How To Deal With
Gift Giveaways

Tips & Ideas To Help You Get The Most
From Amazing Offers This Christmas

It's that time of the year the online marketing world looks forward to eagerly... Christmas gift give-aways. Every year, some business owners and marketers offer one or more of their high value products or services to clients, subscribers or prospects... absolutely free.

Last year, smart folks like you took advantage of the 'Season of Giving' and received goodies worth several hundred dollars in retail value. All you had to do was register with your email address - and download away!

There are many events like this, each with a different twist. All give away valuable stuff you and other marketers will find exciting, informative, educational and instructive.

At first, being offered so much value can be overwhelming. You don't know what to do. I know how intimidated I felt at the beginning, faced with a choice of almost 100 top-notch products. Today, I have a system. And by sharing it with you, hopefully you too will be able to take better advantage of this annual gifting frenzy!

First, some things NOT to do:

·                     Don't complain about the marketing.

All participants in the event are marketers. All are trying to entice you to try out their stuff - and hope you'll be so impressed with the freebie, you'll come back for more.

·                     Don't use a throw-away email address you never intend checking again.

Yes, I understand the deluge of email offers that follow the event can be daunting. But remember you're getting many valuable gifts - without paying a penny.

The least you can do in return is read a couple of emails from the person giving you those gifts. There's no committment - you can always unsubscribe after you are convinced these follow-up emails are not adding value to your life.

·                     Don't whine about failed download links or problems with the gifts.

Sure, it can be frustrating. But consider that the business owner and every partner in the promotion could receive thousands of new subscribers - and if only 5% of them have problems, that's 50 new emails s/he has to deal with.

Be patient. Be polite. Tell them about the problem. Give them some time to respond and fix it. It's the holiday season for them, too!

Next, here are some tips on how you can best deal with gift giveaways.

·                     1. Set up a unique email ID for the give-away registrations. Use it to opt-in to the lists you are interested in. Set up filters in your email program to automatically file ALL emails sent to that address in a folder on your email program, making it easy to review and act upon.

·                     2. Create a new folder on your computer desktop for filing all the downloads. That way, you'll find it easy to go back later and use/read the ones you're most interested in.

·                     3. If you have limited time, a slow Internet connection or other reasons to limit yourself to only a few of these goodies, pick and choose the ones most likely to benefit your work online. Then, download only those gifts.

·                     4. Post-registration deals - also called 'One Time Offers' - are the best parts of a promotion like this. Each marketer is vying with the other to come up with the most mouth-watering offer to give you outstanding value - at rock-bottom prices. Take advantage of as many as you can - these offers will NOT be repeated.

·                     5. Be sensible about your investments. The best thing to do is decide upon your budget for this period before-hand and prioritize the things you choose to buy. Don't bite off more than you can chew.

·                     6. Observe each sales page carefully. If you like, you can copy the landing pages to your 'swipe' file for later use. This is a 'one-time-in-a-year opportunity' to get links to creative promotions put together by some marketing geniuses. Learn from everything.

·                     7. Use the event to build personal rapport with well-known marketers. Can you beat an introduction that says: "Dear XYZ, I downloaded your gift from the XYZ Christmas promotion -- and WOW!" You can then go on to build bridges that connect you to potential partners or mentors - and grow your business explosively in the months ahead.

·                     8. Be grateful. You'll be amazed at how few 'Thank you' notes or emails are sent after this event. I got fewer than 25 of them from over 1,000 people who took up my gift offer last year. Sad - but true. So take a minute to shoot off an email. You'll be amazed at how good it makes YOU feel.

·                     9. Check your email for the first few days after the event. Glance at the headlines and messages. You can learn a LOT from looking at the SUBJECT lines and the email copy these marketing experts use. Learn from their system of following up. It's the equal of a master's degree in email marketing!

·                     10. Take awhile to decide if you want to stay on each person's list. If not, use the unsubscribe link or system to cancel your subscription.

Last, but not least,

Take Action On The Gifts You Get

Read the ebooks. Use the software. Install the scripts. Listen to the audios. Visit the membership sites. Use all the powerful information and wisdom other successful online marketers willingly share with you - and I wish you all success in the year ahead.

Merry Christmas - and a happy, prosperous New Year awaits you.

About the Author:

Dr.Mani Sivasubramanian is webmaster of the Ezine Marketing Center and a niche marketing expert.

Make sure you don't miss his contribution to 3 big gift giveaways -
http://ezinemarketingcenter.com/gifts.htm

You are free to reprint this article in your ezine or on your website or blog if you wish as long as you keep the article and 'About the Author' resource box intact and do not edit the article in any way.

Copyright 2005, Dr.Mani Sivasubramanian