Almost every day I learn something new about email marketing, whether it be from my own tests or reading other online marketer’s blogs. Since starting with email marketing about a year ago I have come so far in what I’ve learnt, and I look back at laugh at my first couple go’s at it.

Email marketing is a very important tool for affiliates and online marketers, and I highly recommend reading the article below which lists what I think are the 7 most important factors for email marketing.

#1 – Your Incentive

Why should I enter my email to sign up for your newsletter (or whatever you are offering)? Getting someone to give you their email can actually be tough, but if you are giving them something in return (that they want) it becomes a lot easier.

You need to clearly state what your visitors will receive for entering their email, and you better make it something that your visitors actually want if you are looking for a good unique visitor to sign up rate.

If you are a poker affiliate don’t make your call to action something vague and boring like “Enter your email for poker tips”… try something that creates interest and suspense like “The 1 secret online poker players don’t want you to know”.

#2 – Quality of Form

This took me a while to actually implement, but the nicer looking the email capture form is the higher sign up rate you will get.

When I first started with Aweber I didn’t really realize you could customize your forms, and would end up just using the ugly and boring templates they provide you with.

After paying a designer $5 to whip up a quick graphic to put in the form my sign up rate instantly grew.

My sign up rate grew even further when I came across a great tool called “Popup Domination” that gives you very nice looking and conversion focused templates to use in Aweber (or whatever email marketing provider you are signed up with).

A small investment in making your form actually look nice will go a long way in helping your sign up rate… make sure your email capture form isn’t an eye sore.

#3 – Privacy Notice

I personally haven’t done a lot of testing with this, but I have heard of other internet marketers that have tested it and came to the conclusion that including some sort of privacy notice letting your users know that you won’t spam them or sell their email address will actually help your sign up rate.

It definitely can’t hurt including some sort of privacy notice, so I would suggest implementing it on your form.

#4 – Personalization

Aweber gives you the option to include some personalization in your emails, which is a must for building relationships with your readers.

When you capture their email make sure that you have a field for their first name, and then you will easily be able to use a piece of Aweber code “{!name}” that will insert the persons first name anywhere you like (the title, the start of the email, etc).

It is very easy to implement and can do wonders building a relationship with individuals on your list. Think about it… would you feel better if an email was address to you with “Hi There,” or “Hi Kevin,”?

Start personalizing your emails a bit and act like you are talking one on one with the people on your list and whether or not they know you are sending the email to a mass amount of people at the same time, they will listen to what you have to say.

#5 – Autoresponder

Maybe the most important on the list is your autoresponder. An autoresponder is a series of emails that will be sent to someone who signs up for your list.

With Aweber you can choose when to send them, so for example the first one goes out right away, the next is the following day, the third is two days after that, the fourth is 4 days later, etc, etc.

You only set this up one time and then the autoresponder works its magic and markets to anyone who signs up all automatically with no work needed from you.

Don’t just hit them up with offer after offer. Build up a bit of a relationship in the first few emails providing them with quality content that you know they will enjoy, and they will start to like you more. Once you have built a small “relationship” with them you can hit them with an offer you will have a much better conversion rate.

#6 – Call To Actions

I actually had a fellow affiliate comment on my call to actions recently, letting me know that I can probably improve in this area (and I agree).

Within your emails you actually want to give your readers a call to action.

This isn’t just for making sales, but can also include your content articles. Mix things up a little bit and instead of just emailing content, how about putting the content on your blog and sending them a link to the post through email.

By using the above tip your readers will actually get used to sometimes clicking on a link you’ve provided for valuable content, so when you do hit them up with an offer (affiliate link to a sales page for example) they won’t think twice about clicking the link.

I have found using call to actions like “Click Here to read more about this…” work good, but get creative.

#7 – Testing

Ice, Ice, Icesicles…. Pop, Pop, Popsicles…. Test, Test, Testing 1-2-3!

Haha sorry I had to start this off with that…

Anyways TESTING IS HUGE for marketing, and it is no difference for email marketing!

Test everything you can when it comes to email marketing. Aweber gives you the option to easily implement split tests, allowing you to test 5, 10, 15 or however many forms you want. Test the headline, test the button color, test the button CTA, test everything to do with your form.

You will also be able to easily test different emails very easily with Aweber. Test the email subject line, try personalizing the email subject line, test the actual email body for clicks, and test everything to do with your email.

