create a portfolio board with examples of your work. Edit each pin and link it back to your portfolio page or your sales page for that particular service.
14. Turn customer testimonials into fancy quote images and pin them to a testimonial board. Edit each pin and link it back to your testimonials page or your sales page for that particular service.
15. Pin video testimonials from your customers to that same testimonials board.
16. Share small tips. For example, if you’re a Web designer, maybe you could have a board with a “tip of the week” for small business website design such as adding a beautiful footer design to your website. If businesses who follow you can’t implement your design tip, they might call upon you to do it for them.

Increase Book Sales

Do you have a book or e-book for sale? Want to spread the word (pun intended!) on Pinterest? Try these tricks!

17. Create a board on your Pinterest profile for your books or e-books. This way, people visiting your profile can get to know you as an author and easily find your work.
18. Create those fancy images with a great quote in them. Upload them directly to Pinterest, then edit the pin to add a link to your book or e-book.
19. Better yet, create a landing page on your website for the book. On that page, include a section of pinnacle quotes, and encourage visitors to share them on Pinterest using the Pin It button and a call to action. Think of it like the movie websites where they offer desktop wallpapers, but pinnacle images for your book instead.
20. Run a contest where people have to pin a book they want to win and explain what they hope to learn from it. Not only do you get entrants excited about the book and ready to buy if they don’t win it, but it creates mini-Pinterest testimonials across the network. Be sure that your contest doesn’t overstep thePinterest contest guidelines.

Promote Affiliate Products

Affiliate marketing on Pinterest can be tricky. There was a time when you could pin an image from an affiliate link or edit the link associated with the image to an affiliate link. But while there are no official rules in the Pinterest Terms of Service about whether or not you can use affiliate links, they do fight them. For example, if you have an Amazon affiliate link to a product you’ve pinned, Pinterest will strip the “tag=youraffiliate-20″ from the link when it forwards Pinterest users to Amazon.

An alternative to this was to post a bit.ly (or other) shortened link to the item instead, but now Pinterest either warns users about the link before they get redirected to the site or blocks it all together. This also goes for redirect links that you create on your own website.

So how do you promote affiliate products on Pinterest? Here are some tips.

21. Test the affiliate link first. Pinterest strips tags from known affiliate networks like Amazon, but smaller networks and websites may make it through. Until someone reports them at least.
22. Pin images from your review post about a product. This way, people can click the affiliate link from your review post instead.
23. Pin images from list-style posts like “My 50 most recommended favorite marketing books of 2013.” People love lists, and if each of your items has an affiliate link, then you’re likely to get sales.
24. Pin a YouTube video review of an affiliate product with an affiliate link. While Pinterest strips tags and causes problems for links on Pinterest, this link will come from YouTube and can’t be monitored by Pinterest.

Bottom Line

Pinterest requires you to get creative about the ways you visually represent your mailing list, products, services, and affiliate products. It’s all about the image. only great images will see likes, comments, shares, and click-throughs from this audience.

Source: http://monetizepros.com/blog/2013/24-ways-to-make-money-with-pinterest/

How to Make Money on Instagram: 30 Proven Tips

Instagram started as an image-only-based network, but has now expanded its functionality to include 15-second videos to trump rival Vine, which offers 7-second videos. This gives you a great way to market the areas of your business that will help you make money online. In this guide, we’re going to skip the basics of setting up an Instagram account and instead dive into the ways you can increase your earnings by growing your mailing list, selling products, offering services, promoting books, promoting webinars, and marketing affiliate products via Instagram.

Note that links on Instagram aren’t clickable, but they will be if you share your Instagram posts to Twitter, Facebook, and Tumblr. For those viewing your post on their Instagram app, make the link memorable (http://bit.ly/free15tips vs. http://bit.ly/dlI03Cl) and make sure the target squeeze / landing page is mobile optimized with a responsive design. Keep this in mind throughout the post as many will link to the specific thing you are working on — mailing list squeeze pages, product landing pages etc.

Another reason to keep your links short and memorable? You’re going to manually have to enter them into the image / video description on your mobile phone.

Grow Your Mailing List

First, let’s start with growing your mailing list. For all of these tips, make sure you include a customized squeeze page for your mailing list that matches the image / video that you share on Instagram.

1. Promote your latest lead magnet using images or video. For example, if you’re giving away an e-book, share a screenshot of the cover. If you’ve created an educational video, share a 15-second highlight of that video.
2. Create a personal message inviting people to subscribe. Use the 15-second video recording to create a video greeting for potential subscribers telling them why they should join your mailing list.
3. Do you get replies from happy subscribers? Ask if you can use their replies as testimonials for your list, then create an image that has the best part of their reply, name, and website. Share it on Instagram.
4. Leak some stats and tips from your lead magnet as images. These should be teaser quotes that will make people want to subscribe to learn more.
5. Take a screenshot of your best looking opt-in form and tell people why they want to subscribe in the description for the image.

Sell Products

Do you sell physical or digital products? Here are some ways to promote them on Instagram.

6. Run a pre-launch on Instagram with teaser photos and videos of your new product. Get people intrigued enough that they are dying to know what you are launching. Increase the hype by adding on a customized product hashtag.
7. Create 15-second commercials for your product. Specifically make sure you can highlight the best parts of your product and get a shortened website URL into the 15 seconds.
8. Do you have video testimonials from customers? Mash up the best 15 seconds of those testimonials and share them as Instagram video.
9. Create collages of photos from fans who share photos of them using your products with a particular hashtag.
10. Turn your customer Instagram photos into an album on your website. (Get their permission first, of course.) Show potential customers how happy people are with your products, and it will increase the likelihood of a sale.

Offer Services

Instagram offers lots of ways to promote your service-based business, whether you are a Web designer or accountant. Here are some tips.

