Using E-mail Autoresponders To Improve
Brand Recognition, Customer Loyalty, and Increase Sales
Introduction - what is an Autoresponder
The typical example of an autoresponder is a sequence of emails sent out over time to people in the form of a 'mini course'.
Talk about a sequence of messages e.g. a person signs up and then they get
- Message #1 immediately
- Message #2 after 1 day
- Message #3 after 3 days
- Message #4 after 7 days
- Message #5 after 10 days
- And a new message every 10 days after that
What are the benifits of sending out Autoresponder messages
Stop and think for a moment. Most people who visit your web site come once, have a look and then move on right? (it's what you do when you're looking around).
The problem is, people often forget who you are and they forget about your product or service. But, if you can convince people to give you their email address and then over time contact them (automatically of course), you do achieve some very important goals:
- You get into people's long term memory. You build up recognition for you or your brand.
- You build up a (very large) database of prospects you can contact at any time. Imagine having a database of 50,000 prospects who are used to recieving high quality content from you? If ever business is ever quiet, or if you want to maximise your sales, you can simply send out an offer to your list of potential customers and drum up new work!
- And you can position yourself as the guru for your particular industry!
The secret to success using Autoresponders
When it comes to writing successful autoresponder messages, the most important key is having quality content.
Unless you provide your subscribers with some valuable information in return for the time they spend reading your autoresponder messages, then they'll quickly lose interest in reading your messages.
It's fine to include a sales pitch, but people must always feel they're getting more value than sales pitch.
One option is to have a defined ratio of emails that are a sales pitch (e.g. 1 sales pitch to every 5 content emails).
Another option is to write newsletter-style e-mails which are full of great content and put a short sales pitch at the bottom of each e-mail.
Depending on your business model, one of these strategies might suit your business better than the other - but both have proven to be very successful for Alliance Software clients who have used them.
The nice thing is in many businesses, if you educate, you actually create the need for your product service at the same time.
Think about it from the perspective of a website development business (e.g. Alliance Software). By showing our customers some of the advanced web marketing strategies used by the most successful online businesses today, we position ourselves as the natural suppliers. You can do the same.
Isn't this spamming people? Won't this annoy some people?
The technical definition of spam is unsolicited commercial emails. So long as people have given their consent for you to send them e-mails (which happens when they voluntarily sign up), then it's not spam.
However, even without breaking the spam laws, you can still be viewed as a "spammer" if you don't have quality content in your e-mails. If the content is good, people will appreciate your emails. (It's like a trade - you're essentially "buying" the ability to give your sales pitch to people in return for giving them valuable information.)
Finally, Autoresponder emails allow people to unsubscribe at any time. That means, if you do offend or annoy someone, they are able to click a link and stop receiving your e-mails.
How do I get people to sign up for my Autoresponder sequence?
In order to get someone to sign up for your autoresponder sequence, you need to "sell" them on the idea of giving you their e-mail address.
This means showing them the benefits of signing up to your autoresponder sequence, such as telling them about the great information they'll receive on a regular basis.
A common trick used by Alliance Software clients is to offer an enticing little bonus at the start in return for their e-mail address.
This is often something downloadable (such as an e-book, audio or video download), but can also be a small gift which is cheap to manufacture and post out (such as a DVD, CD or book), or even a discount voucher they can use next time they buy from you.
Whatever you choose to offer as your enticing bonus in return for people signing up, make sure it's something relevant to your customers, and something they would want to receive.
The better the bonus you're offering, the more likely it is that someone will sign up to your autoresponder sequence.
Finally, when you're writing your pitch for people to sign up to your autoresponder sequence, make sure you gain their trust by telling them how you will keep their personal details private, and they won't receive spam.
A lot of people are distrustful of web-sites which ask them to provide their e-mail address as many less scrupulous sites end up selling or renting e-mail addresses to spammers.
By putting these sort of fears to rest for your web-site visitors, it's more likely that they will give you their e-mail address and sign up to your autoresponder series.
Can I send out special offers to my Autoresponder list?
Yes, of course you can!
If you have a special offer, or an announcement, you can send it to all (or a select group) of your subscribers at any time.
Your autoresponder list is essentially a list of potential customers who have previously expressed interest in your company.
Communicating your special offers and announcements to these people is a great idea if you want to boost your sales!
Advanced Autoresponder Strategies
If you want to make your autoresponder messages even more effective when it comes to selling your products and services, there are certain advanced strategies you can use.
These strategies help you to make sure you're sending the message which is most likely to make people buy to the people who are most likely to buy from you.
Advanced Strategy #1 - Conditional messages
One of the advanced strategies we employ for clients is setting some autoresponder messages to be conditional on user behaviour.
This allows you to send out special offers or special information to customers who have purchased certain products.
An example of how this advanced autoresponder strategy could be used effectively would be if you wanted to contact people who had previously purchased a product from you (such as a software package) and offer them the ability to upgrade that package.
Or if you're selling consumable items (such as printer toner cartridges) you could send a message to previous customers informing them that you were running a special on the model which they had purchased previously.
Or if your business was location specific - for example, if you ran an education and training business, you could contact all of your customers in Melbourne to invite them to a seminar you were running in their local area.
Our proprietary autoresponder software Bazooka™ enables you to do all this and more, targeting customers based on:
- Products they have purchased previously;
- Total value of purchases made;
- Age, and;
- Location;
If you'd like to find out more about Bazooka™, we'd be happy to answer any questions you may have. Click here to get in contact with us.
Advanced Strategy #2 - Split Testing Messages
The beauty of promoting your business over the internet is that it allows you to discover some really interesting insights on your customers buying habits.
You can track practically anything - from where customers click on your e-mails, to how long it takes for them to make their first purchase after signing up to your autoresponder series.
One of the most powerful ways to use this information is in split testing.
Assume you wanted to focus your autoresponders on selling your core product or service to potential customers - split testing is a great way to work out the most effective ways to promote your product or service, and to then work to refine your sales pitch.
Here's how it works…
Split testing involves sending two different versions of the same autoresponder message out (each version to a different group of people on your autoresponder database) and then tracking which version is most successful at generating sales.
As a result, you can quickly determine which sales pitches, product appeals and closes are most successful, and over time keep the bits that work and perfect your sales pitch.
And by doing so, it's possible to dramatically increase your sales - in fact, some Alliance Software clients have more than doubled their sales after using some smart split testing principles!
If you would like to find out more about split testing, we've prepared an article which can give you a better insight into how it works. Click here to view the article on Split Testing.
Summary
As you can see, using an autoresponder for your business can help to improve your business's brand recognition, customer loyalty as well as significantly increasing sales for your business.
And that means autoresponder systems are smart business for anybody wanting to increase their profits, and gain new and loyal customers using the internet.