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Building a Mailing List

Do you really need a mailing list to be successful? Absolutely!

Go look at this article to find out why. When you are done reading that, come back here and get started.

Welcome back. Now you know why it is so important to have a mailing list. What do you do next?

The first thing you have to do is add a form to your website that will allow you to collect names and email addresses from your visitors. The best technique to use for this is an autoresponder.

With an autoresponder, you will not only have an easy to use form for collecting your visitors information, you will also have a convenient way to send messages to your list.

What is an autoresponder?

An autoresponder is a software program that will send a predefined message to anyone who accesses it. It will also keep a list of all people who requested information from it.

To use an autoresponder to build your mailing list, you simply add the form that the software creates to your website and ask people to sign up for your information, usually a newsletter or an ezine. Once they submit the information in your form, the autoresponder will send them a confirmation email so they can confirm they really do want to join your list. This is protection to keep someone else from adding your email address to 1000 lists.

Once someone submits their information and confirms their desire to join your list, they will be added to the data bank of your autoresponder. When you are ready to send a message to your list, you simply access your autoresponder and add your message. You tell the autoresponder to broadcast the information to all your list members and the program does all the work for you.

Where can you get an autoresponder?

There are several good autoresponders available on the internet. You can use a free service, you can pay for a service or you can buy the software and load it onto your server. It isn't recommended you buy your own autoresponder because there are many regulations on servers and ISP's that could cause you a lot of grief. My ISP will only allow me to send out 5 emails at any given time. Can you imagine how long it would take to mail to a list of 1000 members? Not to mention the bandwidth usage on your server.

Save yourself a lot of problems by using someone else's service.

I am going to list a free service and a couple pay services here. Go to the actual site to find out what they have to offer and how much it will cost you.

FreeAutoBot - Is a free autoresponder.
Aweber is a very good autoresponder.
The Ultimate Marketing Center has an excellent autoresponder that you get free when you use their hosting. This is the one I use and recommend. It costs the same as Aweber but you get a whole lot more.

Once you decide on your autoresponder, get your form set up on your website. Each of these programs have very easy to understand instructions to help you get started. If you have any trouble, please contact their support people to solve your problem. It's not that I don't want to help you, it's just very likely that they will be able to help you much better than I will. It is their software after all.

What next?

Now that you have your autoresponder all set up and ready to go, how do you get people to join your list? Ask them to join. Tell them what your list members can expect to receive if they join.

EXAMPLE: I send out a weekly newsletter with all the latest news about _________. Don't miss this hot information, join my list and be informed.

Be sure to tell them that you will not abuse their information by selling or renting their email address out. Also mention that they can easily unsubscribe any time they wish with a simple click.

Don't wait until you get a lot of members before you start mailing. If you have one person on your list, start your weekly, monthly, daily mailings. That one person does not know he is alone on your list. Don't neglect the one person who trusted you enough to join your list. More will join. This does take time.

What do you send to your list?

You don't want every thing you send to your list to be a sale item. Unless, of course, you list is created for the use of notifying people when another item is available for purchase.

Try to write some interesting articles on your topic and send these to your list. You can add an ad somewhere in your message but don't make this the only reason you sent a message. If you don't want to write your own articles, you can get some good information on almost any subject at free article sites.

Every once in a while it is nice to send you list a free gift. An ebook or a link to a great website. Treat your list like you would like to be treated. If you would be happy to see your email come through in your inbox, send it out to your list. If you would unsubscribe from your list, you have to realize your members will not be happy with your content.

A Couple Great Shortcuts:

As you browse through the internet, you will run across a lot of sites trying to sell you safe-lists. Don't buy these lists! They will be nothing but trouble and you will not get any profitable business from them. The people who sell these lists do not have the permission from the email owner to offer their information. Many unscrupulous people will go from one website to another gathering email addresses and form them into a list. They sell this list to you and you get your isp cancelled for spamming. These lists are the furthest thing from safe. Don't fall for this trick.

There are some places where you can join lists and get others to join these lists. You will then have the opportunity to send emails to these people without spamming some unsuspecting webmaster.

These sites are list builders and everyone who joins these sites agrees to receive your email. You also have to agree to receive their email. This is really a good deal because you will find a lot of the information you receive in these emails is information you need and want. You then send your information to the list and you will find other people are happy to see your message.

Below are the list building sites that I have found to be the best. They are all free to join and use. You will have the option to pay a premium to mail to more people. This is a safe thing to do and if you have the finances to do this, you will get your business going a lot faster by using this option. You will have to decide what's right for you.

Get started right now. Your income depends on this!

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