Creating Autoresponse Newsletters
Marketing guru Dan Kennedy tells a story during his workshops and seminars. He talks about those dreaded collection agencies.
When collection agencies have to collect money from dead beat clients, they don't just send them one notice and wait patiently. In stead, they send 3-4-5 notices one after another. Why?
Because their experience shows that very few people pay money on their first attempt. But if you keep on nudging them, they'll eventually pay up.
Imagine if very poor people who have renegaded on their bills end up paying their dues after receiving 4-5 reminders from collection agencies, how many more people will buy your information products if reminded more than once?
My personal experience shows that if I don't remind people through email, 1-2% people who visit my website would end up buying a product. But if I send reminders and newsletters, as many as 12% people end up buying! I would have lost 10% buyers without following up with them!
So now what I do is this: on the first page where people come in, I ask them to subscribe for a newsletter. Once they subscribe, only then can they go further deep into the website. This is a very effective tactic: don't let your visitors read your sales letter without getting their contact email so that you can follow up with them.
Once they subscribe, they then start receiving emails automatically. If the sales letter can't sell them in one go, the autoresponder will then have 10-15-20 chances to persuade them to buy! But if you keep on sending dumb email after email, people will think you are spamming and will never buy from you. There is a system - a structure - that you should follow closely to set the autoresponder system up for best results.
Features of a Good Email Autoresponse System
There are two jobs that a good autoresponse newsletter system should do:
1. Build trust - Most people read only about 20-30 people's newsletters. They might subscribe to more newsletters, but they won't read the rest. The job of your autoresponse system is to delight people withint the first 1-2 emails so that they add you to their 30 "must-read" people's list.
2. Provide new persuasive information - The most common reasons why people don't buy the product after reading the sales letter are:
a. They don't have the money
b. They don't need the product right now
c. They don't think the product will actually solve their problem
d. They are not convinced that your product will deliver on its promises
With the help of an autoresponse newsletter, you can bring forth new information to people and convince them to buy.
Autoresponse System - Frequency & Format
Use this format to setup your email autoresponse newsletter and you'll end up building trust as well as convert people into buying:
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Incentive to subscribe - To convince people to subscribe to the autoresponse newsletter, offer them something not available anywhere else. This could either be a free report. Or a library of useful but hidden articles.
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The Free Gift - Write the report or the articles yourself. Use the writing formula you read about in
Creating Products section to write them both. You could easily get other people's reports and articles and give them away. But this won't build trust. Only your article or report will help in creating trust. Use this chance to show these people how good you really are.
- Overdeliver - Give them more than you promised as soon as they subscribe. If you promised one report, give them 2. If you promised 10 articles, show them 12. Why? Because these will delight these people and build instant trust. Only if you delight them early on will you be able to get into their "must read" list. Or else, all your emails will get deleted.
- First autoresponse email (Day 0) - As soon as people subscribe, send them their first autoresponse email. In this email, Thank them for subscribing. And then send them the link where they can access the free goodies. Give them any instructions that you have to. Provide them with your contact details (to build more trust).
- Second autoresponse email (Day 1) - Send them the "overdeliver" gift. Delight them. Then remind them about your product. Reiterate the main benefits they'll receive by purchasing the product.
- Third autoresponse email (Day 4) - Ask them if every thing was fine in the report. Provide your contact details and let them know that they can contact you if they have any follow up questions. End by summarizing the main product benefits again.
- Forth autoresponse email (Day 7 or 8) - Send them the FAQ - Frequently asked questions. Let these FAQ answer any objections that might arise (What is the product about? Who should buy? Why should they buy? Why should they buy now? Who else has bought the product before? What does the product cost? How is the product delivered? What is the product guarantee?) End the email by asking them once again to ask any questions that they might have but which are not covered in the FAQ.
- Fifth Autoresponse email (Day 11 or 12) - Send them client testimonials and case studies. Show them how others have used the product to solve their problems.
- Sixth Autoresponse email (Day 15 or 16) - Send them all your secondary product benefits. Provide more case studies of unusual ways in which people have used the information available in the report. Provide a few excerpts if need be.
- Seventh Autoresponse email (Day 19 or 20) - Do some price comparison. Show them why your product is a good value. Then give them an installment option - where they can buy the product now and pay in 3-4 installments.
- Eight Autoresponse email (Day 25 or 26) - Send them more FAQ
- Ninth Autoresponse email (Day 32 or 33) - Send them more testimonials and case studies.
- Tenth Autoresponse email (Day 40) - Send them more excerpts from your product.
Keep on repeating step 11, 12 and 13 a few more times after 5-6-7 day intervals.
Newsletter Format & Frequency
In between, start your newsletter and send them insightful tips, tricks and articles relating to the hot market.
The best frequency for the tips and tricks newsletter is one email every two weeks. The reason to keep on sending a useful newsletter is to build and maintain relationships. And to keep people remain subscribed to your newsletter. If all you do is only sell, people will unsubscribe in droves. So follow this rule in all your email communications:
- Provide good useful and exclusive content 80% of the time
- Sell your products 20% of the time
Follow this rule and it'll be very easy for you to develop and sell more products.
What to write in the newsletter?
- Your newsletter could simply be a collection of tips. Read any useful article about your market? Write a one paragraph summary on it. Write 4 such 6-8 line summaries - and voila - you have your newsletter.
- Write down your opinions. Write down your thoughts. People will perceive you as an expert if you provide them with your opinions.
Autoresponse Newsletter Tools
Now that you know the format of the autoresponse newsletter and why it'll work, which tool should you use to set it up so that emails are sent out automatically?
There is only one tool I recommend:
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Aweber - They allow you to start unlimited autoresponse newletters with unlimited follow up emails in each of them.
On top of that, aweber is the most widely used autoresponse email service providers on the web and have good relationships with major email servers like aol and hotmail. This is important because many newer companies that provide autoresponse emails cheaper than aweber fail to get thousands of emails get past through aol and hotmail servers. Emails sent through them are forwarded to the spam and junk boxes.
Aweber also has a free test drive that allows you to try before you buy. Go to their website and scroll down a bit and you'll see a Test Drive form at the bottom. Fill that out and see how Aweber works.
Ecommerce + Affiliate +
Autoresponse Email =
All in One tool
There is one more tool that I use and recommend that sends autoresponse emails. But that tool doesn't just send autoresponse emails like Aweber does. But it also has a shopping cart that allows you to accept payment and sell your products. And it also has an affiliate program that allows you to hire others to promote your products on commission basis (You'll read more about using the affiliate program in the Marketing section a little later).
That tool is 1shoppingcart - and you'll read more about it on the accepting payment page...
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