When email marketers are just getting started, the world of email marketing seems big and challenging. There is so much information out there that it can be difficult to process and understand what you should be trying and what simply isn`t worth your time. While you may find reading blogs and ebooks to be a very useful practice, there are times when having someone to help guide you is very useful.

An email marketing mentor is someone who can teach you what they know, and also give you a sounding board to bounce ideas off of. While your mentor certainly doesn`t have to be someone rich and famous, it never hurts! But for many, simply speaking to someone who has already been through the beginning process can be very helpful.

Finding your way through the maze of email marketing information doesn`t have to be quite so difficult and it can actually be fairly simple if you have someone who can help you out a bit and point out the best information and sources.

Where can you find an email marketing mentor? Try writing someone you respect and asking them a couple of questions. If they seem willing to help out, you can ask them if they would be interested in mentoring you. Not everyone will, some people are really too busy, but it`s always worth asking!

Whether you are just getting started in email marketing or already have some experience under your belt, chances are you are always on the lookout for more information. Which is likely the reason you are reading this right now.

Email Marketing Learning Sources

• Ask other email marketers. Be brave and write an email with some of your pressing questions. Send it to an email marketer that you admire and you might be pleasantly surprised.
• Read email marketing blogs. Blogs like this one are a great source of email marketing information and they are frequently updated, making this a great way to gain knowledge.
• Join a mailing list. While there are plenty of email marketing newsletters around, you can also benefit from signing up for other types of email newsletters and seeing how people are actually putting their methods to work.
• Social network. This might not sound like an area that would help you with learning, but when you are connected through Digg or StumbleUpon, you`ll make friends with similar interests. When they find something interesting on email marketing, you`ll know about it.

There are plenty of places to learn email marketing basics, but don`t forget, even if you`ve been playing the game for a while, it`s possible to learn more. In fact, education should be a part of any email marketer`s success plan, so get out there and start learning!

Once your email marketing campaign reaches certain heights, you will find that you start to receive quite a bit of subscriber feedback. While it is great to be noticed and have interaction with your readers, it is also something that can bog you down and take a lot of time to deal with each day. Since time is indeed money, it´s in your best interest to figure out ways to handle reader email quickly and efficiently.

The first thing to do in order to deal with reader emails is to write a form letter. This should be as general as possible and no more than a paragraph, thanking the person for contacting you. As needed, you can add a line or two to make this more personal, but it is ideal to send out to those who just write to compliment you and who aren´t looking for an answer to a question or a specific reply. This will save you hours, particularly if you keep it as a draft in your email and simply personalize it and send it out.

Taking the time to set up email filters will also help you in your daily management of email marketing emails. The initial process can take a few hours or even a couple of days to get set up, but once it´s done, you´ll have a far easier time manageing emails and deciding which ones need to be dealt with immediately and which can be left for a bit. Press releases, for example, can be saved for future use, while JV requests can be immediately resonded to.

Develop your own system for handling the email that comes in from your email marketing campaigns. Whether you spend several minutes throughout the day dealing with it or just work on it once a day is up to you and your schedule. The point is to get it done and you could benefit greatly from responding in a timely manner to these emails.

When it comes to email marketing, your campaigns are only as good as your autoresponder. If you have a lousy one, it will show through your emails. And a good one will perform quietly in the background, allowing your emails to shine.

Free autoresponders are never a good idea. Nearly all of them include their own ads in your outgoing emails, but even the ones that don´t won´t give you the service you need. Free autoresponders are just that . . . autoresponders. They don´t allow many options and are limited in how many follow up emails you can include.

Find yourself a paid email service with an autoresponder and you´ll get much better service and far fewer limitations. Not to mention, you´ll be able to send out as many emails as you need to. Here are a few things to consider when selecting an autoresponder:

Price: Make sure you shop around and make sure you are getting the best service for the best price, since this can vary drastically. Check out hidden charges, too, like how much you´ll have to pay if you go over the email limit.
Number of emails: How often can you send out emails each month? Some email marketing gurus send out dozens every week.
Number of addresses: This would be how many subscribers you can have. Most limits can be raised for a little extra monthly fee.

There is nothing like reading other email newsletters to stay on top of the latest news and what is going on in the world of email marketing. But that doesn´t mean that you should only subscribe to industry email newsletters. While these can be very enlightening and informative, it´s also helpful to look at completely unrelated newsletters.

Reading email newsletters can really give you a good idea as to what techniques are in use and which ones you´d like to try. If you find an email newsletter that you like the style of, it´s easier to write your own. In fact, you may end up using ideas from various email newsletters that you subscribe to.

