3 Ways to Build Your Email List
The death of email marketing has been greatly exaggerated.
It is still the biggest driver of sales from all the websites I’m involved with. That’s right. It is pushing more sales for clients online than all the other techniques (including all the hoopla over Web 2.0, blogging, and social media).
With all the messages hitting us every day, sometimes it is good to revisit the basics. We simply forget. How do I know? I PERSONALLY forget at times.
Please understand. I’m not putting down any other methods at all. I’m simply stating the fact that time spent on building your list, your relationship with your list, and offers to your list is still some of the best spent time you have in your business. If you allow yourself to be distracted by the other bells and whistles, it’s going to cut your income.
Again don’t think I’m putting down other forms of promotion. I’m not. They ALL make great tools…especially for building your list. For example right now, one of my top 3 ways to build my list is this blog (and all the promotion that goes into a blog).
But what I have neglected a little lately is the concentrate on my email list including both content and promotional emails designed exclusively for them.
Remember this…
The money still isn’t in the list alone.
The money is in a relationship with your list.
Here’s the funny thing. I’ve been examining how my time is spent. In terms of time spent, emails sent directly to list members is some of the most productive time. Next place is time spent on improving Adwords campaigns (in case you’ve wondered why I’ve talked about Adwords a lot lately). Then time spent on product development and coaching comes in next.
Time I’ve spent in social media is on the lower end of the scale which is why whatever can be outsourced there has been outsourced.
For promoting your list, there are a LOT of strategies you can use. I cover numerous ways to build your list in my Email Mastery course.
Here are 3 of the top ways I’m building my lists right now (yes, that is lists plural not singular list):
1. PPC
I’m loving PPC because it eliminates all argument. You can generate traffic quickly. You can test ads, landing pages, keywords, etc. It boils down to the cold numbers. How much are you paying per subscriber to your lists? How much of that money are you earning back form the immediate promotion after someone signs up for the list?
The best case scenario of course which I have on a couple of campaigns is when the immediate sales right after email sign-up put you back at break even or in a slight profit. In other words, you’re earning money WHILE building a list. Other times it is taking me a couple of months to make the leads profit (through follow-up and sales).
I GUARANTEE I will be prioritizing more time towards PPC next year on the list building front. One of the beauties here for me is there are no trades or deals you’re making. Sometimes with JVs and affiliates there is a quid pro quo expected. If your promote my product for an affiliate commission, you expect me to do the same. Well what if I’m not comfortable promoting your product for whatever reason? Issues occur. PPC doesn’t have that coming up.
2. Affiliates
Affiliates can end up building your lists. On many of my sales pages I run popovers to build the lists or create an opt-in form in the sales page itself. If you’re using an affiliate tracking system like Netofficetoolbox (or others out there), you can automatically track affiliate referrals and pay them commissions. It could be on that product or even another product you sell. They still get paid (although no affiliate tracking system is 100% perfect).
Even though you’re sharing a portion of your profits from all these leads, they are still some of the top leads you can have in your business. They responded to someone else’s endorsement of you so automatically have a higher level relationship when they come in. If I compared the two, these leads are often worth 2 to 4 times what the PPC ones are (although that is an estimate from experience not a straight test result).
3. Blogging
There are a LOT of advantages of blogging…one of which is the number of email leads being produced through the blog. It’s easier to rank on the search engines through blog. Plus you’ll find it easier to generate traffic from other blogs as well with this format.
You will not see me quit blogging at any time, although you will see me moving this blog to another location in 2009. Some of the strategies that work well here with list building are that “What Would Seth Godin Do” plugin which offers my list at the bottom of each post for your first 3 visits. You see a subscribe box on the right side of the blog. In addition I’ve tested the popover which will be tested again to show up a limited number of times to generate more email subscribers.
Which Methods Are You Using To Build Your List?
Which methods are you using to build your lists? As I said, I do have other methods in place, but currently these are the 3 strongest list building methods running for me personally. Other methods that are very effective include Youtube videos, article writing, offline advertising, and list trade mailings (where you mail for someone elses list in exchange for them mailing for yours).
Whatever methods you’re using, keep concentrating on those lists. Keep building them and your relationship with your subscribers. No matter what other “exciting breakthroughs” we see, your relationship with an email is STILL where the money is at.
