|
|
Attract Your Dream Customer
Have you clearly defined your target audience? These are the prime buyers of your products or services. It is the people or organizations you are pursuing actively as customers. You don't need every customer in the world! You need the ones who...
Create Viral Traffic With Brandable eBooks
Viral Traffic Building
When I started my website, one of the first things I did was place a few free eBooks up for download in order to have something for free.
Now, a couple of years down the track, 60% of my traffic is untrackable. I...
How to maintain a steady cash flow?
For any business to be successful the most important factor is
availability of ready cash and maintenance of a healthy cash
flow. However, during day-to-day operation of business it is
often found to be the most difficult task and every year a...
Image and Branding Advertising¡KGet over it or Go BROKE!
„Ï Out of 100 products, 90 never get past the initial development and testing stages, of the 10 that do 7 will fail in the market within 3 years.
„Ï To make matters worse 80% of new businesses are gone within 3-5 years!
WHY?
Because a...
Top Inventory Keeping Secrets
Every business knows the importance of a proper inventory.
Without one, a business would not have a proper tally of its
assets and properties. They would not be able to keep their
accounting books straight.
Broken and lost equipment would...
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Does Your E-Newsletter or E-Zine Pass the "So What" Test?
A great number of e-newsletter and e-zine programs fail every day, no matter how much time and money is spent on attempting to make them work. Perhaps they don’t reach their target audience, or they don’t make their sales goals. For some reason or another they simply didn’t work. The majority of times however, it comes down to the fact that they simply did not pass the “so what” test. Instead of trying to solve the reader’s problems, the failed newsletters attempted to sell products or services.
It is a natural progression that when your readers trust you, they’ll buy from you, it’s just that simple. However, one cannot develop a trusting relationship with a customer by shouting “buy, buy, buy” at them. A newsletter must pay attention to what the customer wants and needs, and it must speak to those issues. The reader will make the conclusion to buy on their own, and since they have built up a trust for you through your informative newsletter, they’ll choose you first.
E-newsletter marketing is a less intrusive form of communication than traditional advertising. It is much more appealing to readers and, in turn, is a great deal more effective, as it delivers value to your customers on a regular basis. Additionally, newsletters make it easy for you to track which articles are most read, and therefore what information is most interesting and important to your customers.
The thing is, advertising doesn’t have to look like advertising. It can be an article chock full of interesting information that revolves around your product or service, without specifically mentioning your product or service. People don’t want to read ads - but they do want to find out how to make their lives easier or better in some way. This is illustrated through the 1%-3% of readers who open a direct mail piece and request further information, in comparison to the over 50% of recipients who click on newsletter articles to seek more information.
People want to learn how to solve their daily problems, to stay informed of industry trends, to learn critical information, and save time. So how do you do this and still get your message across? Write quality articles about the value and benefits of the types of products and services that you offer. Make them look just like the type of article you’d see in a quality newspaper. People don’t care as much about the fact that Andyhairdryers.com has come out with a new hair dryer, as they care
that this new dryer can cut their morning prep time in half. See the difference? Stating the benefit of the new hair dryer answered the “so what?” question concerning the new product. This made the product relevant in the reader’s life and therefore prompted the reader to continue learning, and perhaps even buying the new product.
Whenever you write a newsletter, “So What?” should always be at the forefront of your mind. Every statement you make has to pass the “so what” test, or your newsletter simply won’t be maximizing its potential with your readers.
To look at another example: certainly you could tell your reader that eBay sells many different products and services, but this would suggest very little unless you told the reader that this means that people with exactly their kind of business now have access to an entire new realm of opportunity by selling goods and services to the whole world through online auctions, that are easy to access. Simply telling the reader that a business has done something is much less interesting than knowing how to take advantage of that fact in order to increase business and profits. If you’ve managed to make the reader think about how he/she can improve his/her life through what is written, your newsletter has passed the “so what?” test and it is getting the message across. Now, if you happen to be selling a service that has to do with helping business owners with online auctions, the newsletter has worked just like advertising, while creating a trusting relationship with your reader and inspiring your reader to take action. Since the company they trust for online auction advice is yours, as you’ve been providing them with all of their information, they will naturally be inclined to ask you for help first!
