Email Marketing

I am wanting so send out Emails to some local business' but I at a loss of what to say in the email.
I am really not a words person and I hate having to sell myself/talk my self up. I don't even know where to start.
I am in the process of creating an image to attach to the email with some basic pictures and contact info.

Has anyone tried this sort of approach before and had ay success with it?
What sort of things did you say? How would you go about selling your self?
I am hoping to send it to some local schools, after school/holiday programmes, bowling alley.....

TIA

Um... honestly, I don't send unsolicited email - that's spam. I mail postcards. I get really annoyed when I receive that type of thing myself.

I only email people/businesses I already have a relationship with AS WELL as the postcards.

Snail mail marketing is passive and generally non-invasive, unsolicited email marketing is spam and can be very annoying. At least in my opinion. It all gets marked as spam, deleted and reported it appropriate.

Keeping in touch with past clients by email is a great thing though, I make contact at least semi-annually (a couple months before their events) to check-in and "confirm" for this year! They generally respond by giving me the date and time and I then send the contract off for this year.

For those types of email I don't attach photos or anything in particular - just the links in my signature.

I have had great success this approach. When I started up I had just moved to the area so I basically wrote to all the hotels, clubs, resorts etc.

Each email was tailored to what I thought I could offer that business. It was hard to put myself out there but I kept it brief. I also attached one photo of henna and one of face painting. It may be considered spam but I have a no junk mail sign on my snail-mail-box and so I didn't want my postcard to just get tossed.

Where possible I found a name and email address so it went to the right person - this one I've attached I couldn't get past the corporate wall to get a name but have since been booked by them for a few jobs and have a few more planned. They have kids clubs, music festivals and family days at their resort so it is targeted to that. I have also booked workshops, parties etc using this technique.

There was no face painter in this area so I guess I felt I had to show businesses how hiring a painter could benefit them...

"To Whom it May Concern
My name is Riana and I have recently settled in Jindabyne with my family. I am a Professional Henna Tattoo Artist and I also do face painting. I have experience doing busy festivals, markets and corporate events. I've found that offering face painting at family events is very popular, and that henna tattoos go down really well at music festivals. I have worked Byron Bay Blues Fest, Splendour and Woodford Folk Fest to name a few. I am available for bookings and I have an ABN, Public Liabilty Insurance and a full set-up including 3x3 Gazebo and signage. I also thought face painting could be great for the Milo kids during the winter school holidays. I would greatly appreciate you forwarding this e-mail on to the events staff if I've sent it to the wrong person. Thank you and I look forward to hearing from you.
Kind Regards
Riana"

Oh yeah and as it is a small fairly isolated town I put "Local Henna Artist and Face Painter available for event bookings" in the subject box.

I go the post card route...I have sent a few emails to farmers markets, but mostly the cards. I don't do blind mass mailings either. Did that with the first batch not much came out of it. Now I send specifically to places I am trying to connect with and I highlight on the card specific events that I am trying to get with a blip basically saying (in so many words)you need to have us for this event. That's how I got the 3 gigs for comic book day. I have had a really good response from this last mini batch I sent out.

By the way Thank to Perry (Erin) for the heads up a few months back about this. Had she not mentioned it on here I would have never known about it.