When you hear the term “internet marketing“, what do you think of?
For many, that term conjures thoughts of websites or spamming or search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing. For others, it’s all about graphical design, writing fancy code or even affiliate programs. All of those answers correct, but the essence of internet marketing is much simpler.
At its core, internet marketing is about these things:
* Understanding the target market to which the product/service/cause you’re marketing will appeal
* Determining exactly how your target market interacts with the internet
* Positioning your content on the internet to attract the attention of your target market
* Collecting information about your target market (also known as “leads”) for follow-up and conversion into sales
* Design of offers or incentives to induce the desired actions from your leads
Since there is insufficient space in this article to give all of these topics adequate attention, let’s focus on just one specific topic with the realm of internet marketing: Email Marketing.
My best payoff has always come by focusing on permission-based email marketing. Permission-based email marketing refers to the practice of collecting information (including email addresses) from website visitors and communicating with them via e-mail with their direct consent. The “permission” aspect of permission-based email marketing is what separates legitimate email marketers from the spammers that everyone despises.
My love of email marketing is strong for one reason: It works very well. Email marketing has been much like a never-ending goldmine: It enables us to produce income on demand simply by sending a good offer to our list. When you have thousands of loyal subscribers – as we do – and you put a strong and compatible offer in front of them, income becomes nearly automatic.
However, the key to successful email marketing is the development of a legitimate trust relationship with your subscribers. If you opt to send your subscribers a request for purchases every single day, they will likely tire of your badgering and cease reading your emails altogether.
Alternatively, if you take the time to provide good content to your readers on a regular and frequent basis, you’ll discover that your readers take all of your emails far more seriously, and as a result your emails will be opened, read and acted upon with greater frequency. Essentially, email marketing is really an exercise in trust.
Even though there are more sides to internet marketing than just email marketing (permission based), email has been the foundation that our business sits on.
I think everything you say here is accurate.
However, it is so easy for bloggers to overlook the fact that in order for the public to actually purchase something, deep knowledge or deep skill in an area is a must.
Otherwise one ends up attempting to sell the same thing as ten million others.
For example, if one is an expert in lets say French wines.
In order to really be an expert with information that others will pay for, one not only has to be able to venture an opinion regarding different wines, but also what soils make for the best grapes for that particular wine, and how best to treat soils to get the best out of it for the type of grapes a person is interested in.
That’s just an example, but far too often, people have great blogs, follow all the marketing advice, and then at the end of the process realize they don’t personally have anything to sell other than their personhood.
At that point, one must realize that there is a big difference between having an opinion, and having something to say that others are interested enough in to pull out their credit cards.
You have a good site here.
And, I want to thank you for listening to this ramble.
I am in the process of learning enough about an area to be worthy of being listened to once I have my blog up and running. I will send you the first invitation.
Stetson
Very good post. You actually made me think a little about a site that I run. Currently I’m sitting on thousands of email addresses that I’m doing nothing with. This is a very targeted group of people that share common interests. I think I’ll have to come up with a way to take advantage of this.
Thank you, your post might prove to be very profitable.
Mike
Very good post indeed! I also have loads of emails and contact and I never really thought about marketing them I will try this and recommend this post to my fellow web masters! 🙂
I 100% agree with you on this one: “successful email marketing is the development of a legitimate trust relationship with your subscribers”
I have blocked numerus email senders who gave thier word not to Spam, but instead of getting any worthy emails from them.. They just sent a welcome-mail and then an endless stream of spam..
Sadly to say, only little do follow your advise, with a non-spam marketing along side valueble info emails.
I am totally agree with you. Getting customers in your site should always be ranked as high as the importance of the quality and the excellence of the product and the services you provide.
They should go hand in hand in providing your customers the satisfaction they get in exchange for the money they have paid for them. Customer service should as well be as fantastic so that the customers are provided with the same satisfaction. The point is email marketing is the best choice..
Sadly to say, only little do follow your advise, with a non-spam marketing along side valueble info emails.
Thanks…
Mostly when I give companies my e-mail I get tons of spam, so mostly I don’t do that anymore. Do get people to not see your mail as spam, it should be such a small target group. that really enjoy your e-mails about ‘products’. That’s what your telling us. And well that’s what a lot of internet marketeers are doing wrong, sadly. But great post, lots of info. Thanks
Email Marketing is great if you do not black list your server. You also can pay a company to blast these emails out for you to ensure they get to where they need to go.
Email marketing is the best way to introduce your product to many related people..
As a novice affiliate marketer I found your post very interesting and believe that your tips will help me move my sites forward. Many thanks for sharing
Viral marketing is done mostly through emails. But as you said many companies who tried email marketing ended up in spam list. Successful ones are with permissions.
No doubt Email Marketing is the next big thing.Quite a thought provoking article.Email marketing can be a whole lot of fun if used in a sensible way.Your article explains it all really well.Good effort!!
