Have you ever seen that bumper sticker, “the person who dies
with the most toys wins?” Well, in marketing, s/he who dies with the
biggest database wins!
Building and maintaining your database is key to the success
of your business and one of the best ways to build your business is by sending
out a regular electronic newsletter (often called an Ezine – an electronic
magazine).
The success of your newsletter strategy depends on the three
golden rules of my Practice Building Success System.
The three golden rules are:
1. Give
value
2. GIVE value!
3. GIVE VALUE!!!!!!!!
Your database is GOLD and if you treat it that way you will
become GOLDEN! Far too many therapists
ignore this.
The fact is, you are missing a HUGE opportunity if you don’t
have a way to keep in contact with the people you meet and the clients who have
already used your services. In fact I’ve
had several therapists double the revenue in their practice simply by staying
in touch with people who already know and love them.
It’s much easier to have an old client return than to procure a new one.
If you consistently produce a quality newsletter or ezine,
your subscriber database will grow steadily through word of mouth ..... when you provide value to your readers. That last part of the sentence is bold
because it is the key to the magic kingdom.
I don’t know about you but the ezines that hit my inbox and
get read are the ones that educate, inform and inspire and these are the very type of
ezine I have forwarded onto others because I knew it would help those people. While very few therapists can solely rely on
the proliferation of their Ezine as their primary marketing vehicle, it is an
effective way to allow other people to market for you while you sit back and
watch the size of your database grow!
So by now I hope I’ve convinced you of the value of
newsletters. Now lets look at what you
need to avoid:
The three quickest ways to die in cyberspace
1. Make it about you or your modality
2. Don’t make it about them
3. Don’t give value
My 90 Day Challenge is a very grand example of the “Give
Value Golden Rule” in action. I have
had over 850 people sign up to do the challenge from a database of zero. When I launched the 90 Day Challenge I had to
re-sign my whole database onto my new shoppingcart. You might expect my ezine list, created at
the same time, is about the same size.
Well it’s not it’s double that and I can only put it down to the fact
that people are saying such good things about me that people sign up for the
newsletter despite not wanting to do the challenge. When people sign on to the database the
comment section usually goes something like “a friend who did your challenge
told me about you”.
By steadily plodding along giving value at every turn I got a name for myself that is now becoming unstoppable. It doesn’t happen overnight but it
happens! The trick is to consistently
turn out high content, high value newsletters that are designed to genuinely
help people. Your secondary need should
be to publicise events and products that might also help others whilst still
keeping your bank manager happy.
So why do newsletters work so well
There are three key reasons why they work:
1. Credibility
Chances are, when people first subscribe to your Ezine they
won’t know much about you or your profession.
Publishing a regular Ezine allows you to build credibility with your
readers. Natural therapies, like most
professional services, require a level of trust. An Ezine is an excellent way to build the
necessary trust and credibility just by being yourself.
2. Enables Relationship Building
Perhaps you’ve heard the term relationship marketing. In essence, relationship marketing is the
process of allowing people to get to know you and your services over time. Having an Ezine is an excellent way to build
relationships with potential clients.
Let’s face it, people are most comfortable (and willing) to hire a
therapist whom they already know. An
Ezine is one of the most effective and efficient ways to build relationships
with tens, hundreds and even thousands of people.
3. Increase Your Knowledge
When you write articles for your Ezine your own knowledge
and confidence will increase. As you
know, the best way to learn something is to teach it! So when you publish an Ezine and invest the
time and energy to research topics and write about them, your own skills,
proficiency and knowledge increase.
Why are they so powerful?
It a numbers game. In
marketing a certain percentage of your database will react to your offers. That reaction level is VERY low. If you are getting anything between 1 and 3
percent reaction you would be happy. Anything over 10 percent and you will be
ecstatic. So if you aren’t into giving
value you can see why a newsletter won’t work for you. So let’s just look at the numbers for a
minute.
If you send to 100 people and 1% react – that’s 1 person. Lets say they have three treatments with you
at $70 – it means that campaign grossed you $210
If you send to 1,000 people and 1% react – that’s 10 people
and if those people have 3 treatments with you at $70 – well that campaign is
worth $2,100! Now are you are starting to
see why newsletters work?
About now you are probably going into, “well it's all alright
for HER, SHE knows thousands of people”.
Please know the absolute truth is that my first newsletter went to about
TEN people – yes, you read right 10 family and friends. Ask anyone with a big database they built
themselves and they will tell you the same story. Ali Brown, the Ezine Queen reaches millions of people now. She inspired me to
start by telling her list that she too started with 10 people and one of those was her cat!
The hardest yards are in getting your first 500 people, then
the flow becomes a little easier. If you
are a quitter, don’t start, it will break your spirit. But if you are a plodder like me who kept
writing from the heart, kept giving value and bless all of you who told your
friends, family and colleagues about me.
But remember I also worked my little tush off in rain, hail, sunburn,
sandstorms and tears to build my database and six years later I’m getting the
rewards.
So if you are in this for the long haul and if you love what
you do, your ezine will bring you a great deal of pleasure and profit over the
years but the trick is to start NOW!
 |
| Start now and give yourself and become a winner in your prospects eyes! |
