Email Marketing: How to Set Up A Successful Product Giveaway

Friday, November 26, 2010

Learning how to set up a successful product giveaway isn't rocket science, but it does take some planning and at least initially, a little bit of effort.

Giveaway events are a great way to quickly build your mailing list. They will also get your product name and business brand in front of a ton of people very quickly.

Savvy marketers have discovered that putting viral versions of their ebooks into a product giveaway, will increase targeted traffic to their websites and introduce their products to thousands of people at almost no cost.

This article will give people who are thinking about getting involved in a giveaway event, an idea of how to "put it all together" without being totally overwhelmed setting up the process.

Before you even bother searching for a product giveaway to involve yourself in, you will need the following:
  • a domain main and website hosting for your giveaway folder
  • a product or multiple products to give away
  • a short description of your product or products
  • a "one time offer" product to promote as a purchase incentive
  • an Upsell product is not necessary, but is recommended
  • an clear image of your product
  • an autoresponder service, so you can set up a new list.
  • an opt-in squeeze page
  • a “Thank You" and "OTO” landing page for your visitors to land on after they click “submit” button
  • a “Download" and/or "Upsell” page for your visitors to land on after they click link on the confirmation email
  • a welcome email
  • a series of follow-up emails to promote other products.
Most product giveaway events, in order for your product giveaway to show up in their listing, will require you send traffic to their event pages to promote their event.

Points are awarded for every referral you send to the event and the more points you acquire, the higher up your gift will appear on the gifts page. (Something like SEO affecting your site ranking in the search engine results page of Google.)

Like Google's PPC; most product giveaways will offer you an upgrade option where you receive bonus points and have your gift listed, regardless of how much traffic you contribute to the giveaway.

This is particularly advantageous to newcomers to email marketing who haven't already built a substantial list. Most newcomers will want to pay for the upgrade which usually runs only about $10 to $20 dollars.

First pick a product to give away in the event and write a brief description for it. Using PLR products with "giveaway" rights is probably the best way to go, unless you have already developed your own unique product.

Because PLR products can be totally edited; you can modify it, create a new product image cover for it, and make sure it doesn't conflict with any other product being given away on the event.

With PLR products, you can rewrite a condensed version, put it in a "Special Report" to give away at the event, and use the full version as an upgrade for your One Time Only offer.

If you decide on using a one time offer with an upsell product, be sure it that relates to your giveaway product. You can include an advertisement in your giveaway product to your OTO product and an ad for your upsell product. Put one ad in the front of the book and another ad on the last page; or just place both ads on the very last page.

To make things easy, use your giveaway product sales page as a template for your opt in and all your other pages.

Use the most compelling headlines and bullet points, and replace the "buy now" button with your opt in form.

Get rid of all the superfluous BS and remember that even though this is a giveaway event; in order to get people to give you their email address, you still have to promote the benefits of your product.

Set up the landing page, which is what people first see when they click the "submit" button on your opt in form.

This page tells your visitors to check their inbox for a confirmation email and to click the link in order to receive their download.

Use the sales page template to create this page, so that all your pages have the same basic look.

The "Thank You" landing page is where you can promote your OTO product if you decide to have one.

For instance; if you are giving away a free ebook as your product, you can offer a "video training course" or a "software product" as an upgrade to the ebook, at a one time only low price on the "Thank You" page.

You need to set up your product Download page along with your Upsell, if you are using one.

This is the page where your visitors land when they click on the confirmation link in their emails.
You can use either this page or the sales page for your upsell. As long as you prominently display the "DOWNLOAD" link when using the download page for your upsell, it really doesn't matter.

Upload a folder to your domain for the giveaway event that contains the four pages you set up. The Opt In or Squeeze Page, the Thank You and OTO page, the Download or Upsell page, and your product download URL.

Next you need to create your autoresponder list for the giveaway event. Make sure you add your Thank You URL when you set up the opt in form, the URL for your Download Page when you set up the verification email, and then copy the opt in form code and paste it into the opt in Squeeze Page you created.

Entering the correct URLs in the correct sequence is important, so TEST your Squeeze Page when you're finished to make sure your visitor traffic is being directed to the right pages.
  • When you click the Submit button on your Squeeze Page, you should be directed to the Thank You page.
  • When you check your inbox, you should have received the verification email.
  • When you click on the verification link, you should be directed to the Download Page.
  • When you click on the Download, you should receive your product giveaway.

If everything is working correctly, you can add your Welcome message to your new subscriber and include another link to your Download and/or Upsell page.

This will give you a second shot at capturing a sale, while offering your visitor a second chance to download your offer, just in case they missed it the first time around.

When you sign into the giveaway event dashboard to add your free gift, you will need to provide everything you did in the above steps, so be prepared to furnish it.

Once you have your product set up for one giveaway event; you can easily duplicate it for future giveaway events that you might be interested in joining. Even if you change your product, most of the work will already be done by you.

Setting up a successful product giveaway takes time and effort but for the work involved, there is no better way to grow your list and improve your bottom line.

Here are some giveaway ideas that will quickly grow your list.

Strategic Planning: When Is The Best Time For Strategic Planning?

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Strategic planning is extremely important to any organization and determines where an organization is going over the next few years.

Strategic planning is also important in determining how your business is going to get there and how you will know when and if your plan is achieved or not.

A strategic plan is normally focused on an entire organization, whereas the focus of a business plan is usually on a particular program, product, or service.

The strategic planning scheduling process depends on the nature and needs of an organization and it's market.

For example, in an organization that is in an industry whose products and services are rapidly changing, strategic planning should be carried out more frequently than in an industry that is not.

