Strategic List Development

One of the most important assets an organization can have is it's lists. A list is also rarely given the attention it needs from small and medium sized organizations. That is why many of the Virtual Buzz Assistant activities center on development and management of lists (audiences.)

No doubt, as you help create buzz for the organization, you will be generating new lists as well. Who did you contact? Who responded? - Just to list a couple.

While the tenancy is to want to contact as many people as possible, it is also important to think about what information a client may want and need. You should also keep lists for yourself, because once you have had success with someone for one client, they will be more likely to pay attention to you in the future for other clients as well. Virtual Buzz Assistants that have developed great lists and relationships make more money in less time because getting results is easier. Remember if you are doing double entry for yourself and your client, do not charge a client for that additional time.

Working with Lists

Remember that the list is an incredibly valuable asset. This means that you need to have a plan when working on it and always have backups. I have seen excel and other types of files get corrupted for no apparent reason and you simply lost the data in them. For this reason, follow these rules, regardless of what application you are using:

Never work directly with the main database unless you have a fresh backup.

Always make a copy of the data before doing work on it.
Be sure copies of data are in at least two secure locations.
Always have a clear plan of what you can do with client data. Are there things that the client wants you to update and others that are off limits?
Take your time – a mistyped email address is costly in lost opportunity as well as cost to send a message that no one will get.
Keep lists in a secure location/computer.
Never give out the list! I have had people offer $1,000's for lists. Your client's lists are never for sale and your list should only used by you and never sold to others for direct use. That would only ruin the list if you gave it to someone and they started spamming the emails.

Adding Big Value to your List

A list that just has a name and email is valuable, if they have opted to receive messages from you or your client. But how can you collect a little more data or merge different lists to add even more value?

Mailing List – If you send someone an email and a physical piece of mail, they are more likely to notice you. One way to get a great mailing address it to let people that reply to you know that you like to send thank you cards, and collect that information into you list of active advocates.
Build the Database – Can you cross different lists to find smaller groups of people that are worth more individual attention? People that have purchased from you, who live in your state, who work in bigger companies??? You can use data in other places and the occasional survey or follow up form to make a better list.
Brand Ambassadors – Could you client benefit from a Brand Ambassador program? This is a group of people that love the organization and opt to be ambassadors for it. They get periodic news, training and possibly even invitations to special events. This is one example of how to create smaller but more powerful lists with a little creativity.
Tracking - If your system allows it, track the frequency of open, which links they have clicked on, etc.

Techniques for Increasing Lists

Virtual Buzz Assistants are always encouraged to focus on conversion. Results are what clients are paying for, and growing their list is a great result.

On the Internet, there are some very good techniques for encouraging people to sign up. Here is an image of the conversion for one month on several websites we run.

Notice that the % is all over the place. Several factors make a big difference on sign up.

Our main Buzzoodle blog went from under 2% to nearly 5% with the same message,when we changed the technology to be a light box instead of a standard pop-up. A light box actually dims out the back webpage and forces to focus on signing up or clicking cancel.

You might ask why we did not move the light box to every website if it doubled the results. The reasons is because it is an intrusive technology that may have a negative impact on sites that convert better. The blog gets a lot of search engine hits that are one page visitors and then gone. The light box makes them interact with it before they can see the one page.

The best conversion is the websites that are most closely related to the offer, (Buzz Marketing in this case) We put the same offer on some other websites, like www.ronmcdaniel.com and they get some results, but not as good as the focused sites.
The inline page is page that gets linked to from various other places, as well as in emails and such. People do not end up on that page unless they already intend to sign up.

The reason for sharing this is so you understand that your leads for your list should come from various sources and you have to try different technologies, different messages and even different images or colors on your sign up. If you just have one link saying “Sign up for our newsletter” then you or your clients are missing out.