I’d estimate this strategy is responsible for about $2M per year in recurring revenue for our agency. Some of our best business comes from the industry associations & groups that we are involved in.
What industry groups have you joined in your niche? How are you engaging/participating?
Here is what’s worked best for us:
- Join the association/group
- Get the list (mail/phone and hopefully email – reverse scrape if they don’t provide it)
- Sponsor the events (booth, lanyards, etc) and actually show up (hang out in the evening and mixers)
- Look for opportunities to speak at their events
- Run webinars/training specifically for their group (this works pretty well)
- Send an intro package to the members (Be sure to get the new member list every month and send them a nice welcome)
- eMail them on a consistent basis with value-added content
- Get added to the Facebook Group if they have one
- Upload the member list as a custom audience on Facebook for targeting
- Add them to your direct mail list (this is huge). Send them a quarterly printed newsletter.
- MAIL THEM – If you run webinars burn the content to CD and send it to them in the mail with a print out of the workbook. If you do industry interviews (you should) burn those to CD and mail them out to them.
You want to become known, liked, trusted, proven…dare I say omnipresent to the members & leaders of the association (at their events, in their inbox, on their social feed, in their mailbox). You do that by doing what I’ve outlined.