I’ve had a lot of success with email marketing too. I’ve jumped into some other lead gen stuff, but really – having a list you can go back to is the best return over time. It’s hard to build, but the ROI is phenomenal.
as an online marketer it is really hard to explain to someone what you do before they spit out spam or something like that. Online marketing is about conveying a message with great content and keeping in touch with your readers. Some abuse it but in the proper form email marketing is very powerful.
we had a lot of success with email marketing too. I’ve jumped into some other lead gen stuff, but really – having a list you can go back to is the best return over time. It’s hard to build, but the ROI is phenomenal.
we had a lot of success with email marketing too. I’ve jumped into some other lead gen stuff, but really – having a list you can go back to is the best return over time. It’s hard to build, but the ROI is phenomenal.
I agree that this post is well thought out and addresses some issues on internet marketing that people overlooked. But I also have to agree with Stetson that the email marketing alone may not be the only way you can promote. There are so many ways to promote your business and blogs, forums, email marketing, design etc. are all great ways. I would say actually try a range of these ideas and see where you go from there. Good luck everyone!
thank you for explaining internet marketing in a very easy and manageable way. I have seen most of the marketing done on social networking sites in which companies try to cater more consumer attention. Email marketing sounds like a more personal and one-to-one connection with the treasured customer and that makes him feel very special.
Well written article on Internet marketing. Its so difficult to find quality around here so thanks
Very good post indeed! I also have loads of emails and contact and I never really thought about marketing them I will try this and recommend this post to my fellow web masters! 🙂
We’ve got a a list of email addresses for over 50,000 paid customers and are not sure what the most appropriate approach to marketing to this list would be.
The simplest, legitimate reason to contact past customers would be top-of-mind awareness. We want them to keep us in mind down the road when they need another remote control.
I assume your email marketing is based on opt-in lists of users who signed up to get access to niche information and therefore are inherently interested in other related offers.
How often should a top-of-mind campaign notify past customers of new products, sales, etc.?
Spot on post…e-mail marketing (permission based) is a fantastic way to grow your business. Using a great automated marketing system like Infusionsoft can result in amazing changes to your business model and your life.
If you are starting an internet business, building a ist is a key part of growing a business – just as it is in an offline business. So many people building businesses do not keep in touch with their prospects and customers regularly enough because they do not have an effective system to do it.
it’s the best way of working through the ‘know, like, trust’ cycle when you can’t build a relationship face to face
The money is in the list… if you are not building a list from day one you are losing money and leaving it on the table.
Remember people on your list are them and when you have a new sale on you don’t need to go out looking for more people every time…
Yvonne
Really great post…I love what you said about…
At its core, internet marketing is about these things:
* Understanding the target market to which the product/service/cause you’re marketing will appeal
* Determining exactly how your target market interacts with the internet
* Positioning your content on the internet to attract the attention of your target market
* Collecting information about your target market (also known as “leads”) for follow-up and conversion into sales
* Design of offers or incentives to induce the desired actions from your leads
Agreed with most of the comments (and the original article) – getting a list going from day one is huge, and now with Google throwing a wrench into things with the Panda update, it’s more important than ever to avoid relying solely on organic search traffic!
When I think of online marketing I tend to think of niche mini sites and adwords. Adwords is something that has worked very well for me but I am going to look in to something else as Google isn’t the be all and end all.
Right e-mail marketing is the more better way to introduce your product to many related people than any type of such promotion, may be cos of cost of serv and its effect?
Email marketing is inevitably the first step that any of us will take to begin a relationship with an enquirer/subscriber and hopefully a customer. It’s a marathon not a dash! It really is about building a relationship so that one feels comfortable with the interaction.
Let me tell you, if after getting my confirm subscription email, I get sent to a page where I get an OTO and then I extract myself from that but then I get another threatening me that i will never see this page again (I wish) I am going to miss out forever … I go ape sh**t!
Get outa here. You just plugged me. I don’t know you from Adam but now you want to shove all this stuff in my face.
Please, really introduce yourself, show me how you can be of benefit to me. I will listen and maybe I will buy from you.
Martin Jofique
Having a company website alone is not enough.Internet Marketing is necessary nowadays. It’s a proven technique in boosting sales for your business and having a good reputation in the industry.
Permission Based Marketing reminds me of Seth Godin. Permission Marketing is still the best online marketing strat.
I like the idea of you so called “core” because it really will be the core of any marketing strategy and I think that this will also work in the real world it since the cyber space acts almost same with the real world’s market
I think everything you say here is accurate.
However, it is so easy for bloggers to overlook the fact that in order for the public to actually purchase something, deep knowledge or deep skill in an area is a must.
Otherwise one ends up attempting to sell the same thing as ten million others.
For example, if one is an expert in lets say French wines.
However, it is so easy for bloggers to overlook the fact that in order for the public to actually purchase something, deep knowledge or deep skill in an area is a must.
I think E-Mail Marketing is a great way to promote a company or product. Especially when it is new and you want to reach as many people as possible. I think the quality of the content is really important. You have to get the readers interested in the topic and make them want to find out more.
Internet marketing is now used widely in order to promote websites. It is this reason as to why web development firms includes SEO as part of their services since Web development and web design should go hand in hand with SEO. Coz, what’s the use of creating a website if nobody is ever gonna visit them?