The Top 10 E-Commerce Ways to Follow up with Clients - Part 1

Did you know that 80% of all sales are made after the 5th contact?

The biggest mistake we make is not following up with our clients regularly. We not only lose the chance to offer other services and products, we lose the chance for satisfied clients' referrals.

Building your practice needs consistent bi-monthly follow-ups.

If you think this takes too much time, follow my lead and delegate some of it where you will spend only 6-8 hours a week. Remember, only marketing and promotion builds income and business, the rest are expenses.

Here's the top ten ways:

1. Keep track of every one who contacts you, in person or by email about coaching or other service.

Treat email addresses like gold. These are already qualified, targeted future clients. Copy and paste their email note, date, and question into Textpad or notepad under the name "potential clients." Print it out and keep in a hard file named the same.

2. Don't throw away email addresses.

When someone connects with you, copy and paste their address into your computer folder called "eLists." Place the address where you think it belongs. Name one file "potential clients." If they are past clients, create another list and call it "past clients." If present clients, make a file for them too. Categorized into groups, you can personalize your note to each one. Every month you'll want contact one of these groups and offer them something special.

3. Keep track of your ezine subscribers' emails separately.

While you may use a company to send out your ezine, you may also want to have that list handy in your own office. My assistant uses www.textpad.com shareware program to manage all of my different email lists. Since I only send out my ezine on book coaching and business tip monthly, I follow up in between with a thank you or special offer. It takes less than 3 minutes to send out through text pad.

4. Choose the appropriate follow up message for each group.

For your monthly ezine, you may want to send out a mini "marketing survey." You ask 4-8 questions. For any who takes the time to respond, you offer them a fre.e eBook or report. In one follow up I asked, "What are the 3 top questions you want answered about writing and publishing a book?" My subscribers knew I was thinking about them and appreciated it by signing up for the follow up small cost book coaching marathon teleclass.

People love fre.ebies, so when your follow up offers a fre.e tip or question and answer, your potential clients will see your value.

5. Leverage big results from just a little effort.

Don't waste any information that helps you promote. After you get responses to your mini survey, use them again and again. After you answer the questions, keep them in a folder called Q and A. Create a new web site link and post them as new content for your hungry web site visitors.

When other professionals ask me for an interview for their ezines and sites, I get them via email, answer them and get promoted by others through their ezines and Web sites.

At the same time, I divide these interviews into articles under 1000 words and submit them to opt-in ezines looking for free content.

From just one ezine interview, several high power professionals called me to order books first, then to become business clients.

Don't think you are bothering your contacts. If they don't want your news, they can opt-out. Thank you's and free gifts keep your name in front of your buyers. It tells them you appreciate them and let's them know what new things you can offer them. Follow up is good business.

Part two of this article is available at www.bookcoaching.com/freearticles/ article-130.shtml.

Judy Cullins, 20-year book and Internet Marketing Coach, Author of 10 eBooks including "Write your eBook Fast," and "How to Market your Business on the Internet," she offers free help through her 2 monthly ezines, The Book Coach Says...and Business Tip of the Month at http://www.bookcoaching.com/opt-in.shtml and over 140 free articles. Email her at mailto:Judy@bookcoaching.com

---

The Internet Challenge

In spite of the increasing attention on how the Internet... Read More

Why Suppliers Should Use B2B Exchanges

Business to business e-commerce is on the rise! Worldwide B2B... Read More

7 Key Steps To Reduce Refunds and Chargebacks

One sure-fire way to loosing out big time on your... Read More

Dont Get Ripped Off Getting A Merchant Account

Far too many people get ripped off when setting up... Read More

Cyber Banking

The use of electronic cash as a means of transacting... Read More

Online Consumers ? What Are They Complaining About?

For many businesses, e-commerce represents a tremendous method for generating... Read More

Conducting Business through B2B E-marketplaces

Businesses, which are still sitting on sidelines and not doing... Read More

Two Pillars of a Successful Web Site

For a web site to get close to fulfilling its... Read More

Complementary-Relational Linking and How It Could Save Your Internet Business

The concept of linking is that sites with common interests... Read More

What is SSL (the little padlock)?

SSL ("Secured Socket Layer") is a protocol used to... Read More

Grow Your Business Using B2B Emarketplace ? Part II

Selecting the right emarketplaceAlthough, IT spending has been staying flat... Read More

Online Credit Card Processing - How to Accept Credit Cards - Ecommerce 101

Back in 1998 (through 2000 or so), I worked for... Read More

How To Sell Websites Fast !

This article will explain in depth the steps needed to... Read More

Products for a Successful Web Business

There are F words in business. We have seen many... Read More

Ecommerce - Boost Your Business ROI

Did you know that over 90% of all online orders... Read More

The Rise of Multinational Virtual Corporations

The virtual corporation is the emerging organisational form, which best... Read More

Chinas IT Industry to Maintain Fast Growth

China's IT industry is expected to see a sales revenue... Read More

Is It Easy to Build An E-commerce Web Site?

--Online Commerce--E-Commerce website is all about selling products and services... Read More

Why Ecommerce is Not Ready for My Daughter or Me

As the mother of a teenage clothing fanatic I'm often... Read More

eCommerce Software Solutions

All of the long, grueling nights and an unknown number... Read More

A Beginners Guide To Setting Up A Successful Online Store

A beginner's guide to setting up a successful online store... Read More

Shopping from Your Cell Phone with Froogle Wireless

Many surfers already know about Froogle, Google's shopping portal that... Read More

7 Suggestions for an i-Mom Friendly Web Site (e-commerce news and statistics)

The Internet began as a male dominated medium, but those... Read More

How Merchant Accounts Can Save You Money

We all know that accepting credit cards is the key... Read More

The Art of Being Human

This isn't the first time I have written about the... Read More

Intranet Portals ? Collaboration through Team Rooms

Knowledge Management for beginnersKnowledge Management (KM) can be defined simply... Read More

How To Start An Internet Business ? Content, Content, Content

When it comes to e-commerce, the time-tested cliché is, "Content... Read More

How To Turn Any Product You Sell In To Residual Income

The concept of this is for you to offer a... Read More

Electronic Commerce and WTO

The Internet may not be useful for all businesses, nor... Read More

7 Questions to Ask A Potential Internet Merchant Account Provider

Recently I went looking for an online merchant account, with... Read More

Google to Compete with PayPal?

PayPal is secure in its domination over the electronic payment... Read More

The Plain Man?s Guide to Making Money Online

I'm a plain man who uses plain thinking in devising... Read More

Getting Started in ECommerce - Part One

In 2004, Enquiro.com conducted a study of the search behaviors... Read More