Affiliate since: 04/24/2013, Power Rank: 99999999

Hey Jelena

Even though a lot of people on the forum believe that auto-responder is not such a great idea, I tend to disagree. In fact, I believe that it can prove to be a great asset in terms of marketing, if used well.

My personal experience in the field is extremely limited. I would just like to share whatever I have been able to gather from all the research and reading that I have been doing.

As per my knowledge, there are a few basic ground rules to "prospecting" emails.

1) KISS - KEEP IT SWEET AND SIMPLE
No one likes to read long emails singing praises about a product or service. Would you? So try and keep your emails as precise as possible. Give just about enough information to get someone interested. But not so much that they get intimidated. A simple way to do that is to give a broad outline of the program. Don't get into the details. At least not for the first few emails. Preferably, till the prospect asks for those details. Also, try to keep the language as simple as possible. Please remember that your prospects might not be as comfortable with english as you are.

2) LIST IT OUT
From whatever I have learnt from my experience, people get turned off when they see paragraph after paragraph of written content. So, a more effective way is to list out the benefits of the program. You can give a heading followed by a line or two describing it. This will make your emails easier to read and understand. Also, it'll be easier for your prospects to go back to the email and look for certain points for reference.

3) CONTENT
Coming to what your question is specifically about. The content of your email or the information that you should provide. The content of every follow up email will have to be a little different than the previous one. This will maintain the reader's interest. So let's say, you end up sending 3 follow up emails to every prospect. I'm saying 3, because if your prospects don't respond to these, they probably never will. And anyways, it will be considered as spamming, which is against the basic SFI Rules of Conduct.

So, let's talk about every individual email:

a) Letter 1
Your first letter should contain:
i) A brief history / background about SFI.
ii) The key features of the SFI Business model. eg. It is free, You can operate
from any part of the world, You get a website of your own, There are multiple
streams of income, etc.
iii) A brief introduction about you. (Your name, Country, Occupation, How you
discovered SFI, How you feel about SFI, etc)
iv) An invitation to sign up and discover more along with your affiliate sign up
gateway link
v) An invitation to write back to you for details or clarifications
vi) Your Contact Information (even though the email is going from your account,
don't assume that the prospect will use your email address from there.
Mention your email address separately. It could be a part of your signature)

b) Letter 2
If you are sending out a second letter / email, it means that the prospect did not sign up in reaction to the first one. This is the time when you need to start probing a little while also proactively providing information. In all possibility, the prospect is waiting to find out more about SFI before he/she joins it. Here's what your second email should contain:
i) A warm greeting - Treat your prospect like a customer.
ii) A line or two asking about how they are doing.
iii) A line or two asking them why they haven't responded. Or what their concerns
are.
iv) A brief introduction about the income streams that work for u or u find
interesting
v) An invitation to sign up and discover more along with your affiliate sign up
gateway link
vi) An invitation to write back to you for details or clarifications
vii) Your Contact Information

c) Letter 3
This has to be the most persuasive letter/email. This email should be more like a combination of your previous emails.
i) Warm greeting
ii) A brief history about SFI
iii) A line or two about how you understand their dilemma.
iv) A list of all key features about SFI. Followed by a brief description about
each of them. Describe your favorite streams in a more detailed manner.
v) A few success stories. Try to keep them as brief as possible.
vi) An invitation to sign up and discover more along with your affiliate sign up
gateway link
vii) An invitation to write back to you for details or clarifications
viii) Inform them that this is your last email to them, if they choose not to respond to it.
Talk about SFI's zero tolerance policy towards Spam
ix) Your Contact Information

Hopefully, one of these emails should do the trick for you. If they don't, MOVE ON. There's more fish to catch in the waters out there.

Once the affiliate signs up, start sending out more personal emails, depending upon their background and experience.

I hope this answer helps.

Here's wishing you all the luck.

Cheers.
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Hey Jelena

Even though a lot of people on the forum believe that auto-responder is not such a great idea, I tend to disagree. In fact, I believe that it can prove to be a great asset in terms of marketing, if used well.

My personal experience in the field is extremely limited. I would just like to share whatever I have been able to gather from all the research and reading that I have been doing.

As per my knowledge, there are a few basic ground rules to "prospecting"
...more

Affiliate since: 04/24/2013, Power Rank: 99999999

Advertising is most often the most daunting part of any business. You know you have a great product, but you are not sure how to present it to people in an acceptable or more importantly exciting manner.
Personally, I'm a bit of a novice myself. Still, I would like to share whatever little knowledge I have.

