One of the most effective means of marketing strategies available to small business owners today is Email Marketing. As the name suggests, it is the use of electronic mail as a way of advertising, promoting, and selling products or services. The term covers every email sent to existing or prospective customers. If done right, it is a marketing vehicle that can promote a steady flow of new and repeat customers.

Email Marketing is the most inexpensive substitute for postal mails, printed newsletters, and advertisements found on magazines or newspapers. For small businesses, it is the quickest way to reach a large number of people. There are three types of email marketing:

1. Direct Email: means stand-alone email campaigns and advertisements sent to a targeted number of recipients. It is similar to web-based ads in the form of HTML, text or rich media such as streaming video interacting instantaneously with the user.
2. Email Newsletter: comes in a more personalized form because it is sent periodically to a specific group of customers. It also carries promotional messages that create a lasting impact on the readers. Email Newsletters mean more than just sales messages or advertisements since they contain other information beneficial to the readers.
3. Other People's Advertising Space: means paying other people to put your ads or promotions thru their direct mails or newsletters.

In order to guarantee successful email marketing, there are a few rules of thumb you need to consider:

• The key to email marketing is to have permission from the email owners who want to receive your mailings or those who requested for it. Unsolicited emails will be regarded as spam and will only go to their bulk folders. To avoid being labeled as a spammer, never send out mails, offers or newsletters to people who did not opt to receive them.
• Build your email list by asking email addresses from your existing customers with an agreement that you are permitted to send out emails to those addresses.
• Personalize your emails thru the use of their personal information. Email response rates increase thru the power of personalization. People tend to respond more quickly and positively to emails with personalized salutations. Therefore, greet recipients by name. However, do not attempt to use personalized emails if you have incomplete data of the recipient. Furthermore, personalized email campaigns are more useful and interesting to customers.
• Promptly respond to email inquiries. As much as possible, reply within twenty four hours so as not to miss the opportunity and lose a customer forever.
• Send out acknowledgement emails to new subscribers. This will verify the accuracy and truthfulness of the information data entered during registration. This will also ensure that the subscriber really wants to receive your email messages. The acknowledgement process can be automated thru the use of auto respond messages.
• Create a one-to-one dialogue with your current customers to learn about their individual needs, interests or buying habits. The goal is to know more a lot about them, what they want and what they need and what other related products you might be able to offer. Listen to their feedback and pay attention to their suggestions.
• Regularly offer discounts, promos, special announcements and coupons. This is a great way of keeping the customers satisfied.
• Create a trusted relationship by clearly stating your privacy policy. Let them know what information should be shared so as to let them decide what details he or she is willing to provide. Reassure them that the information they provided will not be shared to other companies.
• Keep a record of all your emails, newsletters and product offerings. It is another way of maintaining the company's records and files. It will also ensure protection for both the company and the customer in cases of complains and other concerns.
• Give your customers the opportunity to unsubscribe from your newsletters or the chance to get out of your mailing list. There are times when customers are no longer interested to receive them. Sometimes, they will also want to reduce the number of emails they receive. Respond immediately to subscription termination requests.

Just like any other marketing strategy, email marketing is likely to face doom if not given proper care. Recognize the need and exert the effort to improve email communications standards. To do this, here are some tips:

• Learn to value and respect your customer's time because if you don't, they tend to seek for other business establishments that do.
• Be professional by giving attention to every detail of email marketing. This includes planning the scope of your campaigns, designing and writing your emails, communicating with customers, and delivering value for their time.
• Be different. Design a method that will set your messages apart from thousands of other messages in the market.