And don’t stop testing. Small tweaks can make a world of a difference, and that will result in more money in your pockets!

Click Here to get started with email marketing at Aweber…

Click Here to check out Popup Domination (a tool I HIGHLY recommend)…

I posted my 2011 Goals article earlier today, but also wanted to get my January plans in order.  Although I didn’t meet my income goals for December (not even close) I still look at it as a successful month.  I worked hard and had more sign ups than normal (my bettors just seemed to have a good month).  Below I have my December recap and January goals.

December Affiliate Goals Recap:

Post all NFL games + college bowl games – Did a good job at this, but had some problems with writers being unreliable.  It’s tough running a team of writers, as I always seem to have one or two writers that make up an excuse for not being able to do their articles last minute (although I know some excuses are legit).

Increase rankings on supplement site + sports picks site – These two sites didn’t budge much in December.  I didn’t really put in a solid effort into this though, but I think they still need a bit of time before they will be able to move up much.

Increase mailing lists + keep connected with the lists – Had a great increase in my mailing lists sizes (beat my goals for both of my main lists) and did a good job keeping up with emails.  Also added some auto responder messages that I hope increase sign ups at sportsbooks.

Try to get on a 9am wake up schedule – For most of the month I consistently woke up at 10am, which was a start.  My girlfriend sleeps over quite a bit and has a random work schedule, so that sometimes affects when I go to bed and wake up.  Overall I didn’t sleep in a lot and got work done in the morning so I am happy.

Add 10 static pages to SportsGeek – Don’t think I did this, but I added a few.

Start new workout blog – I got the site going, and added a few pages.

Have another affiliate mastermind session – We didn’t have one this month… just too busy.  I am going to try to organize one maybe the second week of January (hit me up if you’re interested in joining).

11k affiliate income – Was about half of this :S … but like I said earlier my sign ups were awesome, just had winning players.

Expenses under 2k – Kept expenses just under 2k.

JANUARY AFFILIATE GOALS:

• Post NFL playoff articles, plus other news articles focusing on the playoffs
• 10 blog posts on my workout site
• 5 static pages added to the sports geek
• Mess around with newly bought Camtasia and become good at it
• Wake up at 10am consistently
• Monetize this affiliate blog
• Keep up with NHL picks and add a page of content to the site
• Brainstorm and create a business plan for the “health and fitness” niche
• Add a couple of pages of content to my London Ontario Car Dealerships site
• Have an affiliate mastermind chat
• 10k affiliate revenue
• Expenses Under 2k

Have a great month!

Well now that my hangover from New Years is finally cured I think it is time to write a “2011 Goals” post.  Like I mentioned in my 2010 Affiliate Recap post, it seemed like I forgot to do overall goals for 2010 and had to just go off the top of my head.  This year I am changing that and I am printing out my 2011 affiliate goals and posting them on my wall for a reminder of what I want to accomplish.

2011 is probably going to be a life changing year for me.  At the end of the year I will have been an affiliate for 4 years and will know what direction I will be going with my business and life… below are my 2011 goals:

No New Sites – In 2011 I don’t want to create any new sites.  For two reasons: I want to focus on my sites I am already running and if I want to start a new project I have some seriously awesome domains that I have started but haven’t really done anything with yet.  For me it’s so much easier focusing on just a couple sites and turning them into brandable, authority type sites.  I think trust will become even more important in 2011 and it’s easier gaining trust from returning visitors.  Instead of 5-10 page mini sites that I used to create, I am focusing on building my sites bigger.

Become Authority With NHL and MLB Sites – I have two sports betting sites that get good traffic and I want to turn those into authority sites.  I am trying to make them quality resources that get lots of repeat visitors.  I have already been doing this with my NHL site and am starting to make a little bit more money with the site now.  I am going to get a new MLB template designed and do daily blog posts during the MLB months with Free MLB Picks (that will give me something to do in the summer too).  My goal for these sites is 10 RMPs per month each.

Establish Workout Blog – I recently put up a Workout Tips guide that will pretty much be a personal workout blog that I am going to try and monetize in different ways.  I really like the domain name for the site as it mixes in keywords with a brandable sound to it.  My plan is to build up traffic and then down the road maybe sell my own workout product (workout program or something).  Health and Fitness is a niche that will always be around, and I want to be a part of it.  I have a personal interest in it and would enjoy writing content if I knew I could make money from it.