1. IDENTIFYING YOUR TARGET AUDIENCE
The most important part of advertising is to figure out, who do you want to talk to. This will decide everything about your advertising. Right from the colors to the language will be based upon your target audience. For example, if you are marketing Tripleclicks to housewives and small business owners, your approach will obviously be poles apart.

2. UNDERSTANDING THE NEEDS
Any successful marketing/advertising campaign will always address the needs of its audience. We only buy into things that we need (or we are made to believe that we need them). So once, you have identified your target audience, try to understand, what are the things that they could be looking for in the kind of product/service that you are selling.

3. MATCHING THE NEEDS
Since, you now understand their needs, you can figure out, how your product or service satisfies those needs. Highlight those aspects of your product/service. These are going to form the key element of your advertising.

4. MAKING THEM UNDERSTAND THEIR NEEDS
We often don't realize what we are actually looking for till the time that someone points it out to us and makes us take note. You need to be that someone for your target audience. Since you've spent time figuring out their needs, chances are that when you point out those needs, most people will agree. And once you've made them realize their needs, they will be more open to listening to your solution. This leads us to the sales pitch.

5. SALES PITCH
Advertising, at the end of the day is about selling something. And how u sell it is extremely important. The sales pitch has to be all about them. What do they get out of your product/service. How they benefit from it. And towards the end, how you can help them with buying it. Your audience should believe that they are buying your product/service because they are smart enough to see the benefits. They have to feel that it is their decision.
If it is an online or print asvertising campaign, then this sales pitch will be your copy for the ad.

6. CLOSING THE SALE
Once the decision is made by the client, help them with the processing of the order. If you cannot guide them yourself, please make sure that the instructions are clearly stated. For example, if you are marketing SFI and trying toget PSAs to sign up, give clear instructions as to how they can go about signing up. What information they'll need to sign up, referral link, everything that you can do to make the sign up process hassle free for them.

7. AFTER SALES FOLLOW UP
This is one of the most important and most ignored part of any advertising. Don't just leave those people after the sale is made. If its a product, confirm with them if they received it in time and if they are satisfied with it. In case of a service, check if they need help with understanding how to use that service. And if it is the SFI business opportunity, then you have to make sure you guide them at evry step of their career with SFI.

Once you have worked on the above concepts, the rest of it becomes pretty easy. Then all you need to do is find platforms to put up your advertisements. Here again try to think a little out of the box. Try to think of the things your target audience could be interested in. For example, if you are trying to target housewives, a search for "shopping" on google will probably be better than searching for "online business". Go to these websites and see how you can place your ads with them.

Hope this helps.

Cheers and best of luck.
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Advertising is most often the most daunting part of any business. You know you have a great product, but you are not sure how to present it to people in an acceptable or more importantly exciting manner.
Personally, I'm a bit of a novice myself. Still, I would like to share whatever little knowledge I have.

1. IDENTIFYING YOUR TARGET AUDIENCE
The most important part of advertising is to figure out, who do you want to talk to. This will decide everything about your advertising.
...more

Affiliate since: 04/24/2013, Power Rank: 99999999

It is a very valid question. And i can totally understand your concern.

The first thing that is intimidating is the conversion of dollars to your local currency. The moment you think of buying anything, you realize that the conversion rates are so high that you get scared. But whenevr that happens, please remember that when you earn, your income will also be calculated in USD. So eventually thimgs will work out in your favor on that feont.

Secondly, I would say that you are luckyto be based in Africa. You are at the heart of a big potential market. Look around you. There will be so many people you can actually help by introducing them to SFI.

Get in touch with local manufacturers. People who make local products. Get them to sign up as ECAs. That way they can market and sell their goods to more people than they could have ever imagined.

Speak to people. There must be a lot of people who must be looking to do something that gives them a better standard of living. And i'm sure there will be a lot of hard working people like you. Sign them up as your PSAs. You can also work as a team and do the marketing together.

Places like africa have a lot more potential than other more developed countries. Because the need for a better living is also higher. So go out. Make the best use of this opportunity.

Cheers and best of luck.
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It is a very valid question. And i can totally understand your concern.

The first thing that is intimidating is the conversion of dollars to your local currency. The moment you think of buying anything, you realize that the conversion rates are so high that you get scared. But whenevr that happens, please remember that when you earn, your income will also be calculated in USD. So eventually thimgs will work out in your favor on that feont.

Secondly, I would say that you are
...more

Affiliate since: 04/24/2013, Power Rank: 99999999

I have read a lot of great suggestions on the design and content, in answer to your questions. However, all the suggestions include so much stuff that a business card might not have enough space for all of it.

Here's what I would suggest:

1. Decide on what are the most rewarding aspects of SFI for you: SFI has so many different streams of income that you just cannot concentrate on all of them at the same time. So decide which aspect of the SFI business do you want to concentrate on and try to develop with your SFI business card. Once you have shortlisted 2 or maximum 3 aspects, then start about designing your card.

