Tourism Internet Marketing U

Establishing Your Private Mailing List

Private mailing lists enable you to create one-way communication to your target market and are a tremendous vehicle for building relationships and a sense of community. Generating your own mailing lists is highly recommended because a targeted opt-in list has many marketing uses. The list can be used to maintain dialog with customers and potential customers regarding updates, support, specials, and so on. It can also be used to distribute corporate newsletters, price lists, new catalogs, product updates, new product announcements, and upcoming events.

In this and future blog posts we’ll discuss:

• Why should you have your own mailing list?
• Privacy
• Managing your mailing list
• Building your mailing list
• Promoting your mailing list
• Tips to stay under the spam radars
• Recent legislation

First, let’s discuss why you should have a mailing list. There are a number of reasons to have one. Running a private mailing list can be beneficial in a number of ways, to include:

• Permission-based marketing
• Establishing yourself or your business as an expert in your field
• Networking
• Conserving contacts
• Building repeat traffic to your web site
• Branding
• Promotion of your business’s products and services
• Potential source of revenue

Mailing lists are money. Use them properly and you can build a business from scratch. Manage them poorly and you’ll never make a penny. But know that there is money in a private mailing list and it’s up to you to squeeze it out. For more tips on how just to do that, why not take a look at my book 101 Ways to Promote Your Tourism Business Web Site? I know you’ll be thrilled with it.

-Written by Susan Sweeney