Maillist cash Extraction Goldmine part 1

 

Contents

Introduction 

Overview of List Management – Part 1

 Understanding List Management 1

 Always Be Truthful

 The Role of Your List: Always at the Front of Your Mind

 Listen to Your List - Reap the Rewards

 The Rating System

 E-zines and Newsletters

 Personal List - Mixed Content

Summary

Overview of List Management – Part 2

 Personal List, Affiliate and Ad Content

 The Ad List

 Divide and Conquer

 The Personal Touch

 All Done - Now It’s Your Turn

Summary

Overview of List Management – Part 3

 List Building Methods

 Quality over Quantity

 Getting Started

 Throwing Out Prospects Doesn’t Get You Organized

 Am I Building My List While Doing This?

 Professionalism Revisited Where your Most Effective List Comes from

 The Ultimate Tried and Tested List Builder

 Be Careful Not To Interrupt Your Sales Process

 Maximizing Subs Without Losing Sales

 Non-Profit Resource Building

 A Few Last Words

Summary..

Introduction

List maintenance is one of the most important subjects in online marketing.

Your list is your number one and most basic bottom level output for your

promotions. It’s expensive and time consuming to gather, but forms one of

the most powerful resources and profit potential you have.

For this reason, we need to understand exactly how it works. Throughout

my time in online marketing, I’ve tried many different formats. There are

clear differences that allow some methods to come out on top, while some

fail miserably.

Depending on your business, there are several solutions that might be

right for you. For this reason, we need to look at the big five to allow you to

decide which one is going to make you the most cash.

Let’s do it.

Overview of List Management – Part 1

● To show you why you need to decide which method you're going to use

to maintain your list before you even start building it for maximum positive

effect.

● To explain why it's so hard to change mid flow, once you've already

started.

● To show that to get people to listen and take notice of you and avoid

complaints, there's a few things that you'll need to tell the customer

beforehand.

● To set solid goals for your list, and map out where you want it to go in

the future.

● To show you how powerful your list actually is to you, and to display how

much more earning potential some methods have over others, and how

you're going to capitalize on that.

● To introduce the rating system which will be assisting your decision on

how you're going to maintain your list when from the moment the first

subscriber arrives.

● To talk about the advantages and disadvantages of the first list

maintenance type, a standard e-zine or newsletter to your target market.To reveal the first of the most powerful list type that you could possibly

have in your hands, and how to deal with the subscribers and make the

most cash out of it.

Understanding List Management 1

Let’s discuss the various methods of list maintenance that have proven

successful for many marketers, and the up sides and the downsides that

come with them, because to be totally honest with you, there's no way me,

or any other person or guide can ever tell you what’s best in this situation

without knowing you, your business, and your future plans, and what

you're going to use your list for.

Please understand that this is no technical report. I won't be showing you

around autoresponders or telling you the best ones to use, or how to use

them. No, this is far more important, and will generally form the shape of

your future promotions and of course how successful they will become,

and in what way.

So without further ado, lets get talking about the fundamentals and the

type of things you should be looking at for a start. During this guide we'll be

looking at how each management technique affects your response rate,

your customer loyalty, the amount you earn from your list, and what type of

promotion it's suited to, such as your own products, joint ventures or purely

affiliate marketing. We'll also take into account the money you can earn from selling ads to that list, which isn't quite as important as you may think

right now.

Always Be Truthful

So, lets get started. The number one thing that I need to tell you right now,

before we even look at these methods is to make 100% sure that the

people signing up know what they're getting themselves into. For example,

how many e-zines or newsletters have you ever subscribed to only to find

out that they're not actually e-zines and newsletters, just ad lists (which to

be honest aren't all that bad in particular situations, but we'll be getting to

that in a moment).

The choice you make now will shape your business far in to the future, but

more importantly whatever you tell your customers and subscribers they'll

be getting will shape your response rate considerably, and that's obviously

something we'll want to take into account from the very start. So there we

have it. Rule number one, never tell your customers they're getting

something then deny them that, or send them things that they haven't

requested or didn't know about, because not only will that get you into

trouble, but it will also affect the loyalty and trust these customers and

subscribers have with you, which is so important.What we’re aiming to build here is a targeted and effective list that has

response rates through the roof depending on what you're promoting.

