Fortunes are made on the Internet by people who have built
solid mailing lists for the promotion of their online
businesses. But the question many publishers face is how to
turn their ezine subscribers into buyers?
Let me be honest with you. Your mailing list is only as valuable
as your subscriber's willingness to purchase your products and
services, or the products and services of your advertisers.
Until your subscribers begin to buy what you offer, your mailing
list is not worth a plug nickel!
Here are the six ingredients that you need for creating a
successful and profitable ezine:
ADVERTISING YOUR EZINE
* While often expensive, paid brokers can actually get readers
to subscribe to your ezine. Yet, in my own personal experience,
buying subscribers did put a large number of email addresses
on my list, but it provided no value to my list since most
subscribers never read my web-based ezine.
* One ezine advertising program that I have used in the past
to great success is List Partners which permits you to set
up an free affiliate program to permit others to advertise
your ezine in exchange for free advertising or cash.
http://www.listpartners.com
* I have generated some very solid advertising results using
Publisher Ad Swaps.
By setting up private advertising arrangements with other
ezine publishers, you can get your advertisement in another
ezine in exchange for an advertisement in your ezine.
To locate like-minded publishers seeking beneficial ad swaps,
there is a moderated discussion group dedicated to this task
called the Ezine Publishers Swap Meet:
http://lists.topica.com/lists/publishers_swap_meet/
* Paid Search Engine placement can be another solid method for
attracting new subscribers to your ezine.
* For more help in promoting your ezine, check out "How to
Publicize Your E-Zine" at:
http://www.zinebook.com/publicz.html
DEVELOP A STANDARDIZED TEMPLATE FOR YOUR EZINE
Your readers want a specific structure for your ezine. They
want to be able to learn your structure and to be able to
quickly follow your structure to get to the meat and potatoes
of every issue. Your readers are pressed for time in the same
way that you are, so they want you to enable them to get what
they want from you in a quick and orderly fashion.
PROVIDE EXCEPTIONAL AND TARGETED CONTENT
When you develop your ezine, you know in principle what type
of content that you want to bring to your readers.
But, unless you have the financial ability to work your ezine
on a full-time basis, finding the time to create all of your
own content is a challenge that every publisher faces.
Fortunately, there are writers who have the time to create
the content you can use, and they make their content available
for publication so long as their terms of reprint are honored.
These writers cover a wide range of subject materials that
enable publishers in nearly every genre find a ready supply
of content that they can include in their publications.
To learn how you can find articles that can be used for reprint
in your publication, you should explore the following resources:
Niche Content Finder
http://www.freewebs.com/niche-content/
The Article Depot
http://articledepot.50megs.com/
The Phantom Writers Articles Archive
http://thephantomwriters.com/free_content/d/index.shtml
Free-Reprint Article and Content Providers Webring
http://b.webring.com/hub?ring=contentproviders
PERSONALIZE AND BRAND YOUR EZINE
In order to separate your ezine from the thousands of other
online magazines, you must create a solid brand for your ezine.
What I mean by this is that you should always strive to make
your ezine stand well above the crowd and to give your ezine
its own personal identity. You want your ezine to be the one
that your subscribers will read religiously and intently.
The way to develop an identity for your ezine, separate from
your competitors, is to inject a touch of yourself into every
issue. Talk to your readers as if you are talking to a friend
or colleague. Your publishing competitors cannot duplicate your
personality or your own personal take on life itself. Your
personality is the primary ingredient that will help you
to develop a solid ezine brand that your readers can trust.
CREATE READER INTERACTION
The greatest challenge in publishing an ezine is ALWAYS getting
your subscribers to read your ezine.
One method for doing this is to develop reader interaction.
The one ezine that I know that has done the best job of this
is Your Membership Exchange: http://www.your-membership.com
In this ezine, readers submit questions, and other readers
answer the questions. Their unique selling proposition is
"Newsletters for Our Members, By Our Members."
In each issue, a new question is posted, and then the publisher
takes the best answers to a previous question and publishes
them in the ezine. I read this one every day.
In my ezine, I had accomplished a strong level of interaction
with my readers by running a contest. In every issue, I posed
a brain teaser question and published the names of the first
three people who in the previous issue got the answer right.
ASK FOR THE SALE
I mention this only because I know someone who is making this
mistake right now. I am sure a lot of other publishers are
making this mistake as well.
Many people begin the process of publishing an ezine for the
explicit purpose of selling their own wares. They follow the
advice of the guru's about developing a mailing list and
publishing their ezine on a regular basis. A lot of work is
put into the ezine to develop a loyal base of subscribers
who read each and every issue delivered.
And when all is said and done, the publisher fails to ask their
readers to purchase the wares that their e-zine was designed
to promote. How does one actually expect their readers to buy
their wares if they do not ask their readers to buy what is
being offered?
You are the expert in charge of your publication, so you should
not be afraid to ask your readers the hard questions. You must
explain to your readers what you are selling, and you must ask
your readers to actually purchase what you are selling! Don't
be afraid of offending your readers. Take care to do what is
necessary to help your ezine to generate the profits it was
designed to create.
Copyright Bill Platt - All Rights Reserved. Reprints allowed with article and resource box unedited. If you post this article on a website, you must set the links up as hyperlinks.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Bill Platt is the owner of http://www.LinksAndTraffic.com
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