Strategic planning in this type of industry should probably be conducted in a comprehensive and detailed manner at least twice a year, in order to remain competitive and implement their goals.

Particular attention should be paid to mission, values, environmental issues, vision, objectives, responsibilities, time lines, goals, strategies, budgets, etc.

On the other hand, if an organization is in a stable market and has been around for many years; strategic planning could be carried out only once a year on only parts of the planning process.

Here are some guidelines to strategic planning you should consider.

Strategic planning should be done well before hand when an organization is just getting started. It should be part of the overall business plan along with a strategic marketing plan, an operational management plan, and a financial plan.

Strategic planning should always be done in preparation for any new business venture. This could be a partnership, a new product line, or just the development of a new division or department.

Strategic planning should also be conducted prior to each fiscal year's end. This is necessary to identify the organizational goals for the upcoming year. It is also required in order to determine what resources will be needed to achieve those goals and what financial planning is needed to acquire the funds for those resources.

Budget planning for the upcoming fiscal year is always an essential part of strategic planning.

A full strategic planning review should be conducted at least once every three years for a company that is not experiencing tremendous changes or annually if the organization is new or in a state of flux.

Strategic action plans should be updated yearly and during the updating process; the progress of the implementation should also be reviewed and modified when necessary.

Because strategic planning is so important in determining the fate of an organization; the frequency of reviews depends entirely on the degree of change an organization experiences.

If your company, regardless of it's size is not doing any strategic planning, you should implement some sort of policy immediately.

Here are the 5 primary reasons for business failure online that strategic planning can help you avoid.

Reasons To Market Your Products On YouTube

Saturday, November 13, 2010


There are many good reasons to market your products on YouTube and all of them will improve your bottom line.

Millions of people get on YouTube every day to watch videos and while away their time.

By including your website address and other business information into your or others videos; some of these users will visit your website and hopefully either purchase your products or services, or sign up to your list.

Here is a valid list of reasons to market your products on YouTube.
  • You can get people interested in visiting your website by producing short informative videos that highlight your expertise in your specific area of business.
  • By interacting with the YouTube community, leaving comments on other people's pages, and uploading video responses to videos on topics that are related to your business; you can get your business name or brand spread all over the web.

    Because YouTube is a social utility site, the more your business name or brand is out there, the more hits your marketing videos will receive.
  • You can add your YouTube channel website address to your other marketing promotionals and social networking profiles, to increase the visibility of your business brand, products and services.
  • By uploading video testimonials of your customers, you can improve on your business credibility. When doing this, it's important that you don't turn your video testimonials into an infomercial or you may lose credibility.
  • You can literally infuse new life to your products or services on YouTube, by showing the results of how someone is substantially benefited by using your product or service.
  • To make it easier for people to find your website; use your video to advertise your business or product making sure to include your company information, your name, URL, phone number and email address in every video.
  • Promote product placement by allowing others to use your product in their videos and vice versa. This is an extremely effective strategy that benefits both parties.
  • Most people are visual creatures and appreciate being shown a video instead of reading a FAQ or "How To" article. If you are able to produce good marketing videos that answer questions and describe how to do things, you will be a step ahead of your competition.
  • You can upload your videos to YouTube and then use them on your website by embedding the code into your web pages where people can easily find them.

    This also creates great backlinks that the search engines love.
  • Another of the many good reasons to market your products on YouTube, is that you can enter into a partnership with them and earn money from your You Tube marketing videos.
I'm sure that there are many other good reasons to market your products on YouTube that you can come up with that will benefit your company's bottom line.

You can learn more about building web traffic with YouTube here.

Video Marketing: How Long Is Too Long For A Video?

Friday, November 5, 2010

How long is too long for a video?
What impact does the length of your video have on it's chance for success?
Does the length of your video affect it's viral potential?
Are short videos more likely to go viral?

All these questions are important to video marketers but in the final analysis, there is no direct correlation between the length of your video and it potential to go viral.

The length of a video does impact on the message that a video is trying to convey. However, it doesn't seem to have any affect whatsoever on the ability of a video to go viral.

If you stop and think about it, there are many viral video hits that are very very short in duration; like this one about a little girl being pulled by her dog and falling on her face.



That video is probably no longer than 4 seconds, yet it has garnered over 1,595,317 hits as of this writing.

There are also many viral hits that are in excess of 90 minutes, such as the Star Wars Attack of the Clones review.

There are nine segments to the review that are about 10 minutes long each.

Those videos received anywhere from 1,242,872 hits on the first video segment, to 526,189 hits on the last video, as of this writing.

Because I just can't bear to see anyone sit through a boring nine segment review, I didn't include the video. If you care to view it for yourself, here is the URL for the first part:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfBhi6qqFLA&feature=player_embedded#!.

My point is that no one really knows how long is too long for a video.

What is obvious, is that the quality of your content is far more important to the viral success of your video, than the length of your video.

Generally, the longer your video plays, the less likely your viewers will remain on your site; unless you can provide them with engaging content.

On the other hand, a video that is too short cannot make the point you are trying to convey to your audience; unless you can provide them with engaging content.

Obviously, if you are trying to imprint your brand on your audience, you will most likely need a video that is more than 3 or 4 seconds long in order to accomplish your goal.

However, we all know that "short" has become the new trend. Short is currently popular and in vogue. Just look at Twitter with their 140 character limit if you don't think so.

The public has always had a short attention span and most people won't spend more than 5 to 15 seconds on any website online, unless the content is compelling.

In the final analysis and with very few exceptions, length has almost no bearing on whether a video goes viral.

As long as people enjoy what's in your video they will share it with their friends.

So. How long is to too long for a video?
 
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