I would recommend setting yourself up with JV's that work in a quid pro quo manner versus paying somebody for use of their list. The reason why is because these lists are not exactly vetted in particular for you so you would be back to buying 1000 names that aren't a particular fit. That is except for the fact that the JV you are working with should have been checked out enough to have a good chance that their list fit at least your basic criteria and maybe a point or 2 on the detailed criteria.
I may be confusing you so here's an example. Let's say you have a niche in the medical field for general practitioner doctors that you sell your IT services to. A joint venture opportunity would be with people that sell niche specific software packages to these doctor's offices.
Buying that list would probably get you a bunch of doctors with office too small or in locations that don't fit your geography etc etc. So why buy that 1000 name list when 50 fit your criteria. That's wasted time and money.
Besides, the real point of a JV is to have your partner ENDORSE you and send out the notice for you. Not make you pay for a list of people that don't know you causing you to have to set up a mailing campaign with 4 to 8 sequenced mailings to get some bites or a bunch of emails that can get you spam canned.
Them endorsing you will also give you the opportunity to help them not waste their time by doing their own vetting so they send it to those that can really use your service, thus making them look good in the process.
There are a variety of ways to do this and I'll list out a few here but this is not the forum to get into heavy details. You know where to find me if you want to discuss this in detail to fit your business model exactly. So here it goes:
Total Quid Pro Quo: They send out an email for you that you write and they add in their 2 cents at the beginning with an introduction and endorsement and you do the same for them. Cost = nothing. A little tough to do if you have a much smaller list than them but it's possible if you ask. And if the JV is with an association or community often they will endorse anything that helps their members.
I think it's necessary for me to add in that we are talking lead generation so this is a free offer to capture name, email and/or other info. Unless you are selling a low cost product, this is not the time to go in for the kill. We're looking for leads from true prospective clients to put into the marketing funnel and build you personal list.
Back End Payment: This may take a little trust on their part unless you can set up some kind of system to track it, but usually a quick written agreement will work. They agree to send an endorsed email, or an insert in a regularly mailed newsletter, or with their bill mailings, etc and they get a cut of any business gained. Depending on what you are selling the "cut" could be all over the place so I can't go into detail but let's just say you shouldn't be stingy as your costs are minimal for them to do this for you. Don't forget that this is for lead generation so you should be selling in the endorsement but giving something away for free to capture the lead. Then you track the lead to give them a cut of the sale.
Website Thank You Page: In this case you have 2 choices. If selling a low cost product, you could make an up sell offer on a thank you page to something they sell and give up a cut again. In most cases it's better to truly make it a lead generation tactic so giving away an audit, white paper, teleseminar, webinar, etc makes more sense. It doesn't have to be on a thank you web page but think of it this way.
A thank you page indicates that this person already bought something or got something for free so they are already in the right frame of mind to take you up on something else since they are already there. As long as it fits with what they just received from the JV as you are selling this to the JV as something good to put in front of their customers to make them look even better.
These are some basic ways to use other people's lists. Especially lists that are actual customers, not just prospects as they have the propensity to be the decision makers you are looking for. Again the objective is really to pull from their lists those that belong as prospects on your list.
So I encourage you to write down what businesses in your niches would make good JV partners. Then fiddle around with a pitch to them that says you can help them look like heroes to their clients and even better if you can put some money in their pockets.
In the next part for this series we'll go into generating your own lists from scratch.
If you would like to discuss this for your particular business, just follow this link to set up a free 30 minute session http://consultantscoach.com/FreeStrategySession.php.
To Your Business Success-
George Sierchio
The Consultant's Coach
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