Email marketing loosing its effectiveness? There is an alternative - Desktop Marketing.

by Michael Ginzburg
http://www.PromoClock.com

You've heard of email marketing, but it isn't what it used to be.
With today's abundance of spam and even opt-in email
solicitations, your messages are competing against hundreds of
incoming messages daily. How are you ever supposed to stand out?

**There are 2 main problems with email marketing today.**
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The first problem is that your email messages are hardly even
opened. Even if your headline is compelling, the chances of
your email message being read are close to nil. People are becoming
increasingly skeptical about the kind of message attached to what
used to be the best subject lines.

The second problem is that most website visitors don't even
sign up to opt-in mailing lists anymore. Even those who are
interested in your website content are just plain scared to
give over their email address to a website they do not know.
People are concerned that their email addresses will be sold
to third parties and that their "unsubscribe" requests will
never be honored.

Is there a way around these problems or is email marketing dead?
The answer is simple. Desktop alerts.
Desktop alerts are messages that are sent directly to Windows®
Desktops instead of being delivered to email inboxes. Desktop
alerts are the answer, because they solve both email-marketing
problems.

First, they bypass the email inbox and appear directly on the
desktop. No more competing again hundreds of incoming messages
- your messages claim the desktop all to themselves, virtually
guaranteeing they are read and remembered.

Second, users do not need to give over their email or other
contact information in order to subscribe. All they have to
do is simply download a small application. If they ever want
to "unsubscribe", they just simply uninstall the alert application.

You can use desktop alerts for the following:
*Promotion -- Promote, advertise and increase brand exposure
directly on any Windows Desktop.
*Communication -- Send your up-to-the-minute news directly to
consumers' desktops.
*Advertising - Run your own ads or earn revenues by selling
ad space on the Windows Desktop.

If the solution is so simple, why aren't more websites using
desktop alerts? Until now, the only way to send desktop
alerts was to hire a team of software developers to develop
the alerting application for you - which is quite expensive,
not to mention time consuming.

Entertainment and news companies started using desktop
application for branding, communication and advertising. Take
ESPN.com for example. On their website, users can download an
application which gives them daily sports highlights and video
commentary, with embedded commercials. So far, more then 1.6
million people have installed it and about half use it daily.

So how do you get started? Well, if you have content
your site visitors or clients are interested in, you simply
offer them this content in the form of a useful downloadable
application. Instead of developing the application yourself,
you just customize one of the existing desktop applications
with all your promotional materials (such as your own logo,
custom icons, banner ads and menu entries). Users will
download the application because of its informative and/or
entertaining content, special savings, or features like
daily alarms, calendar reminders, or task lists.
Now that the user has voluntarily invited you into their
personal space, you can create a strong, long-lasting
impression and deliver desktop alerts just as you would
email messages. With desktop alerts, there are no other
incoming messages to compete against, and you won't have
to worry about being accused of spam.

Promo Clock has combined all the benefits of interactive
promotional products and new era advertising tools, developing
a cost-effective application for reaching customers with timely
information and updates. Ready-made models as well as custom
models based on animated images or Flash presentations are
available.
Reach author Michael Ginzburg at promo@promoclock.com or simply
go to http://www.PromoClock.com/holiday/email for more information.

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