Email Inbound Marketing (Series Article 2)

The other form of inbound marketing that I find valuable is keeping tabs on satisfied customers or on following up with interest in your product. In order to do this successfully you must be able to track this information and send information to those clients when it is pertinent.

Your current customers or previous buyers are your best advertising tools. Capture their information in order to send them honest tips or suggestions. DO NOT use this information and give it to someone else. Also, DO NOT send your customers useless information. This will only irritate them in the long run. Only send them information that they would find helpful and be purposeful in the timing of the emails as opposed to swarming them with emails. Being purposeful and limiting your amount will help your happy client to notice your email when it comes and not delete it automatically when it enters their inbox. The amount you solicit them of course depends on how much they are wanting it or not. If you are not sure, then go with the purposeful and limited amount.

The cheapest version of tracking the information of your customers would be through an email database such as Constant Contact as long as you are in the building stage of your contacts and don’t have over 500. This is by far the cheapest form of gathering contact info and soliciting with emails. If you have over 500, Constant Contact charges $30 per month and in my opinion you can get it cheaper if you go ahead and create your own custom database. If you do it right the first time and you plan on your company being around for a while you will save in the long run. If you are unsure of your exact needs then it would be good to start with Constant Contact or get some creative consultation on what might be best in creating a strong inbound marketing scheme that you can pay for upfront and not be wishing for a change two years down the road.

To create a custom database you can hire a web designer with strong coding skills and he can create a database for you. Make sure that he makes it user friendly so you can easily retrieve information without having to navigate through his code language. Usually this is accomplished through some sort of Customer Relationship Management System. You should be able to get someone to create a database like this for no more than $2000 assuming you are simply wanting basic contact info and the capability of emailing them from your database.

I recommended to one of my clients a database with basic contact info, name/phone/email in addition to the zipcode. The product was a traveling act that needed an easy way to spread the word when they were coming through town. At a moment’s notice the act can contact his or her fans in a region and have them spread the word.

As you can see, Inbound Marketing can be a very effective tool when done correctly and when you are in a market where there is a need to capture and retain customers (WHICH IS EVERYBODY!!). Just don’t overdo the contacts, you want your customers to continue to love you for years to come.

Know someone that needs to hear this information, please pass this along. If you need assistance getting leads, prospects, and clients cost effectively, please contact me:

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