SendLabs

One week ago, the University of Alabama leatherheads won the NCAA National Championship of American college football and ESPNShop was readily prepared to cash in. While I don't care about buying any of the merchandise, it's an example of how simple preparation and using email marketing can help fuel your business.

So here's the deal: there were two teams playing and one was going to be the national champion at the end of the night. ESPNShop was obviously going to have merchandise for both and obviously created emails for both scenarios. Just hours after Alabama raised the crystal trophy, they sent this out and as bleary-eyed fans checked their email Friday morning, they already had an outlet to buy merchandise and celebrate.

How does this apply to you? Is part of your business based on a result from an outside act or event like this? Just create emails based on either scenario and pounce on that! Why wouldn't you? Look, you have a timely marketing mechanism and you can control the content, time and date of when you deploy it. Put in the work that your competitors aren't and take that money for yourself.

What did we learn today?

• Plan ahead.
• Be timely.
• Use email.
• Make money.

And as always, follow us on Twitter or be our Facebook friend - also timely and well-planned ahead.