Don't forget this also includes affiliates, and may form a large part of your

affiliate base. Which brings me onto one more point, before we look

through the four majorly used techniques for different types of lists through

different marketers.

The Role of Your List Should Always be
at the Front of Your Mind

What's your list there for? Promotion and to allow you to make money from

the subscribers selling products that either you've created, or affiliate

products in your target market, to build joint ventures, and of course

increase your affiliate numbers and quality. But there's one more thing I

want you to be aware of. Where do I get all this information? Through ad

tracking, true, but my list is also a very important part of this.

Listen to Your List & Reap the Rewards

I know what to sell to them because they tell me what they want. I know

when my websites suck or look plain ugly because I ask them. I know what

they're interested in buying, the most effective headlines and language to

use when typing out ads in relation to my list, who are in effect my target

market. So you see, again we're promoting not just for profit, but to learn valuable lessons at the same time. Your list provides as much useful data

as your advert tracking, no matter how small. This Is your key to

developing a successful business that is aimed at your target market, and

creating a sales system that works, not just in your eyes, but in the eyes of

the people that are most important to you. And that's your customer, the

person who at the end of the day is going to make you a whole lot of

money if treated right.

So here's the deal. Ask. Don't feel stupid about sending out mails to your

list that aren't adverts, or that might seem like random babble to you. To

them, not only will they feel closer to you personally, no matter what

technique you use below, (which in turn will have them reading more often)

but it'll give you really important results about you newest product, your

website or even an idea that you have for a product that you'd like

feedback on before you even start. Use your list in this way.

Promote to learn, not to make a profit, and you'll end up with far more cash

at the end of the year than if you just assume, guess or don't bother

(Which seems to be many marketers out there). Don't be one of them. Get

the knowledge you need to succeed from your customers before they even

hand you their money. It works wonders for you, your reputation, your

knowledge and your pockets. Ask your list if you're not sure. It's so

powerful that it'd be a complete waste if not utilized properly. If you're right,

great, go for it. If you're wrong, your list will tell you so, great again. You

can fix it and pocket the cash at the same time. I can't think of a fairer deal

than that. Keep it in mind. Your list is more than a bunch of names. It's a

bunch of opinions, and real important ones at that.Next up, I'm going to talk to you about the four main methods successful

marketers use to maintain their lists. Each one with a different use and

purpose, and each one has its ups and downs. Granted I'm biased towards

two of them, and I'll tell you why when we get there. But like I said, there's

no way for me to tell you how to run your business. All I can do is tell you

the most effective ways of going about it, and let you decide what's most

convenient for you and where you want your business to go.

The Rating System

Let's also have a little bit of fun here, too, and introduce a rating system to

make things interesting. As we discuss each of these techniques, I'll talk to

you about their pros and cons, and where they would most likely be used,

and you can decide if it'll be relevant to you. I'm also going to give these a

starred rating system that will show you the most significant stats related to

running such a list. Understand that each list will vary, and these star

ratings are only to give you an idea after talking to over a hundred

successes with their lists in the following categories. The star rating will be

one to five:

Unsubscription Rate: One star means a high unsubscription rate per

mailing, and five stars means the best, a low unsubscription rate per

mailing.

Subscription Rate: How easy it is to get people to subscribe to the list

using a variety of different methods. The subscription rate at one star is the

hardest, and at five stars is the easiest. Ad income: Ad income is the amount of money that's earned through

selling adverts to the list. One star is the worst, or the least amount of

money earned through ad selling, and five stars is the best, or the most

amount of money earned through ad selling.

JV Circle: This is the ease of using your list as a bargaining tool, for

example in ad swaps or product launches, and specific joint venture

opportunities. One star is the worst, which is also the least valuable in

terms of gaining joint ventures, and five stars is the best, the most valuable

that marketers want to get their hands on for joint ventures.

Response Rate over Time: Response rate over time, measures how

quickly the quality of the list diminishes, for example when sending endless

paid for ads and nothing else, the response rate goes down over time. One

star is the worst, where response rate over time goes down badly, five

stars is the best, where people keep reading and even wait for your mail to

arrive in their inboxes in the morning.

