Whether you are already in the midst of email marketing for your business, or are considering adding it into your marketing mix, you need to be clear about what you expect to accomplish with your mailings. Often businesses simply begin sending without thinking about results, or they have unrealistic expectations.
Understand your product/service lifecycles. What are immediate and long term results based on? It depends on the life cycle of your products and services. These will range from short to long sales cycles. Performance for each cycle type should be gauged differently - and will affect the frequency and content of your mailings.

This is a pyramid I use in many of my presentations. It’s certainly not scientific, but I think it gives the visual you need to figure out why you're contacting your subscribers. Red indicates possible immediate interaction, white is the longest cycle and needs the most nurturing in the relationship before you get results. You’ll find for your own business you'll probably have more than one goal. Some businesses have very specific directives: e.g. IMMEDIATE sales (if you are being realistic about your product or services).

Sales – This is immediate sales, direct sales, or sales leads. It is one of the most popular types of mailings, and often sent more frequently than others. The goal is to sell products that may have an end date (such as concerts, special deals, limited offers), or to garner a sales lead. The mailings need to engage the reader to make a purchase directly from that mailing - or ask for more information.

Drive traffic to the website – Perhaps your goal is to remind and drive subscribers to your website. This is a good opportunity to deep link them to specific sections of the website. Ensure you have strong traffic tracking capabilities on your website so you can track stats and sales conversions once they leave your newsletter.

Upsell to customers– This type of mailing comes from companies having a range of products and services that might be of interest to existing customers. This goal usually ties in with customer retention (building relationships) as well. Upselling can also relate to cycles - e.g. moving prospects to customers.

Build relationships - Email has proven to be a superior retention tool, and useful, information-intense mailings can be very effective in building an ongoing relationship, and also loyalty building, with your customers, subscribers and prospects.

Expertise/Branding – This cycle often ties in with building relationships and/or long sales cycles. You are establishing yourself as a knowledge leader in your field, branding your company as a customer-centric business. It also creates awareness of your products and services and provides value-add information that lets your subscribers know they are in good hands and receiving information from a quality company.

Long Sales Cycle – This is the most challenging cycle, and often fits alongside expertise/branding. This is the cycle in which you are engaging the subscriber during the times they don't need your products and services - and you want to be 'front of mind' when they do. The frequency on these types of mailings tends to be less as well - most often monthly. By offering informational content, and engaging them on the terms they want to hear from you, such as providing relevant useful content -you have the opportunity to catch them at the point of the cycle where they do need the service or product. Examples of this are consultancy services, life events, big ticket items, etc.

One of our contacts in the US has been so encouraged by using our enewsletter system that he set up a conference call for us to talk with a number of his network. In promoting the conference call Brett Figueroa (see right) made these comments about UTN.
"I have used Derek's platform for a very long time and completely and totally support this method of distribution. It's quick, it's fast, it's user friendly, it's extremely affordable, it's trackable (meaning you can track "who" and "how many times" people open your newsletter) this gives you some extremely valuable information on as to "how to conduct" your marketing efforts and to "who."
This is measurable from the moment you press "send" on your computer and it's fun to sit and watch literally within "seconds" who's on-line and who is the hungry fish that stopped their world to open up your newsletter, it's very cool and very very FBI..... This is one of my highest producing and greatest leverage tools I use in the high octane model, the results generate and create amazing offspring. P.S, I do not make money on these propositions, it just assists my players to get to where they say they are committed to getting to faster."
We had a great time introducing our system and later in the year we hope to get across to the US to run some emarketing seminars.

The enemy of great is good. The primary reason so few leaders or organizations ever become great is because they get good and then stop. They stop growing, learning, risking, and changing. They use their track record or prior successes as evidence that they've arrived. Believing their own headlines, the leaders in these successful organizations are ready to write it down, build the manual, and document the formula. This mentality shifts their business from a growth to a maintenance mindset.

Neither you nor your business ever "arrives." We never get to the place where there's nothing more to be done and nothing more to be said. In the words of my friend Dave Anderson, "Yesterday's peacock is tomorrow's feather duster." What you strutted yesterday, the next day is just cleaning dust off of shelves.

I like to distinguish between a "goal mindset" and a "growth mindset." A person with a "goal mindset" has very tangible, numerical goals to achieve over a specific period of time. Nothing is wrong with clearly defined goals, but there's a better way of thinking that I call a "growth mindset." A growth mindset recognizes goals on the journey, but only as part of a process—not as the end results.

When goal-oriented people hit a milestone, they have tendency to settle very quickly, but when growth-minded individuals hit a goal, they blow right on by because they're constantly learning and growing.

Success has a brutal side: It can make you arrogant, it can make you complacent, and it can close your mind. To survive the temptations of triumph, we must realize that success is not the point and should never be the ultimate objective of an enterprise. The goal of business is to strive to reach full potential. I define full potential as focusing on seeing how far you can go, how good you can get, and how many people you can bring with you. Reality dictates that you will most likely never reach your full potential, but the journey keeps you humble, hungry, and focused. What you become in the process helps you and your organization make the leap from good to great. Use your success as a stepping stone, not a pedestal.

Leaders of successful organizations are tempted to stop working on themselves. They continue to work hard on their job, but they have a tendency to neglect personal growth. They use their experience and track record as a license never to read another book and an excuse never to attend another developmental course in their field. They point to their acclaim and accomplishments and decide to rely on the skills they have learned in the past to run the rest of their career. They develop an arrogance of intelligence that creates a disabling ignorance. This ignorance disables them, their people, and, as a result, their business.

Growing people grow people. But when you don't grow, you plateau. It's just a matter of time. Once this happens, you plateau everyone working for you. When I as a leader go flat, my influence with everybody in my organization fizzles and fades. When the leader doesn't grow, the people don't grow. It's the Law of the Lid; a stagnant leader stunts the growth of the organization.