Here's another online business tip that some business owners use, but strangely enough many do not, or do not use it properly.  Emailing past customers and people who signed-up for an account is one of the best ways to promote your business for free.  Business owners really underestimate the power of this.

 

With my fashion accessory business, we used to send out 2-3 emails a month that mentioned new items, closeout sale items, and sometimes included a 10%-20% off coupon, depending on the time of season it was.  I would say 70% of our sales came from these emails. 

 

I was really surprised that it took one of our main competitors almost three years to figure this out.  Even though "they" received our company emails 2-3 times a month, it never clicked in their heads that they should be doing this too.  Now after three years, I get a sales email from this company every week, sometimes twice a week.  Like I said, it works!

 

But Don't People Hate Email?  Isn't This Spam?

If a customer bought something from you and they enjoy the products you sell, the answer to both questions is "NO."  You will get a few people that object, maybe 2-3% of the entire customer email list.  All you have to do is remove them from your list when they request you to so that they’ll never get the emails again.

 

How Much Is Too Much In Terms Of Sending Out These Emails? 

We've never gotten complaints from 2-3 emails a month.  You might be able to get by with one a week, but I've never tried it.  We've gotten such good results with 2-3 emails a month that it made no sense for me to force the issue with more emails, which would cause a higher % of people asking to be unsubscribed from our customer email list.

 

Be sure to allow people to join your mailing list from the homepage even if they don't buy anything.  If your shopping cart doesn't allow this, there are programs and companies online that handle mailing lists.  Sometimes people will join your mailing list but won’t make a purchase from you that same day, and then they’ll come back and make a purchase after receiving your sales email.  I suggest offering some sort of small giveaway to entice people to signup for your mailing list like, "Subscribe to our sales mailing list and be eligible for a free 'whatever'."  You could do this every month but it is most effective obviously during your more busy months when more people are visiting your website.  Obviously, you'll get more subscribers and still have to give out only one prize.