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How to Build an Email List
When you first embark on an Internet Marketing career and email list building, you have so much information available to you that you can easily become overwhelmed and fail to get off the ground as you read so many sometimes-conflicting comment to earn money on the Internet.
However, there is one way to taste success and establish your income with which everyone agrees – you will never have consistent performance unless you put together an email list of double opt-in interested customers. ‘The money is in the email list’ is the common cry, yet I know people who set up a mailing list that contain hundreds if not thousands of names and email addresses and yet the owners still struggle to make an income. So simply building an email list is not the full answer.
Obviously, if you are just starting out in Internet Marketing (IM) you will not have an email list. or your email list. will be very small and as you look around for advice on how to put together your targeted list you may as I say get conflicting opinions and get frustrated by your early efforts. There are people who have been in Internet marketing for years and still try to find the ’Magic Bullet’ without building an email list of targeted people.
Take a deep breath all is not lost the point of this article is to help you get off the mark and ready to develop your skills into those of an email list ‘guru’.
Let us look at some basics to get you going. I would like to ask you a question.
Do you have an online lead generation capture device on your website?
This is not as daft as it sounds for there is a large portion of web pages on the Internet including some from large organisations that fail to capture the names and email addresses from every person who visits their web page.
Therefore, RULE #1 – Lead generation solutions to build your email list…
Here is another myth I am going to break. To create a targeted email list is not the end of the matter. You will only be successful if you contact those who subscribe on a regular basis to forge a relationship with them.
Word of warning, it is no good just offering up a capture device, then sitting back and waiting for the thousands of potential prospects who you know will visit your site to leave their details and build your email list for you. Look at your message through the eyes of your visitor – Would you leave your private details on this site? Is the information on your site of sufficient quality that your visitor believes they can benefit by leaving their details?
People who make enquiries are seeking information that will improve their lives whether you are selling digital products or physical products. Whether they are your own or you are acting in affiliate marketing, unless your web page provides information that encourages your visitor to want to associate with you, because they feel you can help them, you will whistle in the wind as far as email list building is concerned.
Rule No.2 Build your email list by networking
Your website is not the only place you can gather names and email addresses. In the course of your everyday business how many people do you meet, many of them could welcome the information you will provide via your newsletter and will willingly give you their email address as long as they are confident that the information you send to them will be of value. Do you attend trade shows I always found that these were a gold mine for increasing my email list and helped me make money online? Yes, it is a little harder because you have to ask them face-to-face, but if you truly believe that you offer quality over quantity why should you withhold it from these potential customers just because you are meeting them in the flesh, so to speak.
I used to be in financial services and when one of my new team members would say something like, “I will not sell life assurance to my friends and relatives”. I used to laugh and ask, “Are they not going to die and leave loved ones. How will you feel if you have to stand next to their widow knowing you had not given them the chance to financially secure the lives of those loved ones? Tell me the names of your friends and relatives and I will tell them what we have to offer.” That usually gave them the courage to campaign to their friends and family about the ethical product they handled. The same with building your email list, you don’t bore people but say you will send them one free copy of your newsletter, as you would welcome their opinion.
Rule No. 3 Free information helps to build you email list.
You can of course manage to put together a small quality report, in the form of an ebook, that will encourage people to leave their details but you cannot have a poor quality website and get their details, on you email list, no matter how good your report may be.
However, creating interest in your mailing list by way of a free ebook is certainly the most popular method of advertising and building your email list. You should make it clear to those who sign up for your ebook that you will also send an email containing your newsletter.
Don’t be scared by the word ‘newsletter’ it can be anything from a brief email with just a few headers on to a full message explaining some of the advantages of owning the product you or your provider are selling.
Rule No. 4 There are more places to generate your email list than your home page.
How many pages of information do you have on your site? Certainly the home page and have you got some articles. Did you create a blog?
Put your double opt-in email name capture text on every page where you have relevant information.
Remember, not every page of your website should be a sales page; some pages should contain high quality comment with no sales links except for your name capture. This type of design encourages visitors to stay on your pages and increases your chances of building a relationship with them.
Rule No. 5 Build your email list in the real world.
Publish brief details of your free newsletter on all emails you send out just below your signature. On printed advertising, brochures, leaflets, business cards never miss the opportunity to promote details of your website and free newsletter. Most on-line forums will allow you to put anchor text under your signature such as, “Get our newsletter with tips of how to grow your business” These words should either be hyperlinked back to your web site via the home page or a non-sales page containing an article.
Your email list is never complete
Try these tactics and you will see your email list of valued members continue to grow and if you offer valuable information in your newsletter you will encourage not only your members to stay but to promote your newsletter virally amongst their contacts. Your greatest campaigns come out of your email list.
