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This is a somewhat advanced email marketing tactic, although most serious email marketers having been doing it for years. For me though, this is something I’ve only recently been able to test because I haven’t had the technological resources to do so.

I recently upgraded my AWeber account to the “new” version. In case you missed the news about the new AWeber upgrades, the CEO Tom Kulzer and his team recently rolled out some nice advanced email marketing features.

The features let you create segmentations in your lists based on various elements, such as who opened your email and who clicked your links within the emails. There are other options as well, but for the purpose of this article let’s just focus on these two basic segmentations.

Before upgrading my account I was on the legacy version of AWeber, which is basically the same service, except I didn’t have as much power to segment my lists and consequently, beyond deciding which list I would broadcast too, I didn’t do much else. As a result, I generally hit all my newsletter with each message - a shotgun approach to email marketing.

Unfortunately (or really, fortunately) for me, my list is probably a bit larger than the average at AWeber, and with their new services came a new pricing structure, which meant I would pay more than five times per month than what I was previously, if I decided to upgrade. I eventually decided to bite the bullet because I know how good a service it is, how important my newsletter is to my business, and of course the primary reason - so I could test the new features.

Luckily for most of you reading this, if you are just starting out your email newsletter, the AWeber fee hasn’t really changed even for the new features. You’re still going to pay the very justified price of around the sub-$20 a month mark for a business-critical service. In my case, with some 40,000+ members of my newsletter, the fee is a little bit more.

In case you haven’t started your newsletter, here’s my review to help you decide whether AWeber is right for you - AWeber Email Autoresponder Review.

Now let me explain how I made use of the new features and how you can implement these advanced email marketing techniques…

The Problem With The Shotgun Approach

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I wanted to use the word “honesty” in the title for this blog post, but I expect the word “Lying” will pull more attention. However don’t let that mislead you, this article is about using honesty in your marketing, not lying.

At the start of September you may recall StomperNet offered their Stomping The Search Engines 2 course for the cost of shipping if you were willing to try their new print newsletter. They made money off this offer because of the multiple upsells involved during the ordering process and the potential for rebills if customers decided to stay subscribed to the print newsletter.

I had no problem with this offer, in fact I thought it was a good deal and promptly blogged about it and sent a notice to my newsletter too.

Besides a brief hiccup that killed the opening day, StomperNet did well, and many of you, my readers, grabbed the offer.

A few days later Brad and Andy at StomperNet decided to up the ante a little and with the help of many of their top Internet marketing friends, put together a bonus package that was, well, a little over the top.

Guys like Ed Dale, Jeff Johnson, Jeff Walker, Rich Schefren, Mike Filsaime, Paul Colligan and Shawn Casey (and others) gave everything from teleseminar downloads, audio files, free months in coaching programs, reports and more on top of what was already offered by StomperNet, just for the cost of shipping. That offer has since passed, though you can still buy the course and trial the first month of the newsletter if you pay for sending it to you.

Why Do They Do This?

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I’ve been talking about it for long enough. Now is your chance to watch my latest video. Here’s the link -

This video covers a form of Internet marketing that combines the traffic and raw exposure power of a blog, with the direct marketing power of email lists.

I call it Conversion Blogging, and it’s the basis for my entire six-figure online business.

I honestly believe this system represents a much easier methodology for making money with blogs. I’m not saying you shouldn’t make money from traditional blog monetization methods like advertising (I still make a big chunk of change from sponsorship), but a blog can be so much more if you combine it with what has worked in the Internet marketing and direct marketing worlds for years (almost centuries when you look at offline mail order).

Of course for this system to work you can’t ignore blogging fundamentals - you still need to know what goes into building a great blog.

To help with this, after you watch the Conversion Blogging video, you can enter your name and email to watch my second video, a brand new visual presentation of the Blog Profits Blueprint and grab an updated copy of the text version of the Blueprint too.

I’ll let the videos do the explaining, so please go watch now, and then tell me what you think in comment replies here.

http://www.blogmastermind.com/video/

Yaro Starak
Conversion Blogger

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Over the weekend I worked hard on video presentations for the release of Blog Mastermind. Obviously the core topic of the videos is how to make money via blogging, however I’m introducing a new form of blogging for profit, something that can lead to income quicker, it’s more stable and in the long haul is a much better model for bloggers to follow.

I’ve got a name for this type of blogging that I will reveal when the video comes out but what I can tell you now, it is based on email marketing. I’m not the only person doing this form of blogging of course, but I’m one of very few compared to the total number of professional bloggers out there.

How The Humble Email List Changed My Business

Back in 2005 I started blogging. A few months later I began studying the work of some prominent Internet marketers and a trend arose - everyone talked about how you had to have an email list.

Strangely enough, I didn’t listen. Well, at least I didn’t take action, which is just as bad. I could see how having an email list was valuable, but my focus at the time was my editing business and I just didn’t see how email marketing was going to help it. My blog at the time was still more hobby site than a money maker.

Fast forward to the end of 2006 and I decided to finally launch an email list. However I still didn’t get it completely right because instead of leveraging my blog for continuous email opt-ins, I created an off-site landing page and wrote a few blog articles pointing towards it. At least it was a start.

When it came time to do a blog redesign I was well and truly convinced that I had to include an opt-in for my list on my blog. I asked my designer to put the opt-in in the right column at the top in the above the fold area. You can see it in action in most of the 2006 archives of my blog at the Way Back Machine.

Instantly my opt-ins grew and I quickly found myself generating an extra 20-50 new leads per day, which continued to increase as my blog traffic increased.

Since then, nearly every success I have enjoyed online has come thanks to making these decisions. I finally understood what Internet marketers were talking about when they said you have to have a list - and yes, that applies in EVERY niche online, not just the make money topics (email marketing is so good in non-business markets because not so many people use it well there).

How Email Will Make A Difference To Your Blogging

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On the weekend I attended a workshop by Australian copywriting expert Pete Godfrey.

The room was full of a variety of people and I was pleased to hear that it wasn’t all about Internet marketing. There was a lot of advice handed out for small business owners in any market and plenty of people in the room were from traditional companies who do normal things like sell widget type stuff - you know, physical goods offline. People like mechanics and printers were in attendance, and also a few people looking to become better sales writers like journalists and budding freelance copywriters.

Today I want to pass on some of the biggest lessons from the workshop that every small business owner needs to think about.

The Money Is In The Relationship

Pete was quick to point out that the money is not in the list but in the relationship you have with your members. He teaches that you need to foster a “tribe”, a group of core customers who buy from you not just because of your good service, but because they have a real vested interest in you and what you do.

To facilitate relationship building Pete recommended the use of a newsletter, but in this case not your typical online email newsletter (though Pete certainly agreed you want one of them too!), but a print newsletter you send to people via oldschool snail mail.

The Print Newsletter

Pete showed a copy of his print newsletter that he charges $49 a month to subscribe to and also a copy of a free print newsletter one of his clients use (a car parts wholesaler).

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