2 Secrets To Free Email Marketing And Driving Traffic To Your Website

Digital Marketing Published on

Using an email address in your domain and adding an email signature to all email communications are two free, easy, and hassle-free ways to promote yourself, your website, and your products or services. Here's how to incorporate this strategy into your email marketing:

At a conference I attended recently, I met a lot of people and collected a lot of business cards. As I read the cards and talked to the students, I noticed many people in this group:

A. Don't know how powerful email addresses are;

b. Don't promote yourself in daily email newsletters via email signature articles.

These two free email marketing strategies are feasible for most business owners, but many fail to adopt them. Here's how you can use these two free strategies:

1. Use an email address that includes your domain. Get free advertising by sending your email address to someone else from AOL, Yahoo, Hotmail, Earthlink, GMail, etc. in a business environment. Create and use an email address in your business domain, advertise it in all your marketing materials, and use it in all your email communications. Most of the time, the only two pieces of information I have about a person are their name and email address. I'm just mad enough to check out the sites listed in that area to learn more about what this person has to offer or do. However, if everything is an AOL or Verizon email address, it's harder to decide if I want to do business with someone or get to know that person better.

What savvy business owners with their own websites and domains don't use the appropriate email addresses in their day-to-day operations? The main thing is that they don't know how to prepare. To use an email with a domain name, you must use an email client (such as Outlook, Outlook Express, Eudora, or Thunderbird) to send and receive email. You will also need to log into your hosting account's web hosting controls and set up a POP3 email account. After logging in, set an address (such as info@ or your name@) and password. Your host will also provide you with incoming and outgoing email server information. Incoming email server information looks like pop.yourdomainname.com, and outgoing email server information looks like smtp.yourdomainname.com. If you are having trouble setting up a domain email address, most hosting companies will help you set up this email account in most common email clients or provide tutorials on their websites.

2. Sign the document using email. All email programs offer the ability to format a document called a signature, a small text attached to an email that gives the recipient some information about the sender. This is a great marketing tool that is free and easy to use as long as you set it up properly. At a minimum, your email signature should include your name, title, phone number, and website. Effective email signature files contain an attractive offer to attract someone to your website. For example, you can mention a free gift in your signature, ask someone to sign up for your newsletter, or tell recipients that you have a blog. Most internet business owners create multiple email signature files and use different signature files depending on the type of audience or people they are talking to. For marketing through mailing lists and online forums, you may want to create a shorter version of your signature text, as many online groups limit email signature files to 3-5 lines of text. As with your business email address, you must use one of the email clients above to set up and use your email to sign documents. Here are some resources to help you create signature files in various email clients:

Outlook Express: http://video.about.com/email/Signatures-in-Outlook-Express.htm

Outlook: http://email.about.com/od/outlooktips/qt/et072706.htm

Eudora: http://email.about.com/cs/eudoratips/qt/et122701.htm

Thunderbird: http://opensourcearticles.com/introduction_to_thunderbird_3

Using an email address in your domain and adding an email signature to all email communications are two free, easy, and hassle-free ways to promote yourself, your website, and your products or services. Once you have your email client set up, you can use it every day to market yourself without even thinking about it!