2. The Regular Stuff: The card should obviously have your information like
a) Your Name
b) Your Designation (Executive Affiliate sounds good to me, if you have achieved the status)
c) Your Contact Address / Phone Number
d) Your Website URL / Blog Address / Prestige Domain Address / Splash Page Address

All this information should be neatly listed on one side of the card, So that it is easy for people to read about you first. This makes a great difference because you are presenting yourself to them through the card.

3. SFI Logo: This is a very important part of the card as per me. I would suggest putting the logo on the same side as the one with your personal information. The logo can be on one of the 4 corners or any other place as per your design and aesthetics.

4. Back Side: The back side of the card should carry the information about the streams of income you have shortlisted. Find out the key words that work for that stream of income. Make sure to include them in your description. Here also, try to keep the information concise and precise. Over information can often be a turn off. Also, the description should leave scope for the prospects to speak to you and want to find out more about what it is.

5. Referral Links: Please make sure you include your personal Referral Links to the 2-3 business stream in the card. A very good way is, if you have a Prestige Domain. It looks less like a referral link and more like a website address. Or else, there are a lot of free website hosting services available online. You can use any of them to camouflage your referral link.


These were just some of the things I could come up with. Hope they help.

Cheers and best of luck.
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I have read a lot of great suggestions on the design and content, in answer to your questions. However, all the suggestions include so much stuff that a business card might not have enough space for all of it.

Here's what I would suggest:

1. Decide on what are the most rewarding aspects of SFI for you: SFI has so many different streams of income that you just cannot concentrate on all of them at the same time. So decide which aspect of the SFI business do you want to concentrate
...more

Affiliate since: 04/24/2013, Power Rank: 99999999

That honestly is a very valid question. And I asked myself the same question before I signed up for SFI. And this is what I realized.

1. STARTING CAPITAL

All traditional businesses need a starting capital. Depending upon what kind of a business you are planning to get into, this number will vary but it will definitely be there.
With SFI, you need ZERO starting capital. Which basically means that you do not need to invest any money.

2. INVENTORY

Whenever you start a traditional business, you will need to maintain an inventory of your products. Even if you are providing a service, you will still have to maintain an inventory of consumables that you will need for providing that service.
With SFI, the need for an inventory is abolished.

3. TIME

Of course, you will need to invest your time in both the places. But I can assure you, that the amount of time that you invest in SFI and that you do in a traditional business is very different. What you can achieve at SFI in just a couple of hours, you can probably never achieve that in twice the amount in a traditional business. So, you make your moeny with SFI and still have time to enjoy the other pleasures that life has to offer you.

4. FLEXIBLE WORKING HOURS

In a traditional business, you are bound by the rising and the setting sun. There are only a limited time frame within which you can operate. And these working hours will pretty much be fixed.
With SFI, you can choose when you want to work. Your timings and your income are not controlled by the timings in your area.

5. GLOBAL REACH

With a traditional business, you can only market your products within your city, state or country (if and when you make it that big).
With SFI, you start off marketing your business to the entire world. And at no cost at all. You could be sitting in the remotest town of the world and selling your stuff to people sitting across the globe.

6. RECESSION BUFFER

A common problem with traditional business is that it suffers every time there is a recession in the country of its operation.
However, SFI is almost recession free. It is recession free unless the whole world is going through an economic recession which hasn't happened in a very long time. This is because your market is not limited to your country. It is global.

7. LONG TERM INCOME

When you are operating a traditional business, you only make money as long as you work. Once you stop working, your income stops as well.
And this is the most beautiful part of the SFI business. It earns for you while you sleep. You could probably be on a vacation with your family and still be making money. Because the system is working for you.

8. FREE TRAINING

Every time you want to start a new business, you need to learn about it. IN a traditional business, it is extremely difficult to find someone who will teach you. I know because I have been there.
At SFI, you have an endless stream of training. Starting from the Launchpad Lessons to Upline Support to the Ask SC Forum to the A2A program, the list is endless. Everytime you have a question or a doubt, you have access to an unlimited amount of resources to find your answers.

I'm sure many other affiliates would like to add to this list. And I hope this somewhat answers your question.

Cheers and best of luck.
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That honestly is a very valid question. And I asked myself the same question before I signed up for SFI. And this is what I realized.

1. STARTING CAPITAL

All traditional businesses need a starting capital. Depending upon what kind of a business you are planning to get into, this number will vary but it will definitely be there.
With SFI, you need ZERO starting capital. Which basically means that you do not need to invest any money.

2. INVENTORY

Whenever
...more