How to know if your Mequoda System Online Publishing & Marketing System is working for or against you
I suspect that 50 percent of Mequoda Daily readers should not be launching their own Mequoda System periodical website and daily email newsletter…
I get questions nearly every week from single-title newsletter or book publishers who ask, “Should I launch a Mequoda System free daily newsletter?”
And my answer is always, “No. Absolutely not… unless you plan to launch or acquire a bunch of information products ASAP.”
Surprised?
Well, here’s why I’m so sure. The numbers simply don’t work for a single-product marketer trying to operate a Mequoda System daily email newsletter on their own.
Now, don’t get me wrong.
Understanding the Mequoda System is important, because you need to know who operates an effective Mequoda System website and email newsletter in your market. Those people are the database marketers with whom you want to affiliate.
The Mequoda System is a database marketing system. It mandates that you give away valuable content in order to build a large email newsletter subscriber database.
But if you only have a single product, you should not launch a daily website and newsletter.
Here’s why:
The average Mequoda System operator generates information product sales of about $12 per email subscriber annually, or about 5 cents per email subscriber per daily email Monday thru Friday, 52 weeks a year.
Think about that.
Q: How do Mequoda System online publishers make money?
A: A nickel at a time.
It’s true. On average, each email to your database is worth $50 per 1,000 names mailed. If you mail five times a week, you make an average of about 25 cents per name, per week.
Over the course of a year, you make an average of about $12 per name. Those are the basic economics of online publishing and email marketing using the Mequoda System.
Of course, some Mequoda System online publishers make much more. Some are making an average of $20, $30 — even $80 per name, per year. And some others make only an average of $6 per name, per year.
What do all Mequoda System online publishers who generate at least an average of 5 cents per day, per email newsletter subscriber, have in common?
They have at least 12-15 items to sell. Usually they have many more products to sell, and at least 12-15 of these information products are best sellers.
The Mequoda System is biased toward publishers who have a catalog of products — magazines, newsletters, books, audio conferences, special reports, etc.
But if you have only a single book, or a solo newsletter, or annual event, you simply don’t have enough products to make an average of five cents per email newsletter subscriber, per day five days a week, 52 weeks a year.
You should not be trying to be a database marketer, because you can’t amortize your database building expenses over enough product sales.
You are on online retailer — and you simply don’t have enough products to sponsor a daily online publishing business… and daily is the way to make money as an online publisher.
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So, if you operate a solo book, newsletter or event business and have no intention of producing or selling more related information products, what should you be doing instead of trying to operate a Mequoda System website and daily newsletter?
You should find someone else who is running a Mequoda System online publishing business, who doesn’t have enough of their own products (yet), and form an alliance. For instance:
- If you publish a travel newsletter, you might try negotiating a deal with TripAdvisor.com.
- If you publish a financial information product, you might find a promotion partner at DailyReckoning.com.
- If you have a business opportunity product, you might want to talk to the folks who publish Early To Rise.
- If you publish a cookbook, you might make a deal with AllRecipes.com.
Find the biggest Mequoda System online publisher in your market segment, and if they sell third-party products, ask them to sell yours. (See our article on How to Do an Online Market Audit.)
Should you thoroughly understand the 12 Mequoda System skills for making money online? Certainly!
Will you be practicing all of them? No. But you will be practicing them selectively. And your marketing partner will be practicing all of them.
You should be looking for a marketing partner with a large database, who is doing business with affiliates on a CPA or cost-per-acquisition (or cost-per-action) basis.
Expect to — and be willing to — give up 50 to 100 percent of the first year revenue to your new partner for every sale they make of your product to their email newsletter subscribers.
This is affiliate marketing at its best, because it is the least risky for you. You can’t lose money, because your affiliate only earns if your product sells.
Alternatively, you may also discover that you can succeed at pay-per-click marketing with Google AdWords or others.
Take the big keyword universe that you’ve learned to build, and instead of creating and optimizing a website, buy the keywords and drive paid traffic to your retail website.
This is a slightly riskier strategy, but Google provides enough tools that you can safely set spending limits, control your costs and decide if the program is profitable.
The third, and perhaps the most risky strategy, is to buy banner advertising — or preferably text advertising — on another operator’s website. You could lose money, because when you buy advertising on a CPM or cost-per-thousand basis, there is no guarantee that your ads will generate sales.
So what’s right for you? Online publishing and marketing? Or just online marketing?
If you’re a single-product marketer, you can still understand and adopt the skills and tools that are fundamental to your online marketing success.
You can discover how to do an online market audit to identify the perfect marketing partner.
You can conduct keyword research, which is fundamental to your pay-per-click advertising campaign.
You can implement effective website architecture, which is fundamental to your retail website construction.
You can learn how to optimize your landing pages, which are fundamental to selling your product.
All the 12 Mequoda System skills still apply to your single-product marketing website — some directly, some as a variation, but still fundamentally important.
Hi Martin:
The $50 per 1000 emails is based on emails sent. We see open rates in the 20 to 40% range on a healthy file the is both opt-in and that drops subscribers who don’t open for 180 days. Both opt-in and cleaning non-openers are Mequoda best practices for maximizing email publishing profits.
Thanks for your kind feedback,
Don
Hi
First (from the bottom of my heart) excellent, superb, first class Post.
I read about 1000 emails a week. The Mequoda Email that alerted me to this post was the winner (by a mile) for the last seven days. Truly excellent content.
Question: When you talk about $50 per 1000 Names Mailed, does this figure assume all 1000 subscribers received and opened the email, or does the 5c return per subscriber, still stand, even when allowing for the fact that although 1000 were mailed, maybe only 40% received and opened the message?
By the way, what are reasonable to assume open rates and read rates for a double opt-in list with a 50/50 ‘decent content’ to promotions ratio?
Very Best Wishes & Happy Easter from the UK (thanks again for a fantastic Post)
Martin