Impressions - February 2014 - 50

process, and the more consistent you are
at developing and managing your lists,
the more profitable you will become. The
thing I like most about list building is that
you have a reliable, available asset that
can be turned on and off at will to create
new business.
It's quite common to hear the complaint, "My production is filled with peaks
and valleys," or "It's either feast or famine
around here." This happens because most
small-to-medium shops operate using "the
hunter-gatherer" method of sales. When
they need work, they go on the hunt. This
usually results in bringing back small game
(small orders), but occasionally they'll
land a big one. They spend the next week
or more working off the big order, only to
find there's nothing waiting behind it.
A valley in production follows while a
new catch is being hunted and the cycle
repeats. With managed lists, it is much
easier to send out an offer and wait for the
orders to call or come in. Using managed
lists, it's easily possible to create $10,000$100,000 or more of new business in
less than a week or two. While it's not a
sure bet or completely automatic, I have
enough firsthand experience to know that
when it's done right, it is a consistent, predictable, repeatable method of generating
almost instant sales.

LIST BASICS
List building can happen in different
ways. You can physically collect business
cards or email addresses at your shop's front
desk, or use a registration process tied to a
physical or digital event. Examples include
a soccer or baseball tournament, online
webinar or Google Hangout. There are
hundreds of ways to access targeted traffic
that can end up on one of your lists.
In the old-school world of direct marketing, names and addresses were collected so a physical postcard or flier could be
mailed. One of the most effective methods
of list building still is the monthly newsletter, regardless of whether it's physical or
digital. Currently, the physical newsletter is
making a comeback because the U.S. Postal
Service now has an inexpensive mailing
program that targets individual neighborhoods. You see this a lot with restaurant,
fast food and pizza fliers. You can create a
hybrid where a physical piece is sent to a
prospect neighborhood with the intention
of driving the prospects online to a specific
landing page with a personalized offer.
Since the focus here is on the digital
50

Impressions | February 2014

side, let's move on to the minimum requirements of an effective list-building
campaign and the associated compliance
issues. At the very front end, you will need
some way to capture the prospect's name
and email address. This is getting increasingly harder to do, as consumers are very
conscious about the possibility of signing
up and then getting inundated with a ton
of junk emails. Big mistake.
On all of my sites, I make it abundantly
clear that anyone can instantly opt-out at
anytime if they no longer wish to receive
communication from me. I don't want angry prospects or customers. I also let them
know exactly what they will be receiving
from me: meaningful, useful and relevant
information about their specific interest,
and an occasional offer. I try to keep the offers to about 10% of the overall messaging
sent. It should be secondary to developing
the relationship and adding value to it.
The second element that's essential is
the opt-in process. I let everyone know
they must confirm their intention to receive information from me before I will
send it to them. This is called a "double
opt-in process" and it is the gold standard
for compliance. It also shows that you value and respect the person who has shared
his email address with you.
When building your list, be aware of
the minimum government compliance
requirements. These were enacted under
the CANN-SPAM Act to protect consumers from junk email abuse. It's debatable if
it has helped, but you must be compliant
nonetheless. Here is what you need to do:
1. Use a reliable email service provider
(ESP). Some of the most common are
Constant Contact, AWeber, Get Response,
iContact, and Mail Chimp. These all are
paid services, but they make it easy to be
in compliance. As you use their setup wizards, you'll be prompted to enter all the
necessary compliance information.
2. Make sure every email you send
has an automatic unsubscribe notice at the
bottom with an active unsubscribe link to
delete people from the email database if
they no longer wish to receive your information. The aforementioned programs do
this for you automatically.
3. Regardless of the program you
use, it must support double opt-in. While
you can legally capture names without a
required confirmation, it's always best to
have prospects reconfirm their intentions
to receive information from you.
4. Make it a habit of requiring your

customers to reconfirm their desire to
continue to receive your content on an annual basis.
Once you've captured the names, there
are two types of mailings you can do. The
first is called an auto-response mailing. This
can be one or more automatically generated mailings to the prospect. If they have
asked for a free e-book or brochure, the
confirming email with the download link is
automatically generated. You can create a
sequence of mailings to help the prospect
move toward purchasing. I usually space
seven to 10 emails out during a month.
Each email has a call to action that - if
they respond - will cancel the remaining
sequence. This is done so prospects don't
get annoyed if they decide to engage with
you. This is handled through the automations function in the email software.
The auto-responder sequence is a fundamental tool and can be used in hundreds of different ways. As an example, if
you have a volunteer who's doing a school
fundraiser event using T-shirts, you could
create a sequence of messages delivered
starting 30 days before the event as timed
reminders for what needs to be done to
keep the project on task and on time. This
can greatly help in reducing last-minute
rushes and drama because a key item was
missed or overlooked.
The second core type of mailing is
called the broadcast mailing. This is essentially a mass mailing to one or more
of your segments with a special offer, seasonal special, general announcement, or
monthly or quarterly newsletter. These
general mailings can be very helpful in
maintaining contact with your prospects
and customer base. They're great for keeping everyone up to speed on the different
local events for which you're printing and
to help promote those events on behalf of
your customers.
This is a valuable offer that your competition almost never uses to its advantage.
When it comes down to the bid and the
other guy has lower costs, you often can
turn it around by letting them know you
promote all events for which you print to
your list of hundreds or thousands of local
businesses and consumers. This is the kind
of value that differentiates you from the
rest and costs you essentially nothing.

SEGMENTATION
The real power of list building comes
in the segmentation process. It's really a
pretty simple concept. The idea is to be
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