The “so what?” test is the most simple and effective method to ascertain whether or not your e-newsletter or e-zine is doing all that it can with your potential customers. Why not take advantage of every second of your time with your customer’s attention and ask yourself this simple question to make your newsletter work for you?
About the Author
Robert Moment, Author and Business Coach. Author of bestselling e-books “27 Powerful Networking, Branding, and Prospecting Tactics for Your Business” and “The Truth About Winning Federal Contracts”.
Robert@federalcontractsforsmallbusinesses.com http://www.federalcontractsforsmallbusinesses.com
|
|
|
|
|
Brand - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
The brand, and "branding" and brand equity have become increasingly important ... From the perspective of brand owners, branded products or services also ... |
en.wikipedia.org |
  |
Branding - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
Livestock branding, the marking of animals to indicate ownership; Human branding, ... Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Branding" ... |
en.wikipedia.org |
  |
AllAboutBranding.com : Home |
Provides resources and opinions on branding. Includes brand development, management and communications. |
www.allaboutbranding.com |
  |
brandchannel.com | branding resource produced by Interbrand | brands |
An international online exchange and resource about brand marketing and branding. |
www.brandchannel.com |
  |
Branding Company Corporate Branding Internet Brand Identity ... |
Brand Identity Guru Inc. creates, develops and promotes powerful brands. Our clients enjoy an array of innovative, creative and powerful branding solutions ... |
www.brandidentityguru.com |
  |
Branding Blog |
Branding and positioning news and opinion. |
www.brandingblog.com |
  |
Branding Asia |
Free articles, news and columns on branding in Asia. Market research and Asian marketing. |
www.brandingasia.com |
  |
Pages tagged with "branding" on del.icio.us |
All items tagged branding ??? view popular ... industrie./design and branding consultant specialists./ · save this. by kittim to design branding graphic ... |
del.icio.us |
  |
The Brand Called You |
Big companies understand the importance of brands. Today, in the Age of the Individual, you have to be your own brand. Here's what it takes to be the CEO of ... |
www.fastcompany.com |
  |
Branding: See what people are saying right now on Technorati |
See all blog posts tagged with branding on Technorati. |
www.technorati.com |
  |
Mozilla Branding |
The purpose of this document is to describe mozilla.org's branding strategy during and after the release of what has generally been called Mozilla 1.4. ... |
www.mozilla.org |
  |
What Brand Are You? A branding viral by The Design Conspiracy |
What Brand Are You? has since been picked out as Site Of The Day by the likes of the Financial Times, Yahoo, USA Today and BBC News, and has received more ... |
www.whatbrandareyou.com |
  |
Julie & Company: Affordable branding, web design, graphic design ... |
Julie & Company creates stellar branding, integrated marketing, advertising, web design, web development, Flash, trade show booths - all at affordable ... |
www.julieandcompany.com |
  |
Forty Media - Web Design, Web Development, Branding, Great Websites |
a professional web design agency based in Phoenix, Arizona. |
www.fortymedia.com |
  |
Branding - Yahoo! Small Business |
Find information to help grow your online business with business plans, Thomas Register, news articles and more. |
smallbusiness.yahoo.com |
  |
Lexicon |
Lexicon Branding appears on KTVU News; Lexicon Branding creates Ridgeline for Honda, Viiv for Intel, and GameTap for Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. ... |
www.lexicon-branding.com |
  |
Branding and Usability |
We're finding that a site's usability can dramatically affect branding. ... There are two basic techniques for branding: direct experience and indirect ... |
www.uie.com |
  |
iMedia Connection: Research & Metrics - Branding |
Majority of marketers feel branding opportunities -- online and offline -- aren't ... IAB case studies prove real-world power of online in branding mix. ... |
www.imediaconnection.com |
  |
Small Business Marketing And Branding |
Small business marketing and branding advice and how-to guides for small business owners. Learn how to start and grow your own successful business. |
smallbusinessbranding.com |
  |
Beyond Branding |
Beyond Branding, published in hardcover in 2003 and paperback in 2005, presents innovative business models for the survival of 21st century organizations. |
www.beyond-branding.com |
  |
|