Marketing to your database
Database marketing is using the power of technology to keep in communication with your clients, prospects and sphere of influence (SOI). An effective database is the best tool that a marketer can have in their arsenal, bar none! It allows you to keep in touch with your Sphere of Influence, prospects and past and current clients.
If you are looking for the simplest method of adding new clients to your database, you cant do better than creating an online form and having your website or blog users enter their information directly. The beauty of this is that it allows you to set up auto-responders that will communicate with your clients handsfree! Setting up a web form can sometimes seem overwhelming, but it is VERY easy and affordable to find someone to handle the technical aspects if you are not HTML savvy.
Making your message personalized is one of the great tricks that your marketing database will help you perform. Any decent database will allow you to send out direct mail or email messages that start with Dear Client rather than a generic message like Hello Friends. This personalization is a key to getting your marketing message to be opened and responded to!
A great database takes a commitment ” a commitment to adding new people to it regularly! It is VERY easy to find new people to add, you dont have to look any further than your church group or your professional associations or your friends and family. You can easily add five people per day, gaining you well over a thousand people by this time next year.
The best thing about the internet is the ability to market affordably, and no where is that more apparent than with email marketing! Using just a little time, you can send a message to your entire database with just a few mouse clicks. A great message that is helpful to your clients can be sent once or twice a month without burning out your list.
Direct mail marketing is a great way to communicate with your customers. A targeted, multi-part campaign can make a tremendous difference in your sales volume and how your clients think of you and your product. That having been said, if you are only planning to send out one marketing piece, you may want to consider using another medium as direct mail requires a number of touches to be effective.
Autoresponders or drip marketing is another way to communicate with your database. This involves sending out a series of messages over time to your new clients or prospects, telling them about aspects of your business or service. Instead of yelling at them about your business, you tell them about it gradually through a series emails sent once a week or even every few days. Two great services for autoresponders are AWeber and Constant Contact, both of which supply a great service at an affordable price.
Make sure to have a plan for your marketing message to your database and stick to it! Nothing will cause you to lose touch with your list faster than sending out unrelated marketing messages that differ from your core product or service. If you are not careful, all those users you spent time adding will unsubscribe and reduce the number of people you have permission to market to!