Tag Archives: online

Email Marketing

Sending Online Coupons Increases Sales And Promotes Your Local Business

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By: Jeff Schuman

An effective way to promote your local business information and also increase sales at the same time is to include coupons with an email marketing campaign. Those receiving the promotional emails are more likely to open them when discounts for products or services are involved.

A recent survey by Experian discovered that when marketing emails also included a coupon there was a higher transaction-to-click rate than those without. The results were the same whether the full list received the email or if only a segmented group received it.

Before we get ahead of ourselves, it’s important for all small local businesses to understand the importance of having an auto-responder and some type of opt-in subscription form on their website. Once in place, business can be more efficient and effective with sending marketing emails.

With most consumers now thinking of ways to save money, businesses need to be keenly aware of the importance of offering deals. Those that understand this and meet those demands will be more successful than those businesses that underestimate the importance of doing so.

In fact, Experian has also found that 66 percent of United States households now use coupons. It’s important for businesses to send out coupons via email because there’s an increase of nearly 50 percent of people using coupons from that source since 2007.

The value of email coupons is that they increase interaction or participation of the readers and can be seen in these statistics: marketing emails including coupons are opened approximately 25 percent of the time compared to only about 17 percent if they don’t include them. When coupons were redeemed online, there was a 17 percent higher click-through rate.

There are some best practices that local businesses should consider when planning an email marketing campaign that includes coupons:

– Make sure the offers you send out match the type of list you’re targeting.

– To find out what gives you the highest return, test your coupon amount and frequency.

– To make your coupon recipient feel special, use the words “exclusive” or “selected” on the coupon.

– To create an urgency for people to “react now”, it’s best to mention a time frame or a specific date for it to be used.

– To help get rid of unwanted inventory, time your coupons to your business cycles by offering deep discounts on products nearing a season’s end.

– Add a link to the email that gives the recipient the opportunity to “share with a friend” or “tell your group”, etc.

Coupons can be a real win-win for everyone. Customers get the deal they’re looking for and you get extra sales while clearing out inventory, and a chance to promote your local business information.

Article Source: http://www.articlesnatch.com

About the Author:
If you enjoyed this article by Jeff Schuman on local business information and emailing coupons please visit our local business website today. Learn how you can use local business marketing to rank high on search engines and drive more traffic to your small business website.

Email Marketing, Offline Promotions

Tips on How to Keep Your Customers Coming Back

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Photo by enriqueburgosgarciaby Yodle

Let’s begin this week’s Yodle Tipster from Local Online Advertising for Dummies. We will jump all the way to pages 300 through 304 from Chapter 16, Staying at the Top of Customers’ Minds, to discuss cost-effective ways you can keep in contact with your current clients.

Although a quality service, a competitive price, and superb customer service are huge factors in maintaining repeat business from your customers, nothing quite compares to the emotional connection a customer has to your business. If your customer feels personally connected to your business, they will come back, even if you’re not all that different from the competition. Therefore, if you want them coming back for more, you have to create and maintain that connection, facilitate two-way communication with customers to build long-term loyalty, and foster ongoing business with them.

To achieve the goal of building a personal relationship with your customers, there are a number of simple ways. Here are some useful tips the book offers, all of which are easy to do and cost virtually nothing to execute.

1. Send thank you emails: These days, technology has made writing the thank you note a whole lot faster. You can send a business email to confirm a purchase or scheduled appointment or other activity and simultaneously thank the customer for their business. Thank you emails can also help in other ways – like suggesting other products or services you offer, soliciting e-newsletter subscribers, acquiring testimonials for your website, generating more fans on your Facebook page, etc.

2. Use e-newsletters: An e-newsletter is a form of communication to your customers sent out on a regular basis. E-newletters build loyalty from your customers by building your brand, keeping them up to date with important information about your company, and offering material that presents you as a thought leader in your industry.

3. Conduct satisfaction surveys: By allowing your customers to voice their opinion in a satisfaction survey, you can gain helpful feedback that you need to know about your business. In addition, by doing so, you also show your customers that you value their business if you choose to do a survey online. Some great online resources include SurveyMonkey.com and SurveyGizmo.com.

By following the above suggestions, you will do your best to keep your customers coming back!

About the Author

Yodle is a leading provider of local online advertising that provides businesses with a simple and affordable way to get more phone calls – and new customers. Follow Yodle on Twitter today! Check out Yodle Blog and you will read more about online advertising and social media advertising.

Business Cards

Business Card Marketing Ideas to Generate Leads

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by Mina Palencia

We are in an economic crunch right now and your car dealership may have been among the many small businesses affected by low profit margins. In this kind of situation, buying new cars (or even used one for that matter) may not be among the top priorities of many people. You need to think of marketing ideas to generate new leads and move your car units out of the showroom.

Business cards are just the right tools to get new leads for your business without the need to spend a lot. From most online printing companies, you can have 1000 copies of business cards printed for less than $25. With these many copies, you can get your business in the forefront of many people’s minds without the added costs. All you need to know now is how to use your business card prints to your business’ advantage.

Tips on How to Use Your Car Dealership Business Cards

Hand out your cards to every client or prospective client entering your showroom. Your new clients may know someone who really needs new car and will benefit from your business card. You should also bring copies of your business cards with you all the time. You never know when you might meet someone or even an old friend who could give you new business.

You can attach a copy of your business cards in every correspondence that you send. This is especially good for business to business correspondence. You know how companies need vehicles for their employees and business. In this case, it will be great to have them among your new leads.

Car shows and exhibits are great avenues to hand out your business cards. You can just be a visitor in these events but you can still exchange contacts with other visitors and exhibitors. Events like these also give you opportunities to meet many prospective clients ranging from individuals to corporate magnates. Just make sure that your cards are of great quality and have impressive designs because corporate executives are hard to convince when it comes to influencing their buying decisions.

Though you might have designed your business cards using the right elements and have printed them on high quality paper, you will still not get the maximum benefits if you only know one way to hand them out. You have to explore all the possible ways.

About the Author

Mina Palencia is a writer who resides in Lancaster, LA. She has experiences writing for online marketing campaigns, writing technical documents for online audiences and loves blogging.