Newsletterology

When deciding on what your newsletter will be about, it’s important to hone in on a niche topic or area of expertise. Picking a niche will help to ensure that subscribers are getting the information and resources they are looking for about a particular topic. It allows you to focus on one niche area rather than trying to cover an entire area.

An opt-in mailing list is a mailing list that a person subscribes to and has to verify that they did indeed subscribe. An opt-in mailing list is preferable because it cuts down on the possibility of spam in that the subscriber asked to get your newsletters.

Before beginning the niche newsletter, do some research and find out how many, if any, other newsletters there are out there that focus on your desired niche. Generally speaking, the fewer the better. Having fewer newsletters already on your topic means that when someone is searching for said topic, they will find you much easier. Having a niche area that’s rather obscure will mean it might be slower building your opt-in mailing list, but at the same time, you might gain more simply because there aren’t many newsletters on your chosen topic.

When making your website on your niche, use a lot of keywords and use them often. You might consider archiving your newsletter on the site to help draw in readers. The keywords will help to generate more traffic and thereby boost your mailing list subscribers. If your niche happens to deal with any brand names, use those brand names often through your site and in your newsletter. The key is to not only drive traffic to your site and gain subscribers but to make sales.

If your desired niche for your newsletter is special needs kids, consider focusing in on that idea. Rather than trying to cover all things about special needs kids, think about a tighter niche such as autism. Special needs kids with autism is still a big area, so focus even tighter. You might consider a niche about an autism diet for special needs kids, the Gluten Free Casein Free Diet, or GFCF Diet.

So instead of publishing on a wide topic area of autism in special needs kids, your niche topic would be about the GCFC autism diet. This would mean that readers who are not interested in information and resources about the GCFC autism diet wouldn’t subscribe to your opt-in mailing list, but those readers who are wanting resources would sign up to your mailing list. You might tighten the niche even more by offering only particular products for sale that deal with this topic.

Building an opt-in niche mailing list will result in having subscribers who want only what you are offering, thereby increasing the number of subscribers and sales.

Having a newsletter is a must for anyone doing business online. A newsletter is the main lifeline to the customer. It’s through the newsletter that businesses can let customers know about sales and discounts or updates to their website.

Online marketing has grown by leaps and bounds. Opt-in marketing can greatly increase repeat visitors to your site, and drastically increase sales of your services or products. The wonderful thing about an opt-in mailing list is that the subscriber is wanting to receive emails from you, meaning they are interested in hearing from you on a regular basis.

One of the goals for your website should be to gain subscribers to your newsletter. It’s important that your newsletter be an opt-in newsletter, and that you don’t just add people or email addresses to your mailing list on your own. The opt-in feature is to ensure that the person wants your emails so that you are not spamming them. Opt-in means that the subscriber has to sign up for our newsletter and then confirm that subscription via the email they signed up with. This prevents anyone from just adding them or subscribing them without their permission or knowledge.

Put a sign up form on every page of your website. Most of your visitors will come from to your site from a search engine, and they could land on any page. Give them the option of signing up for your newsletter no matter what page they land on.

Focus on a niche for your newsletter. Instead of trying to do a little of everything out there, focus on one main niche area of interest. For example, if your interest is teddy bears, your website and newsletter could focus on teddy bear clothing or designer made teddy bears. Instead of trying to do all things regarding teddy bears, focus in on a small niche.

Keep fresh content on your site and as you update the site, relay the news to your subscribers. Keeping interesting and fresh content will help keep from losing subscribers. Give subscribers something new to look forward to.

Pick a day that your newsletter goes out and keep on that schedule. Your readers will know when to expect to hear from you. Don’t send something out every day, because most likely readers will grow tired of an everyday mailing. Once a week is the best option, although some choose to send out only on a monthly basis.

When you are getting material ready for your newsletter, be honest in product descriptions, etc. Don’t give your readers a lot of hype about something that you know doesn’t work as well as you are saying it does. Don’t say you have tried something that you’ve in fact never tried or used. Be honest with your subscribers. They will appreciate the honesty and see that you can be trusted. Trust is important in business. Gain the trust of the readers and don’t lose it.

On occasion, ask subscribers their thoughts on what you can do to improve your newsletter. Ask them what they want to see more of or less of. Remember that the customer is the lifeline to you making a profit. For example, even though you might love the layout of your newsletter, your readers might find it less than appealing. Go with what works best for your mailing list. The subscribers are the ones reading it, so you want to please them overall.

Even in the internet age, word of mouth is still the biggest and best advertising. Word of mouth can still make or break a business, and word of mouth can bring in new subscribers. Keeping a friendly appearance and attending to the needs of your subscribers on your mailing list can cause a domino affect. People will take about your business, your website will get more hits, and your subscriber base will grow.

Never sell your mailing list. Never give away your mailing list, or share it. When a subscriber joins your opt-in mailing list, they are not joining for your to sell or share their personal and private information or email address. They are joining to receive updates and newsletters from you, and you alone. This comes back to the trust issue. Your subscribers trust that you will not sell them out.

Offer a potential subscriber a sample newsletter on your website. Be sure to keep the sample newsletter up to date so that the reader can see just what they will be getting when they opt-in to your newsletter. It’s also a good idea to keep back issues of newsletters archived on your site. This gives readers and visitors the opportunity to look at older issues they might have missed.

