If you’ve got a mailing list of at least a thousand names or more, you’re
sitting on a gold mine. All it takes is for you to get the word out that you’ve
got a mailing list for rent, at a competitive price, and you should be home free!
First of all, you’ve got to have a bonafide list of customers – a list of
names of people that have responded to an ad or bought from you.
You can accumulate such a list simply by noting on 3 by 5 index cards – the names and addresses of each person sending you something in the mail. If
it’s in response to an ad you’ve ran, not that on your file card with the date
you received the response. If it’s an order for something you’re selling, not
that on your file card with the date, and dollar figure relative to what they
bought from you. If it’s just an incoming offer for something they’re selling,
not the date and what they’re selling on your index card.
Keep your cards filed by zip code, and in alphabetical order within the
zip code numbers. When you have a thousand or more of these cards on file,
either type or have these names and addresses types onto full sheets of mailing
labels. Be sure to number your lists, and each page of your lists.
From this point, you simply make up an advertising sales letter stating
that you offer mailing lists for rent – a brochure or circular you can make up
from the best features of all the incoming offers you get. Be sure to write your
sales letter or put your circular together in such a manner that it makes the
would-be buyer feel that he’ll make money from the use of your list – for
instance, one of the current more popular headlines being used these days, asks
the reader if he would like more orders and/or money in his bank account. These
letters then go on to explain just how the use of the advertised mailing list
should be able to multiply his investment.
Send this letter or brochure out to all the people sending you offers in
the mail, and also to all the people you see advertising in mail order
publications.
In addition to these people, you should also check in your local Yellow
Pages under “mailing lists” and get a copy of your sales letter or brochure off
to them. You might also drop by your local public library and look up the names
and address of all the “mailing list brokers” in the Standard Rate & Data Service
books, and send them a copy of your sales material. Finally, take down the names
and addresses of all the mailing list houses you might want to send a copy of
sales materials to, from the Standard Rate & Data Service books.
A good mailing list “all customers” will rent form $50 per thousand, and
will be in use as often as you care to rent it out. The best way to go is
through a reputable list broker. He does all the promoting for you, and handles
everything, more or less sending you a check – minus his 10-15% commission – at
the end of each month. This is definitely the kind of business you can set up on
almost any home computer,
and so long as you keep the “nixies” to a bare minimum, you can realize an
unbelievable income.
If you’re promoting/renting your own list, you should set up a working
relationship with either a copy shop of lease/buy your own photocopy machine.
Look in the Yellow Pages for wholesale paper houses in your area, explain to them
the kind of labels you want, and then buy your supplies in quantity lots. Then
as you receive orders for your list, just run your master copies through the
machine onto the labels and send the labels out to your customers.
Be sure to keep a log on the front of each list, and note the date – name
– and kind of offer sent out by each renter. Try to find out as much as you can
about each of your list renters, and the type of materials they’re sending out –
and then ask them to check back with you on their results. By all means, you’ll
get more renters if you offer some sort of compensation for any nixies returned
to you – and at the same time, you’ll be able to keep your list free of
undeliverables. Such an offer might be one new, and guaranteed fresh name for
every undeliverable returned to you within 60 days from the date of their order.
Copyright 2004 by DeAnna Spencer
Note to editors:
To show my appreciation to the editors that use my articles, I offer a free solo
ad. Simply send an email to me by using the form on the contact me page on my
website to tell me the url the article was used on or send me a copy of the ezine
it was used in.
This article may be redistributed freely on the Internet as long as the resource box remains intact.
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
DeAnna is the publisher of the ezine, Prospecting and Presents.
Subscribers get one free ad per week.
Subscribe today by visiting
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