11. Turn your Instagram into a portfolio of work you have done for clients. It can be a screenshot of a graphic design, shots from your latest wedding, you reading a letter from a satisfied customer on video, or similar.
12. Follow your target customers and critique their work. A product designer could easily follow big brands and share some feedback about their latest product packaging. You never know where this could lead.
13. Create a commercial for your services. Specifically make sure you can make a description of a problem and how your service can solve it fit into 15 seconds.
14. Invite your target customers to submit a photo that represents a particular problem they are having using a unique hashtag. Turn it into contest where you give a free 30-minute consultation. The winner will likely want to buy services from you, and the ones who don’t win will be interested in the same.
15. Create images with testimonials from clients as part of your social proof.

Promote Books

If you have authored a book on Amazon or just give away a book as a lead magnet, these tips can help you get more exposure, sales, and downloads.

16. Screenshot your five-star reviews and share a snippet of them with a link to your book. It allows you to brag about your book using someone else’s words.
17. Create images with quotes from the book, or share images directly from the book. Go with the parts that will get potential readers most interested in buying.
18. Create images with questions that can be answered by parts of the book. Include a page number as an additional bonus to get people excited about buying and finding the answer.
19. Share a screenshot of any special sales or discounts for your book as they happen.
20. Get a video from your book signings to boost credibility and authority for yourself as an author.

Promote Webinars

A webinar is a great way to sell products, as the conversion rate is significantly higher than email blasts and sales pages alone. The more people in attendance, the better. Here are some tips to promote your webinar on Instagram.

21. Create a 15-second preview video for your webinar, preferably with the main presenter but, if not, then record the host getting people excited about it.
22. Send reminder graphics about the date of the webinar. Also create a graphic to show the webinar is live.
23. If you’ve received great feedback about previous webinars, turn them into image testimonials to share before your upcoming webinar.
24. If you have more than one speaker (such as a Google+ hangout), then get their head shots and collect them into a collage.
25. Share an image that represents something that only attendees will receive for free, like a sneak into the product you are selling on the webinar.

Increase Affiliate Products Sales

As an affiliate marketer, here are some ways you can use Instagram to boost affiliate sales. Note that you have two options for sharing links with any of these posts: links to a review you have written for an affiliate product, or actual affiliate links. If you do include affiliate links, they must be noted as such.

26. Show genuine enthusiasm for a product you purchased and are an affiliate for. Use multiple image and video updates to get your followers excited about purchasing.
27. Share images and videos that show results for a particular affiliate product. Nothing drives people to want to learn more about a particular product than seeing people who have gained measured results.
28. Create 15-second review videos that encourage people to click through to your review to learn more.
29. If you have followers who are interested in making money online, share your referral link so that they can become affiliates under you for second tier commissions. Use a screenshot of your latest affiliate commissions to attract them to the program.
30. Promote a bonus if people buy through your affiliate link. Create an image or 15-second commercial for your bonus.

Bottom Line

You may not think much of Instagram beyond people posting pictures of their lunch, pets, and kids. But with the right followers and messages, Instagram can be a hotbed in your quest to make money online.

Source: http://monetizepros.com/blog/2013/30-ways-to-make-money-with-instagram/

Email Marketing 101

Social media might get all the glory, but email marketing is the most direct way to get your information in front of the consumer.

Everyone has an email address which is essentially a personal point of contact. Most people will check their email at least once a day, if not multiple times (considering how available email is thanks to smart phones, laptops, and tablets.) Social media’s biggest problem is the limiting of your access to your customers. For example, even if your Facebook page has 10k “likes”, at best your posts will reach only a fraction of those individuals. In comparison, email marketing ensures your material gets sent directly to the individual with the only limitation being whether or not they choose to open your message. It doesn’t get much more direct than that. Email marketing also offers a surprisingly high return on investment and can be very cost-effective.

Now that we’ve covered why you should choose email marketing, let’s get to the basics of how to go about it.

Find Your Platform

First, find the email marketing campaign tool that is the most user friendly to you. Mail Chimp, Aweber, and Vertical Response are all popular thanks to their simple analytics, response tools, and easy to operate interfaces, but there are plenty of other options. Check in with your small business network to see who they use to manage their email campaigns. Feel free to try out a few different ones before settling on what works best for you. Again, trial and error plays a great role in discovery for these types of efforts. The good news is that many platforms offer free trials so you can see if they work for you before you commit to one.

Write Good Subject Lines, Follow With Good Content

Once you’ve got a platform selected, it’s time to work on the content. Your first priority is your subject line. A subject has to be enough to get your email opened and the rest of your content read. Nobody wants to be fast tracked to the spam folder and an enticing subject line is the only way to avoid the trash. Once you’ve convinced someone to open the email, make sure the message content is relevant and worth their time. Keep it interesting and of value to the recipient. Emails are the preferred and expected way to receive promotions for most people, so if you have discounts or coupons you want to offer, include them accordingly–and mention them in your subject line.

Other Action Items:

• Make it easy to read!
• Give people a reason to want to open your email.
• Make it simple for people to subscribe to your email list. Post a signup link or info box wherever your social media followers are most active.
• Make sure you have consistent branding on all of your marketing efforts, including email blasts and social media.
• Integrate emails with your other social media platforms. Be sure to include a link to your other social media platforms on your email blast and make it easy for consumers to find you.
• Don’t spam your subscribers – have an editorial calendar and a schedule for how you do blasts. Once a week is a good start. Don’t let months go in-between mailings. Decide how often to send and stick with it.

Email may not be as flashy as some contact methods, but it works and you can’t argue with that. Use these tips and information to get started today.

Source: http://freshlime.com/smb-tools/email-marketing-101/