General Usefulness: For things such as research, surveys and requesting

information, testimonials etc. Five stars is the best, easiest to get results

from. One star is the worst, the hardest to get results from.

Maintenance Time: The time it takes per issue to put together and send

out. One star is the worst, taking a lot of time to prepare and send. And,

five stars is the best, the fastest, and the easiest to prepare and send out.Important note here: These are base figures and your exact results may

be higher or lower than the following. It's more to give you some insight

into aiming your business in the right direction than to give you exact

figures and numbers and guaranteed base earning, response rate, income,

number of JV prospects etc.

The Four Methods of List Maintenance

E-zine Or Newsletter: The e-zine, or newsletter, is a list of people that you

gather, and send information related to your target market on a weekly, bi￾weekly, fortnightly or monthly basis. The idea is the useful content that you

send them will have them want to keep reading and open your mail each

time, keeping your response rates and read rates high.

OK so here we have it. The staple of most online marketers before they hit

is big, and sometimes even after, the well-known e-zine list. I'm sure you'll

already know from reading the intro here that this method in itself can

actually become a lot of work. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not afraid of

work, obviously, seeing as I'm sitting here writing a half million word report

spread over 15 manuals, but when it gets to a particular point, it may not

be prudent for you to run an e-zine anymore. This however is a good place

to start if you have the time.

Expect to have to present an issue of your e-zine every week or two weeks

and avoid leaving long, long gaps in between mailings, otherwise, quite

simply people will forget you. This is a great place to start if you're starting out, for the simple reason people like free info, and it's so much easier to

get people to subscribe to this type of list compared to others, even when

there's freebies involved. Of course, you will have to know a lot about your

field of expertise to present regular useful issues, or even pull in outside

articles from publishers to use as content.

The catch is you'll have to be on top of things, and it does take some time

to come up with good content for issues. The up side to this is people will

be waiting for your e-zine. If it's good and keeps people reading content

wise, it's a surefire way to keep response rates up and to make a

connection with your subscribers, the personal touch, which in turn will add

up to trust and a higher purchase rate for your own products.

The next upside to this is that you can sell ads for cash. To whom? To your

subscribers of course. It's an instant quick way to earn cash, by selling

large solo ads that go out separately from the e-zine, to smaller ads that

precede each issue, and even cheaper, mid and smaller ads contained

within the issue. It's a good all rounder in fact. The downside here is many

e-zines turn into ad lists (Category 4, which we'll talk about later). When

the ads massively outnumber the useful content, subscribers start to feel

cheated and leave. I've been there before, and if you've tested out or

subscribed to some e-zines before you may have seen this.

Another great thing here is prospects. Your e-zine is attracting people who

are in your field of expertise and may have lists of their own. This in turn

increases your prospects for joint ventures, meeting new contacts that can sometimes spiral into full blown products (This course for example is a

product of such a case).

Another great thing about the newsletter and e-zine is it can be quite

personal. As the readers and subscribers get used to you as a publisher,

and you become white listed (In their spam filers and in their minds) you'll

see a greater interest in your products, because after all, you're not just

another marketer out there spouting rubbish to everyone to make a quick

buck. You're a trusted publisher in an authoritative role, and people will

listen to you, and buy your stuff. This takes time though. Don't expect to

become well know to all your subscribers overnight.

Unsubscription Rate: **** Many e-zines have become successful

because of their great response rates and low unsubscription rates due to

good content. A small lapse though and this can all go pear shaped,

especially when it starts to turn into an ad list and subscribers trust is

broken.

Subscription Rate: **** A higher than average subscription rate is good

news. Reasons for this include people liking to get useful content for free.

Once you've proven to them that this is the case, it's not unlikely they'll tell

their friends. Word of mouth is a powerful thing. With so many dud e-zines

out there that are just ad lists, it can be hard to persuade people that your

list is quality. Use example issues, or a website of back issues to combat

this and prove you are what you say you are.Ad income: ***** Excellent and steady ad income from your subscriber

base. Compared to other lists that don't even sell ads, this is a great way to

bring in the few extra thousand dollars per month. Be careful not to over do

this though, as subscribers may start deleting mail from you on the basis

they think it's an ad rather than anything useful.

