Using an autoresponder is a time-efficient way to market a product or service. An autoresponder gives you the opportunity to educate and build excitement about your offering. Savvy marketers have known for years that in most cases, a prospect must hear a message an average of seven times before they will make a purchase. Autoresponders provide the perfect vehicle for delivering these messages.

It's really quite simple, and in fact, the autoresponders make getting the message to your potential customers those seven times possible. On the Internet, without the use of autoresponders, you probably could not achieve that. Too often, marketers make the mistake of literally slamming the potential customer with a hard sales pitch with the first autoresponder messagethis won't work.

An autoresponder allows you to build interest slowly. Start with an informative messagea message that educates the reader in some way on the topic that your product or service is related to. At the bottom of the message, include a link to the sales page for your product. Use that first message to focus on the pain that the customer is feeling and how your product or service might address it, providing just a hint of the solution.

Build upon this first message by moving into how your product or service can solve a problem, and then with the next message, ease into the benefits of your productgiving the reader more actual information with each and every message. Your final message should be the sale pitchnot your first one! With each message, make sure that you are giving the customer information pertaining to the topicfree information! This keeps them interested in what you have to say.

This type of marketing is an art. It may take time to get it exactly right. The great thing about the Internet is that someone is always trying to sell you something. Use the examples that other marketers have set for you. Pay attention to the messages that you receive from other marketers. Keep a file of those messages that you think are most effective. Use some of the better sales copy for your own autoresponder messagesmake sure that yours doesn't turn out to be an exact copy of someone else's sales message!

Remember not to start with a hard sale. Build your potential customers interest. Keep building on what the problem is, and how your product or service can solve that problem or fill that need. If you are doing this right, by the time the potential customer reads the last message in that series, they will be convinced enough to make a purchase!