E-mail

E-mail remains by far the fastest and most effective way of letting relevant businesses know that they can list their details on your directory. However, there are some really important things to consider when sending e-mails to businesses.

Firstly, in some countries it is not legal to send unsolicited emails even to businesses. In the UK it is technically legal to send unsolicited email from one business to another as long as the service offered is directly related to the business, and as long as the send email contains a method of unsubscribing and your full business name and address. It is not legal to send unsolicited emails to personal email addresses ever, so you should avoid sending to businesses that use email addresses that do not sound like business email addresses, such as Yahoo, Gmail and AOL email addresses.

If you do decide to send emails you should do so very carefully even if you follow the law to the letter. Do not send out thousands of emails in one day, you will most probably annoy your hosting company and your emails will almost certainly not be personalised enough. Send just a few carefully targeted emails a day working on just one category from your directory at a time.

Always remember that there are thousands of web directories out there, most of which are not very good quality and almost all of which send out bulk email to businesses trying to attract new listings. You must set your directory apart from these directories from the start. Make sure every single email you send is personalised with at least the business name, and if you want to increase your take up rate dramatically, take the time to learn a little about the company and compliment them on a feature of their business or website. Making the effort to send a well constructed first email will definitely increase the amount of advertisers you get, and they will be more likely to trust you enough to spend money with you.

E-mails should be short and to the point. Most people will hit the delete button on a long email that they do not consider important. keeping your email short will increase the number of people who read your email and click through to your directory.

If email is going to be part of your strategy for attracting new listings I definitely recommend offering a free listing as well as a paid type listing. If you can offer a free listing in your email you will get a great deal more potential advertisers clicking through to your directory. Even if these advertisers only take a free listing, you can regularly offer them upgrades and turn them into paying customers later. Some will take paid listings from the start, especially if you offer a website link and pictures with a paid listing.

Telephone

I completely understand that many people don’t like telesales, especially cold calling, but you should consider using the telephone when trying to get new listings.

There are actually three ways the telephone can help you to get new listings…

Telephone Selling  (Cold Calling)

If you have the gift of the gab and are good at selling, calling businesses offering listings, perhaps even creating their listing with them whilst on the phone, can be a very successful way of getting new listings.

Telephone Selling (Listing Upgrade)

If you offer free listings, you can use the telephone to call the advertiser, go over their listing to check that the details are correct, perhaps add some extra details, and then offer the advertiser an upgrade, perhaps at a discounted rate. This can be a very successful way of turning free listings into paying advertisers.

Telephone For Permission To Send An E-mail

This one sounds a little odd, but it work very well. Many companies do not read unsolicited email, so to increase the number of people who read and act upon your email, call each company and ask for permission to send an email about your directory listings. Some will say no, but most will say yes, some will even thank you for taking the time and consideration to ask them first.  Those companies who agree to receiving your email are far more likely to submit a listing.

Trade Associations

Many trade associations have will send their members E-mail newsletters and may be willing to let you advertise in the newsletter for a small fee. This can be a very effective way to reach potential advertisers because they are likely to trust and see the value in a service recommended by trade associations they belong to.

Trade associations may also allow you to purchase advertising on their website, blog, forum or magazine.

You may find that trade associations will not accept you as an advertiser until your directory is at least a little established.

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