JV Circle: ** Only two stars here for a few reasons. The main one being if

you're already selling ads, it's quite likely that your joint ventures or any ad

swaps you may do with other marketers may reflect the cost at which you

sell your ads. Personal non public lists are far more desirable in general,

and are much more valuable when put on the bargaining table. There is,

however, an income to be had here through joint venture affiliate

promotion, a free ad for a percentage of the profits. If your list is

particularly good though, and your ad cost low enough, the promoter may

instead opt just to buy the ad themselves and bypass the need to pay you

a percentage of each sale.

Response Rate Over Time: *** Response rate over time is again higher

than average. Of course this stat varies a lot depending on if your

subscribers are actually interested in what you're sending them or not. If

not you may see your response rates dwindle. Another danger here is the

use of freebies. Get a list of non spenders and freebie seekers, send too

many special offers, and they'll come to expect it, which will also have an

effect on your profits. This also applies to outside ads that people may

have no interest in that you may be selling. This can only be bad for your

subscriber base.General usefulness: *** Very handy to get that all important information

from your subscribers. Many have asked why their subscribers never write

to them. I tell them that they need to ask them to write to them about

something that affects them, and they will. Again, third party ads can be a

distraction, but all in all, if your content is good and people are reading, this

is prime research material, albeit not quite as personal as some of the

other list types, which can bring in a lower response.

Maintenance Time: * One star. Ouch. You want people to keep reading

your e-zine? Well you have to make sure they stay interested, balance the

amount of adverts with the amount of content, write articles or organize

consent from third parties. If you're a writer and enjoy this, great, go for it.

But many of us just don't have the time to write a full fledged e-zine every

week, because we're busy with other products and projects. It's hard work

alright, but if you don't believe there's anything more productive that you

can be doing, or enjoy writing and editing your e-zine, keep at it. The

results and income both from your own ads, and paid ads is worth it in the

long and short term.

Summary: A great place to start if you have no list at all right now. The

ease of pulling subscribers when you're giving them good content beats

any other type of list out there. If you don't mind high maintenance and

putting a lot of time into this, the e-zine or newsletter may just be for you. If

however you're short on time, or don't enjoy writing articles particularly, the

other lists may be more up your street. The results, however, from running

this type of list are plain to see and are very encouraging. Just be careful how you balance out ads and content. And hey, if things get too much in

the future, you can always slowly evolve the e-zine into one of the other list

types, which is how many marketers start out. It is hard work, but a great

little earner, and an investment for the future.

Personal List - Mixed Content

Personal mixed content list is a list gathered by you, that you don't use to

sell outside ads to on a regular basis. Mailings contain research, new

product information for your customers, a few articles that you write, the

odd tips here and there, testimonial requests, and of course the ads for

your own products. Mailings are very similar to an e-zine, except for the

mixed content and the lower sales of ads to third parties. They also require

less content on your part.

One of the most highly used list types by specialist marketers, and in my

personal opinion, definitely one of the most interesting and robust of the

lot. Imagine having a list of your own, which generally comprises of

customers that know who you are, trust your word, many of them having

bought from you before or subscribed to your list for the simple sake of

following the progress and watching what you do as an authoritative figure

in your chosen field of expertise. All of these factors come together to

make a highly responsive list and one heck of a joint venture bargaining

tool.These types of lists are usually an evolution of some sort, either from

previously published e-zines or newsletters, but of course you can go

down this route right away if you think it'll be beneficial, and it probably will

be. What we've got here is the quality without having to do the work, and in

some cases, considering the content you'll be sending your list is solely

related to you and the projects you get involved with, it's more personal

and has higher response rates than even some of the best e-zines,

especially when your subscribers get to know you, or you make your mark

as an authority. Bottom line is, you don't have to spend ages publishing a

newsletter every week, packing it with masses of useful content to see a

profitable list.

See if you play your cards right and gain the trust you need over time, you

don't need to seduce people with masses of content, they're just happy to

be receiving something for free from a respected marketer. That's great

news for you, because the more you mail them, the more you teach them,

share with them and have contact with them, the more trust you'll get.

Usually this comes in the form of short articles, snippets or insights into

what you're doing to succeed.