Avoid sending out newsletters that are too heavy in advertising. While the goal of a newsletter is often to make a profit, no subscriber wants to get newsletters that contain nothing but a constant barrage of ads wanting them to buy something on a continual basis.

Your good reputation and the trust of your readers will build your mailing list size and increase your subscriber base.

It is important that you understand keyword density if you write for the web and write SEO articles. keyword density basically indicates the amount of times that a selected keyword or keyword phrase appears on a web page or in an article on said page.

Keywords should be used throughout the article but you do not want to over use them. If you repeat them too often, your article or web site could be misconstrued as attempting to spam search engines or artificially boost your search engine rankings. Rather than help your site, it will hurt it. Be careful not to overuse those words!

What is keyword density and how can you determine what it is for your article or web page? Simply put, keyword density is defined as a percentage of the total word count on a web page, or how many times certain words appear within the total body of the article (web page).

For example, imagine that you have 100 words on your web page. Do not include the HMTL code used for writing the web page. Imagine that you use a certain keyword five times on the page or in that article. The keyword density on that page is figured by simply dividing the total number of keywords, by the total number of words that appear on your web page. So five divided by 100 = .05. Because keyword density is defined as the percentage of the total word count on the page, multiply the above by 100, that is 0.05 x 100 = 5%.

The accepted standard for keyword density is between 3% and 5%, so to get recognized by the search engines and you should never exceed it and you would want to have a 3% density at the minimum.

Remember that this rule applies to every page on your site and to every article that you write for the web or your own web site. It also applies to not just to one keyword but also a set of keywords that relates to a different product or service.

Easy steps to check the density:
1. Copy and paste the content from the web page or article that you wish to check into a word processor program such as Microsoft Word or Open Office.

2. On the tool bar, select Edit from the menu and click Select All. Next, go to the Tools menu and select Word Count. Jot down the total word count.

3. Now select the Find or Find and Replace function from in the Edit menu. Go to the Replace tab and fill in the keyword you wish to locate. Replace that word with the same word, so that you are not changing the text.

4. After you have completed the Replace function, the system will provide a count of the words that you have replaced. This gives you the number of times you have used the keyword on that page or in said article.

5. Using this method and the examples shown above, you can now calculate the keyword density.

You’ve built the ultimate website. The layout looks fantastic, it’s easy to navigate, and you’ve got a nice selection of content for your readers to enjoy. You’ve promoted your site and the hits have been coming in, but suddenly there’s a huge drop in your hits. What’s going on and how do you keep traffic returning to your website?

First of all, to keep visitors returning to your website, you have to give them something to return to. Promotion and marketing is great, but if you don’t give a reader a reason to return, why are they going to return? Studies show that repeat customers make you a profit as much, if not more so, than first time visitors.

Following are some tips and ideas that can keep traffic returning to your site and increase profits from your affiliate marketing and sales from your site.

Keep fresh and updated content on your website. New articles are a must to a content site. Visitors who return to your site want to see new content added for them to read. A good rule of thumb is to add one to four articles a week, perhaps more so, depending on the size and topic of your site.

You can write articles yourself or you can hire someone to write for you to your specifications. You can also look at article directories online and find free articles that pertain to your website. Often people will provide free articles in exchange for links back to their site, something that benefits both you and the author of the articles.

Offer a free download to your readers. Offering free downloadable ebooks is another way to keep traffic coming back to your site. Change the ebook each week that you are giving away so that the customer has something new to download. You can also offer free patterns if you have a craft or sewing site, free music samples if you have a music site, etc. The point is to offer something new on a regular basis.

Run a contest. People love to win things! Offering a contest on your site is a sure way to increase traffic and have visitors coming back. Offering a new contest on a regular basis will improve even on this idea. You can give away books, DVDs, CDs, ebooks, designer jewelry you created, handcrafted baby items, beauty samples, gift baskets, run writing contests, etc. Keeping a new contest going will ensure more repeat web traffic.

Offer special discounts and/or coupons on items. People love sales and bargains! Offering a regular sale or discount on something that you sell on your site can help with repeat web business. Changing the sales weekly or monthly will give readers something new to look for on your site, so they will visit to see what you are offering. Saving money is something that just about everyone wants to do, so if you offer something at a nice savings to the customer on a regular basis, chances are they will return to see what you have available.

Have a blog and a newsletter. Keep in touch on a personal level with your readers by means of a blog and a newsletter. Blogs have become very popular, and they are much more personal in nature. Newsletters offer the opportunity to tell customers what’s new on the site, what areas you have updated, specials you have going, etc. Blogs and newsletters are great business tools in that they offer direct communication with your readers and customers, thereby bringing in repeat traffic. You can add links in your blog to your latest articles or contests. Offering a gift when they sign up for your newsletter helps to gain subscribers.

Host a forum or chat. Allow your customers a place to talk to you or to others interested in your site. Getting on a personal level with your readers shows the readers that you are real and are interested in their thoughts about your products or services. It also helps to bring them back to you site for repeat business.

Bringing repeat traffic back to your website isn’t hard to do, but it does require that you keep your site updated and that you communicate with your readers. Keeping fresh content up in the form of articles and news and giving the reader something new to look forward to will not only bring back customers to your website, it will add more profit in your pocket.