Wow some great feedback and posts here. First I would like to say a big thank you to Kris for his kind words. I do appreciate it.

The program I use for bulk e-mails is ACT as I can do mail merging from it as well as blind carbon copy as well. I can do it all with the press of a button and it automates things for me nicely.

I also always make PDF files of my entire promo kit as well as every marketing material I have. This is not to always send to prospects, but I use it as a source to get it into someones hands wuickly in the event they need my info ASAP> Also, becuase I work a lot of festivals, this is a way for me to send the PDF to the festival chair person right before the meeting. This way he or she can print out as many copies as they need for each memeber to have. It works out well.

For lead generation and for starting my contact list, I always first define my market area and what areas I am willing to travel. This becomes my travel radius. I then go online and start a search for my intended market. For me I start looking for festival and events and such. It is amazing how much you can find if you search on the internet and have patience to do so. I then make a list of contacts and then cold call to make sure I have the proper decision maker. This is important as I want to make sure my packet is going to the right person.

I handle follow ups as a two part follow up procedure. The first follow up is 5 days after I mailed out the packet and basically asked if they received it, hope it answerd their questions and may I be of service to them to answer further questions. I then do another follow up 2 weeks after this if I do not hear anything. Do NOT do a direct sales follow up after the 2nd one. That is pushing the limit and can get the prospect upset. Instead... I back off for a while and I make contact wqith them throughout the year by sending them invites to my public performances, sending them out cards for the holidays etc. It is not a hard sell but I am keeping my name fresh in their minds.

Halcom:

If you want to send the same exact e-mail to these 100.. then you need to Blind Carbon Copy or BCC them in your e-mail. Outlook does this as does most e-mail programs.

Hope this helps.

Kyle

There are serious bulk mailing programs that can customize each e-mail
(e.g Dear Fred) and try to make each look like a personal message. These
have tracking features, can measure click-throughs and can be quite
expensive and overkill likely for what is being talked about here.

The BCC method described above is probably best and just use a program
such as Outlook to send the mail. Many ISPs limit the number of addresses
you can have on a single mail so you may need to break it up into smaller
mailings.

With regard to SPAM, many people don't consider mail SPAM if it is
on a topic that interests them. I occassionally receive unsolicited
e-mail regarding magic and I often enjoy them. The key is to get the
right list of folks who will be interested in your message, and always
give them option to be removed from future mailings.

Thanks guys. This topic is great

Halcon