There are plenty of places to get inspiration. The next time you are on a website that you are enjoying, no matter what it´s about, sewing or business, sign up for the email newsletter. You can also take note of the sign up procedure and get a good idea of what works there, too.

Take notes whenever you see something that you like in someone else´s email newsletter. You don´t have to outright copy, but it´s fine to take an idea and make it your own. This can really be a useful method of gaining new techniques to spruce up your own email marketing.

Do your email newsletters contain a clear call to action? If not, your readers might enjoy the articles and design, but when they finish reading . . . nothing happens. You need to make sure that you are telling your subscribers exactly what to do. Many email marketers just getting started miss this step, but it is is one of the most important email marketing basics that you will learn.

Let´s break the call to action down into steps:

Step One: Ask a question. This is a very common method of beginning the process. Something like “Do you want to earn $500 in one day, like I did?” will catch the reader´s attention and have them answering mentally.

Step Two: Tell them how to get what they want. In the previous step, we asked if they wanted to earn more money, so now you tell them how. “Click here and sign up for your free e-course on how to earn $500 a day.” Nice and clear. The directions are very easy to follow and chances are your reader will click through.

As far as email marketing basics go, this should be fairly easy to get. To make your call to action super clear, make sure that you don´t have a lot of ads around it. Too many inexperienced email marketers load the end of their email newsletters with a dozen or more links and the reader is left confused and wondering where to click. Keep it simple, give them one direction to go in and they´ll take it.

Email format is on of the most important email marketing basics. Will you offer your email newsletter in text format? HTML? Or both.

Text
Everyone can receive text emails. They aren´t pretty and don´t include photos, unless attached, but this is one of the formats that will get through to any email server. Accessibility is a super important email marketing basic. If your subscribers can´t read your email, they won´t be able to buy what you´re selling.

Text also has the advantage of appearing more personal, but it can be fairly limited in the presentation. It takes up less space, as well. Many newsletter writers prefer HTML as text doesn´t allow for tracking open rates.

HTML
HTML allows you to design a more magazine-like newsletter, with graphics and photos incorporated into the body of the email. Links can also be made into clickable text, which looks far neater than full URLs, which have to be used in a text email.

HTML newletter formats also allow you to track open rates, so you can test various subject lines and the like. Email marketing is all about testing and tracking to find what works, and HTML is the best format for this.

However, HTML email marketing newsletters also have their downside. Some email servers can´t display the newsletter correctly and since these tend to be larger, anyone with only a small amount of free space won´t receive them. HTML emails can also take longer to download than text, making them less likely to be read.

Another option is to offer both text and HTML, allowing the reader to choose.

Renting an email marketing list is only a one-time shot at success. If you are serious about email marketing then you need to think about developing your own list. Here are some basic guidelines for starting your email marketing strategy:

• Think about who your target market is and ask yourself, “What can I offer them?”
• How do you see your relationship with your email marketing recipients playing out?
• Decide on a format for your email marketing mailings
• Will your email messages be sent in html or text?
• Who will write and design your emails? Will you do it yourself?
• How often will send out email messages?
• How long will your emails be?
• You’ll also need to think about how big you want to grow your list; where do you see it in six months or 1 year?
• What methods will you use to collect email addresses?
• Ensure that everyone who receives your email messages have opted in to receive them
• Give your email marketing recipients a chance to opt out in every email message
• Build trust with your email marketing recipients; there is no substitute for trust in an email marketing relationship

The secret about email marketing is out. It seems that everyone wants to do it. Most people now get a ton of email in their inbox every day and end up deleting most of it without reading it. The big question for most of us is, How do we get people to read our emails?

A better approach is to get people’s permission before contacting them by email. There are several ways you can do that. You can offer something for free on your website in exchange for their email address (be sure you tell them that you will be sending periodic emails to them with offers). You can sell a product or service and one way of getting people to provide you with an email address for future mailings is to offer your product or service at a discount. You can also offer an e-course by email. By providing a course that people can take through email that is rather short (5-10 email messages long), you can acquire their email address and use it for marketing purposes later.

There are various ways to get people to give you permission to contact them by email, but it is a necessary step. If you run a brick and mortar store then ask for it at the point of sale when you ring them up. If you can capture the email address there and send a confirmation email later then you’ve utilized the double opt-in process. They have told you twice about their interest to receive email marketing messages from you.

One thing is absolutely necessary when it comes to email marketing: Get the prospect’s permission!