Here’s a broad-strokes overview of your sources of fans and ways to communicate with them. Let’s start with looking at your email correspondence – one of the most important pillars of your list building and maintenance.
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- Opt-in emails. Whether you got your members through your website or through a written signup form during a gig, these are the people who WANTED you to have their contact. And this means you can, and indeed should, stay in touch with them with periodic updates by email. There are certain rules of engagement you need to be aware of, when using email to contact people. Here’s just a few of them:
- Don’t spam. Don’t mail them every few minutes with any trivial trash that comes to your mind. If you mail them something, it needs to be interesting and relevant. VALUABLE. And not “too” often!
Never waste people’s time!
Brand yourself. Make sure your emails contain elements of your branding. Something that sticks in people’s minds. Your logo, your slogan, your graphics. Whatever. Any copyright information you may convey in your emails should be Creative-Commons-based.- Post Regularly. Make this a ritual. Every Monday morning. Or once a month, last Sunday. Whatever. And, of course, it MUST be interesting and relevant. You can post about your upcoming shows, interesting things that happened during a gig, featured photos, interesting links to reviews, your (strong) opinions, stories with a moral, funny quotes, discussions, questions to your fans, anecdotes, fan Q&A’s, fan mentions – anything. And just keep it current and engaging.
- Have links to your site in your mails. You want to promote ENGAGEMENT. If people don’t read your emails. How do you know? If they read them but get bored, how do you know? Both questions are answered by your Autoresponder. You can see how many people open your emails and how many click through on the content links within them. SUPER important!
- Occasional email broadcasts. Quite apart from any regular emails you can schedule, you can also send broadcasts to your list, if something out of the ordinary happens. But keep in mind that if your regular mails are too frequent, your broadcasts may get lost in the mix. As always, it takes tact and balance.
- Write GOOD emails. It’s better not to write at all than to write boring, trite stuff. But apart from the fact that your content needs to be informative and engaging, you also need to use subtle little “tricks” such as “calls to action” (“click here,” “click this link to learn more,” etc), teasers (leave them on a cliff-hanger and “force” them to click to read the rest of the story), etc. Above all, try to keep your emails SHORT and to the point, with any elaborations available through live links to designated pages or posts within your website. Apart from that, make sure you grammar and spell-check your emails as well!
- Track everything. INFORMATION is one of your keys to success. Using a professional auto-responder program you can track just about everything that people do with your emails – and you can improve your follow-up campaigns accordingly. If you see that hardly anyone opens your emails, this means they’re “switched off” and are basically avoiding reading your messages. Some email subjects convert better than others. You need to find the right balance between importance/relevance and hype. People first look at the subjects of emails before they open them – that’s certainly true in case of emails they receive from strangers or “semi-strangers” like you. Your “open rates”, i.e. how many people go beyond the subject, will tell you something about how appealing your subject lines are. Your “click-through” rates will tell you how compelling your body copy has been and how many people wanted to “know more”. A typical “responsive” list will get up to 50% open rates (in some cases more). An “average” marketing list gets about 20%-30% opens. A “good” list will have 30%-50% click-through rates, whereas an average one may be between 5% and 15%. Knowing those numbers will help you fine-tune your communication skills.
- Style. Write in the language your audience is familiar with. Use their typical slang expressions and their general style, if you need to. If your niche is “natural” to you, I don’t even have to tell you this. Remember to treat your members as if they’re already people you know. The objective is to build rapport with your fans. Encourage feedback, be approachable, unpretentious, vulnerable, honest – like them. Above all, LISTEN to what they have to say, if they take the time to respond to you. Show them your appreciation by frequently referring to those among them whom you want to show your gratitude or appreciation to. And ALWAYS reply to their emails. Even the nasty ones. But be polite.
- Incentives. It’s a good idea to sometimes have extra little incentives for fans to open your emails. Bonuses, coupons, charity initiatives – whatever you think might make them that much more keen on following your links. Reward loyalty. Wish them “happy birthday” if you’re on Facebook or a similar network. Encourage reciprocity with the generosity and quality of your input.
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Book 2 – Chapter 13
Fan List Building
Course Overview Book 2 – Chapter 14b
Building Fans With Social Webs
Book 2: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 14b, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, Overview
