Establishing a Mailing List for Your Company Newsletter

You have spent countless hours and tons of cash on developing your website to near perfection. You have developed a newsletter to keep your customers informed and bring in new sales. You have everything in place and are ready for business. All you need now is a subscriber list. Getting your business, your promotions and your newsworthy events in front of your customers is vital. Read on to discover a few tips on building an effective subscriber list.

A great way to let people know that they can subscribe to your newsletter is to include a tag on your email signature. Many email programs allow users to customize a signature that is included with each email. When anyone opens an email that was sent including the email signature, they will have the ability to click on a link and subscribe.

Including a comment on your invoices or sales orders is also very effective. Many accounting software programs allow users the ability to customize the invoice or sales order template. By adding a line that reads: "Keep up to date with ABC Widget Company by subscribing to our monthly newsletter. To subscribe, send an email to Newsletter@ABCWidget.com." This method will not be quite as effective as an email signature because it requires your customers to manually send you an email rather than clicking on a link.

What could be the most obvious way to build a subscriber list is putting a link on your website. Anyone visiting your website will have the option of subscribing to your newsletter at the click of the mouse. Put this link in the same area on each page of your site. Make subscribing to your mailing list easy for users to do.

How often have you been to trade shows or other public meeting places and filled your name and contact information on a postcard? A great promotion is to offer a give-away. Have customers fill out a contact card and include a box that allows them to opt out of your mailing list. This will imply that each person filling out the card will be added to your mailing list. Those who wish not to be added must simple check the box.

Be very wary of the method in which you receive your subscriber list. If you purchase a list from a clearinghouse type company, many customers will flag you as spam, which can result in trouble with your website hosting company as well as tarnish your company's reputation.

There are many valid methods in building a subscriber list. Give your customers the option on every piece of outgoing correspondence and ask them each time you are face to face.