Monetize Affiliate Blog – I am one of the few poker affiliates who actually blogs at least once a month consistently, and feel I should be trying to make a little bit of money with the blog.  My main reason for blogging here is to keep myself on track and help out others (because I have gotten tons of free help), but if I can do that at the same time as making a couple $$ I might as well.

$200k Net Revenue – This year I want to net $200k with my business.  It’s going to take a lot of work, but I am ready to put in the effort.  I have been slacking too much over the last two years and feel I should have made this amount in 2010.  I am 100% focused heading into 2011 and would be pretty disappointed if I didn’t reach this goal.

Personal Goals – As far as personal goals go it is pretty much same old.. I want to keep working out 5 times per week and eating healthy (will go hand in hand with my workout tips blog anyways), keep donating to a charity of choice once per month, travel and just have some fun!

Good Luck to you in 2011, I hope it’s a good one!

With 2010 coming to an end I have decided to make a blog post recapping the 2010 year for me as an affiliate.  I could have sworn I made either a blog post or a post at PAL with my 2010 goals, but I can’t find it anywhere.

Oh well, I pretty much have an idea of what my goals were and I am going to post a general recap of the year below.

Income

I definitely hit my goals income wise in 2010, but that was mainly due to selling off my poker network in April.

I can’t really say if I would have hit my income goals without the sale of my poker sites, because I went from like 90% poker affiliate to 90% sports betting affiliate over the course of the year and I invested a lot of what I got from my network sale back into my sites – but I think I would have hit my goal either way.

The last couple months of 2010 have been bad revenue wise due mainly to sports bettors winning, but at least I have a lot of active accounts under me.

Overall I was happy with my numbers income wise in 2010.

Work Ethic

I think I could have worked a lot harder in 2010, and I seem to always say that.  I do work pretty hard, but not hard enough yet to be where I want to be quick enough.

I am sure I work just as hard as a lot of affiliate marketers out there, but I want to be out working other affiliates.

My main let down was the summer.  I did shit all pretty much all summer.  Because I sold my sites I didn’t feel stressed for money and I think I felt like spending that money on SEO and content was “work”.  With MLB being basically the only sport going during the summer that was another cause for me being lazy.. instead of getting prepared early for the other sports I pretty much sat around and didn’t do much to get ahead of the game.

Overall not too happy with my 2010 work ethic.

Direction

I am think I set myself up nicely in 2010 for my future in the affiliate business.  After my poker affiliate network sale instead of blowing the cash on  random things  I actually invested quite a bit of it back into my affiliate business.  Some of the investments haven’t really worked out, but a lot of the investments are already proving to be worth it and should help my income get back to where I want it in these early months of 2011.

In 2010 I also learned a lot.  I have become a better marketer overall and have a lot of ideas for 2011 that I think will take me to the next level as an affiliate.  Only time will tell but I think some ideas I have for 2011 will be pretty successful.

Overall I am happy with the direction I am going.

Personal Stuff

I wanted to throw in a bit of a personal recap for 2010 too.  Right now I am pretty happy with where I’m at in life.  I live in a nice apartment and own my car completely after paying it off.  My goal is to buy a house in the near future and I have been setting aside money for that.  I have started to donate a small % of my monthly income to a charity at the end of each month.  I have done a pretty awesome job with getting to the gym quite a bit and eating healthy most of the time.  I am working on improving on a few things, but overall 2010 was a great year.

I am going to make a post early in January with my 2011 affiliate goals… I will make sure I do it this year!  How was your 2010?

Just wanted to get a quick blog post up to say Merry Christmas to all the affiliates that read my blog from time to time!  Hope you have a happy and safe holidays!

My Christmas will consist of going to my mom’s house later today for a big dinner that I am obviously looking forward to.  That is followed by gifts and drinks with the family.  Then on Christmas day I will have breakfast at mom’s and head on over to my Dad’s house (only a 10 minute drive – it’s nice to have split up parents that live in the same city… never really think about that!).  Gifts at my dad’s, usually followed by some board games and drinks and then a nice dinner.  Me and my buddies usually get together Christmas night and get pretty wasted, always resulting in a fun time.

This time of the year is awesome as an affiliate.  You can pretty much take off as much time as you want from work and spend time with family, friends and just relaxing. Enjoy it!