Quote:
Originally Posted by Giftgirl
Hi everyone
I NEED to up the numbers on my mailing list, and have had a look at some other threads about it, but can't find anything about whether people think it's worth spending the money? (Please don't bombard me with proof that I'm wrong here! I'm exhausted, trying to move house and run a business, and my fridge is empty, so a touch on the stressed side!) If anyone has any thoughts either way on whether it's worth it, and if not, what other effective ways there are to build up your mailing list, I'd be very grateful.
Thanks peeps.
Oh and I mean lists of customers, not other businesses. I'm looking at some of the companies mentioned on other threads, like Selectabase and LBM, and am getting very confused! Maybe I should just go to bed........
Gah, another edit. Also I'm thinking of names and emails, not postal addresses, or is that not possible?
|
It is hard to make financial sense of direct mailing unless you have a front end offer with profits in the few tens of pounds, with a back end product or lifetime value at least over a hundred,and preferably hundreds
Reason being that at say £600/1000 front end costs and (say 2-6% conversion) you need £20 profit just to break even on the front end.....typical back end /repeat percentages is where the money is made.
If you are still in the game at those figures, you want to find a list that has bought your type of product recently - that clearly depends which products you are selling........but lists like
www.hilitedms.co.uk can be good if you can find what you are looking for there...for example windsor group sells a lot of different types of products, in the sunday papers, and you can rent those lists at hilite.
Lists based on demographics alone are never as good as targetted purchasers.
Many address lists from big magazines are not advertised but even still are up for rent. On a say £150/1000 basis - dont use lists from FREE magazines, they convert far less than paid.
On the email front DONT RENT EMAIL LISTS PERIOD......you have no idea who and how they were gained, and your ISP may take you offline if they get spam complaints
The way I do this, is look around for opt in lists for magazines and websites that are in my niches....some allow one time mailing of a list of anywhere up to 20000 for sums as low as £300 - can be as high as £1000 for a big list SOMETIMES IT CAN BE FREE, if you build a relationship
email list conversion tends to be lower than targetted direct mail, BUT......
If instead you do a JV and offer the list owner a % ofyour profit in return for the list owner ENDORSING the offer with what is called a lift letter, it can massively increase response.
One final way to do things is to build a list is virally, which is to offer free reports,with a back end paid upsell, and the ability to rebrand them - so that anyone whor passes the report on, is credited with the sale if any of the downline buys.