For example, many of these lists’ often owned by the well-known

marketers, send small snippets of the letters they receive, their ad tracking

results for a particular project, some small tips, and interesting story that

applies to the subscribers interests that they learned that day. Contained

within is the ad for a related product. Not all the time of course. It totally

depends on whether your goal is to sell, educate, recruit affiliates or get them to tell their friends about you and talk (very powerful) etc. The fact is

it's interesting. Reality TV even though on a larger scale is a big hit, but

this is definitely similar with its entertainment value, but goes even further

through education.

Who do you admire? Is there someone you want to be like or at least

follow in the footsteps of, someone that is already doing something you

want to do, and doing it well? If you had a choice, would you want to get on

their e-zine list that sends you a list of outside published articles each

week or on their personal list where you get an insight into what they're

doing and what makes them successful? I know which I'd choose. So you

see, again, the underlying features are the same. It's a list of people you're

going to get to buy your stuff, but this time around it's far more focused on

you, and the type of people that are subscribing here are the doers. The

people that are interested in what you have to say. This is something very

powerful that also contributes to the response rate that comes from these

lists when selling your products.

So aside from the eased workload, more time to concentrate on your

product creation, and developing new ideas, and the increased response

rate and trust you gain from these valuable subscribers, what else do we

have? Well, let me tell you that what you've just created here by choosing

this method is pure money in your pocket. Your list, your personal list that

you don't allow anyone access to, packed with people that trust you, ready

to take your word that something is good, will help them, or is worth buying

is an important bargaining chip See, once upon a time before you started list building here, you had to

exchange products and high commissions for joint ventures solely related

to sales. Now though, not only will your in demand list )that no one has

access to but you) put you ahead in the bartering process of gaining joint

ventures, but it'll also sell your products, increase your reputation and allow

your resources to grow even further. So you see, once you start with this

type of list, expect it to spiral and it will be far easier to build on this in the

future.

But you might say to me “I don't have a reputation to go on. People won't

listen to me unless I have one or they think I have something useful to

say”. You're quite right too, but you can fix that. For example, back when I

first started out with online marketing, a friend of mine started up a website

with a free option and a paid option. I joined up and sat back for a few

months being lazy like I was back then, when I had no concept of actual

work. A couple of months later I dawdled back and had a chat with this

friend. He informed me that he added a mail your down line option. I was

told that I could mail them a training series or two if I wanted in an effort to

convert some free members into paid members. I agreed.

The problem was I didn't know much back then. The only thing I knew for

certain was related to lead-generation, hence all these free members piling

up in my down line. So I figured I'd teach them what I know, and send them

a few guides, which is exactly what I did, and they listened, for the simple

reason I included a screenshot of my inbox from the previous weeks of

free members signing up in my down line. It was a shot of my inbox with pages of 'You have a new member' subject lines and e-mail bodies. That

was all. Everyone’s ears were pricked and paying attention. I started

receiving requests to join my list, joint venture offers, people asking me

what to do via e-mail, if they could have more, and when I'll be sending

further issues. All I did was demonstrate that what I was saying actually

worked, not to mention they were only free signups not paid ones that I

was showing them, yet they were still so interested.

I've taken that lesson everywhere with me ever since that day, and it's

served me well. Provide proof that you have the answers to others

questions, even on a small scale, and people will listen to you. So you see,

it doesn't matter if this is your first day in online marketing. If you sent me a

mail in a week’s time telling me you've arranged 20 successful JV's in one

week, come up with 10 new products and have already developed four of

them, each one ready to launch and sell at $500, I'd listen in if you showed

me it was true. See how that isn't even directly related to how much money

you're earning? This is how to run one of these lists. Enough of that for

now though, because I've got a lovely wad of text for you later on about

how to make peoples ears spark up and listen, along with more examples.

I hope that gave you a little insight to my thoughts and how you can get

started without being a big well known marketer that everyone already

trusts. This list is by no means out of anybodies league that knows what

they're talking about in their current field of expertise.

