It is a well known fact that "The money is in the list". You have most likely heard this over and over again if you have been involved in Internet marketing for any decent length of time. I agree with the statement because if you have a decent sized list, you can easily generate profits from it, but there is more to it than just that. If you want to reach the BIG time with a BIG Income, I'm talking tens of millions, even hundreds of millions of dollars a year from your business, it is absolutely critical that you implement database marketing in your business marketing efforts.

So what is database marketing? Database marketing is all about your prospects, current and past customers. It is when you gather their information and use the data you retrieve to more effectively market your products and services to those individuals. Do you realize that if you take a look at all the big companies, I'm talking about companies that are publicly traded and making an insane amount of money every year, the large majority of them use database marketing.

That's called a clue.

Case in point, take a trip to your local supermarket. Chances are your local supermarket is part of a national chain. There are very few local supermarkets left due to global competition. When you reach the supermarket, grab some items and head over to the checkout area. The cashier will likely ask you if you have some type of "advantage" card.

If you did not have the advantage card, you would not be able to receive the same discounts and other special opportunities like you would receive if you had it. For the supermarket, the advantage card gives the supermarket the ability to store your identifying information into a database so that they can use it to market better to you. Not only do they have the basic information, such as your name, your address and your telephone number. They also know your shopping and purchase habits because you have to show or swipe your advantage card when you are checking out and purchasing your goods.

This is a classic example of database marketing at work.

Even though you are not a multi-million dollar national supermarket chain or retail store, you can still employ database marketing in your business as well. The secret is the create a thourough system that will gather the appropiate information and store it for future data mining usage.

How do you gather the information?

One strategy that you can use is the same strategy the supermarkets use. You can create some type of "preferred buyers" club where any member of the club receives discounts or special perks that other prospects and/or customers do not receive. The only requirement is to sign up for the club by providing some simple information, such as your name, address and telephone number.

Employing this ONE strategy would put you light years ahead of much of your competition, ESPECIALLY if you are running an internet business. Do you realize how much of your competition isn't gathering any information about your customers besides a name and an email address? If you take it one step further and are able to get an address and a telephone number, that opens up the door for you to use TWO additional means of getting your offers in the face of your prospect.

So decide today to develop a plan to employ database marketing into your business model. Implementing just this one step can allow you to easily triple the annual revenue your business receives!