Promotion Can Help your Business Blog Launch – After that It’s up to You
August 21, 2007 by Eric Eggertson
Filed under Marketing
Existing e-mail lists are a resource not be ignored when launching a business blog.
Brian Clark published a case study of an e-learning blog that converted the company’s existing contacts into thousands of subscribers – on the first day.
Another way they drove people to subscribe was to offer a white paper on a topic that has value to the target audience.
E-mail may be so 1990s, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t still work as a way to reach a targeted group quickly. Clark also made sure the landing page included an option for people to subscribe to an e-mail alert of each blog post.
Remember, if you’re reaching people by e-mail, they may want to continue to be connected by e-mail. It’s a lesson that too many people forget. (I’m thinking of several websites that allow me to phone a customer service person, but won’t let me send an e-mail or fill in a "contact us" form.)
As for whether you can keep your subscribers, that requires ongoing effort to provide something of value.
Tags: email, subscribers, case studies, business, blogs, conversion, customer, copyblogger, brian clark
So, do you have any snappy advice for a new business blog that doesn’t have existing customers to convert? Great case study, though. Thanks for pointing us there.
Jason:
I think Brian is pointing in the right direction, when he talks about offering something free on the site that has real value to the target audience. If it’s not a white paper, maybe a really well-designed decision tree that people can print out and have by their desk, or some other PDF that is the kind of thing people would want to save and keep handy.
Even something goofy, like a mock-up of a business card template that automatically generates uber-cool job titles, or something, could be a draw, with the right audience.
Another option is some sort of give-away for 2-3 new subscribers to be chosen at random.
Just some thoughts…
Good thoughts, all. Thanks!