So there we have it, great JV prospects, not too much work for anyone,

great response rates, builds trust and your reputation. Amazing stuff, as strong as the upsides are, the downsides equal it. First up, your ad income

is going to be cut drastically compared to the standard e-zine, unless you

start actually selling ads, which defeats the object and devalues your joint

venture prospects if done often or over long periods of time. This isn't

really a huge downer though, because you'll likely be getting a lot more out

of it than you would simply selling $200 solo ads twice a week through

your e-zines, but in the way of JV income and resources.

Here's the real kicker though. If you screw up, you're in big trouble and

may in extreme circumstances have to start all over again. You being an

authoritative figure, taking all that time to build up trust, and after one bad

decision, one bad joint venture with the wrong person, and your rep is in

tatters, and you have a lot of groveling to the subscribers to do to make up

for it. I can think of several examples where marketers’ reputations have

been tarnished, some even to the point of them quitting the business,

because this important resource they built up over the years was

destroyed by a JV with someone unreliable or that has a bad reputation

that they didn't know about.

Do your research, don't take big joint ventures lightly, and this won't

happen to you. The biggest risk, but with the biggest reward, as always.

Unsubscription Rate: ***** Generally you'll find once you've built the trust

with your subscribers they won't leave unless you particularly annoy them

or do something brash. Beware though, bad news travels faster than good,

and a slip up here could cost you a lot Subscription Rate: *** Getting subscribers here can be a lot harder, but

the rewards greater. As these lists are generally smaller than a large sized

e-zine, the numbers can seem a little off putting, but it's far better to have a

list of 1000 dedicated loyal customers that buy from you over and over,

than a list of 100k who don't even read your mailings. Remember quality

over quantity. Many subscribers may have also bought from you before.

Ad income: * Virtually zero direct ad income. It's possible to sell small ads

to people if you get short of cash, but it can be harder to do if your list is

smaller and more focused than some of the e-zines out there. It's even

harder to charge the price it's worth for this very same reason. If you do

decide to sell ads here and there, keep it rare. Very rare, or your list will

lose it's purpose and subscribers will move on. Don't forget to push your

response rate tracking stats too, or you may find people don't buy at your

higher prices for smaller numbers and stick with an e-zine ad, which to an

uneducated eye, provides better value for money.

JV Circle: ***** Due to the personal nature of this list, it's easy to start

talking to people, specific subscribers even, and to become a target for

other marketers with similar lists in the same category. Don't be surprised

to find yourself in high demand as this is prime territory to create many a

profitable joint venture. That list of people I was sending reports to that we

talked about earlier, that was my first mailing, and I still have a bunch of

them on my messenger contact list. From just one mailing. Not bad huh?

This is what joint venture prospects look like and is by far the most

effective way to get them.Response Rate Over Time: **** Great response rates over time are

expected due to the trust you build with these people in such a personal

manner. Unless you mess something up big time, loose their trust, annoy

them or suddenly stop offering them the insight and knowledge they're

looking for, they'll keep reading what you have to say, buying your

products, and checking out your recommendations. This is especially

useful for inflating the value of your list to your JV circle. Watch what you

mail very carefully though. One slip up or bad move and it could all be

gone.

General usefulness: **** Who's more responsive, your friends and

acquaintances or random people you put questions to on the street?

Again, this is where the personal touch is handy. As far as they're

concerned, they're getting something very important from you. Make sure

to ask for something in return in the way of surveys which should be aimed

in the general direction of assisting the subscribers in some way, even if

you're publishing the results for their use, a great research tool at your

fingertips.

Maintenance Time: *** Three stars and very variable. Sometimes it can

take you ten minutes to write a mailing, sometimes less, sometimes a lot

more, depending on what you've got to say, which makes maintenance

time hard to judge unless seeing each circumstance in turn. Not as bad as

a fully-fledged e-zine, though not as quick as some of the lists we have yet

to talk about. This is a good bet if you're short on time, or want to dedicate your days to something more productive, or just don't like writing e-zines

and doing research and using outside articles.

Important note here: These are base figures and your exact results may

be higher or lower than the stated. It's more to give you some insight into

aiming your business in the right direction than to give you exact figures

and numbers and guaranteed base earning, response rate, income,

number of JV prospects etc.

Right, we're out of space here. See you in part two, where we'll be looking

at two more list maintenance methods (the final two) and some general

non-technical tips to keep your list pulling in the cash like crazy. Stay..

 

tuned.