3 Email Marketing Secrets

Over $4,000 in eight hours.

That’s how much money in new shows I booked as I drove from Niagara Falls, NY (where I live) to Kentucky for a gig.

I can’t stand long car trips. These days, I try to avoid them at all costs. But my wife and I are adding space to our house so she can move her salon here. In the long run, it will save us money on her salon’s current rent, utilities, and other expenses.

So I’ve booked myself a few out-of-town gigs over the next few months.

Coincidentally, I had scheduled some email blasts to go out on the day of my trip. Here in Western New York, March is a prime time for booking library programs for Summer Reading Program. It’s also a pretty good time to market to schools for end-of-the-year shows.

Early in my trip, the calls started coming in. A $1500 show from a high school client who thanked me for my ‘reminder email.’ A few libraries. Another local school.

By the time I reached my hotel in Kentucky, I had over $4,000 in contracts I had to send out. Not bad for a day’s work.

Over the next week, that number swelled to over $10,000.

That’s the power of email marketing.

I know I’ve written before about why email marketing, and specifically having a list, is so important. Rather than rehash those same virtues, this week I’m going to outline three ‘absolutes’ to effective email marketing and list management.

1. Always include an ‘unsubscribe’ link at the bottom of each email.

Don’t try to get around this. Some unscrupulous marketers try to hide the unsubscribe link or remove it from their emails. But email marketing companies like AWeber and Constant Contact know the law. And they don’t want to get hit with Spam complaints.

The easiest way to avoid those complaints? Include the unsubscribe link at the bottom of every email blast you send.

To clarify, I’m NOT talking about unsubscribe links when sending something to just one client. You don’t need to include an unsubscribe link when sending a contract or responding to an individual message.

Unsubscribe links are only needed when sending out a message to multiple contacts on your list.

And if someone wants to unsubscribe, let them. If they don’t want your emails, this will only help you in the long run. More on this in just a moment.

2. Clean your lists regularly

If you’re new to email marketing, the idea of ‘cleaning’ a list may sound weird.

Very simply, it’s combing through your list and deleting old names that haven’t responded or even opened your emails in quite some time.

The reason? Email servers will see you’re sending emails to names that aren’t responding. They’ll start to assume you’re spamming these folks.

In our business, it’s quite common to have names on our list that don’t respond anymore. Parents’ kids ‘age out’ of being suitable for birthday parties. Parents quit their child’s school’s PTA/PTO. Principles, HR directors, media specialists, and other professionals leave their jobs for new ones or retire.

If you’ve got past client contacts in your list who haven’t responded or even opened your emails in years, it’s time to cut them.

You’ll improve your email online reputation. And your deliverability will improve.

Deliverability simply refers to the ability of your email to reach its intended target’s inbox.

3. Monitor your bounced emails

If your email goes out and doesn’t reach its intended recipient, it may have ‘bounced.’ Bounced emails, those that don’t reach the intended destination, can really kill your deliverability.

Why?

If you keep sending emails to ‘dead,’ dormant, or nonexistent email addresses, email servers may take note of this. And their algorithms may assume you’re just bots sending out phishing emails without rhyme or reason.

Over the last several years, I’ve noticed it’s become much harder to get emails to their intended recipients. Clients I’ve been doing shows for every year have a hard time receiving my emails. And if I’m sending an email with an attachment, like a contract or invoice, it’s even tougher.

Many of my clients are librarians using the library system’s email server. Or school principals, PTA/POTO parents, or media specialists using the school district’s email system.

And these systems are super-aggressive about keeping nefarious types out.

So the only thing I can do is keep my email ‘reputation’ as high as possible.

That means if I send out an email blast promoting a show and I get a message saying so-and-so’s email server rejected my email, I gotta take that person off my list.

These days, I try to get my clients’ personal email addresses as much as possible. Fighting against these server issues is just too much. And while these folks may have the capacity to change their settings to let my stuff come through, I’ve found most of them lack the technical know-how to do this.

In the end, the only thing you can do is keep your own nose clean when sending emails.

Done correctly, email marketing can net you a LOT of money for very little effort. I offer a complete service of email marketing for magicians. Check it out HERE.

Until next time, have a great week!

--Cris

P.S. By the way…whenever you’re ready, here are 4 ways I can help you grow your magic business to book more shows at higher fees:

 
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Need help in multiple areas? I can help you with your website, direct mail, email, or other marketing strategies. I also offer consulting services for crafting magic routines or even entire shows. Want to find out more? Shoot me an email at cris@theprofessionalmagicianclubpro.com.

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