Related Entries:- The Money Is Not In Your List
- 5 Ways to Increase Your Income
- JVs For List Building
- Quality Website Traffic
- What Is Your Email Marketing Strategy?
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“…although you will see me moving this blog to another location in 2009.”
To another domain or…?
Great suggestions. I need to go back to PPC. Thanks for the reminder.
Ryan
Hi Ryan,
Yes the blog will move to another domain name. I shouldn’t just say another location as I just changed hosts so it already moved to another “location.” Just like a copywriter to remind you to be more specific.
A little advice on the popover – try testing an on-exit popover. I’ve found my subscriptions increase by over 250% in the last 6 months since I implemented it.
I won’t use, nor do I like, any popover that comes before I’ve had a chance to thoroughly evaluate the content on a website. I auto-close any popups that appear anytime other than on-exit.
But, if a website does truly bring value… then when that visitor tries to leave, they’ll actually be grateful for the on-exit popover offering them more great value.
I think this is the biggest mistake people make with popovers… the wrong timing. The goal isn’t to get attention or distract the reader – it’s not to make them go googly-eyed over the immense value of the free offer in the popup (just get these 198 PLR ebooks for free!)… it’s to get the subscriber to trust you and come back.
The best way I know to do that is give them what they want first (great content), then ask them if they want more.
This reminds me… I still have a couple of sites I haven’t implemented the on-exit popovers for again. Better do that this week….
Yes, there are many ways to drive traffic & build a list.
The 3 ways that Terry mentioned are definitely 3 of the good ways to build a list. Blogging seems to be the easier way to build a list if you know how to optimized it. JV affiliates will promote their affiliate products & thus also generate Leads.
PPC is very targeted in terms of generating a list. We must know how in terms of using PPC or you will loose your pants daily if targeted in-correctly.
Great Tips, Terry.. Thanks..
Best Regards,
Frankie Teo
http://www.frankieteo.com/
Cool. I’ll be interested to hear your reasoning on the new domain whenever that happens.
Just don’t go Diego on us, okay?
Ryan
Another great post Terry, well done.
Perhaps what pushes the focus off email and other basics is that those selling to webmasters have to keep coming up with new and sexy stuff to capture our attention. Thanks for keeping it real, and taking us back to basics.
I’d be very interested in a poll of webmasters to find out how many really make use of email in their business. I get the impression that most of us know it’s important, but spend almost all our time on our sites anyway. Sites engage our egos in ways that a mailing list doesn’t? Dunno.
I appreciate the info and resources you’ve provided here.
What is PPC? And could you elaborate a bit on how these three systems operate and how to begin using them….
a very limited marketer but wanting to do a lot more….
Tim
Hi Tim:
PPC refers to Pay-Per-Click where you pay for each visitor to your site using a system such as Google Adwords (which is the biggest PPC service).
I discussed a little on Adwords last week: http://www.terrydean.org/7-adwords-tips-for-beginners/
On affiliates and blogging, I have other posts covering those you can find in some of the archives and will have more in the future as well.
The best way for me to build my email list was and still is PPC and article markeing.
These 2 have helped me build a list of 10,000 + opt in email subscribers.
Tal
Thanks for the great post. When I started my list two years ago I was getting around 20 new subscribers per day simply from a youtube video.
Now it’s dropped to an average of 8 since I have done away with the squeeze page in trade for more visibility to our blog at htttp://www.banjoexpert.com.
Youtube videos can be very powerful if your topic is what they want. I definitely think every business should have a promo on youtube.
Hi Terry,
I was using PPC to build my list. Glad to know this is also one of your recommended methods to build list. I also have a blog but was not very active in it. Once I am done optimising my PPC campaigns, I will put more efforts on blogging and article marketing.
Thanks terry I am using affiliates and also ppc, these are my favorites, your post its great and I think you are one of my best mentors
Hi Terry I’ve just hear your audio about email list building, and there is something that I want to ask to you, you said, now if we used adwords tor drive traffic and send it to our squesez page or optin page, it will drop our quality score, do you have any suggestion for this one? Oh one more thing, for the survey. adwords will reduce our quality score or not? Since there is no good content on survey’s site. thank you for your advice
Cheers
Semmy
Hi Semmy:
If you use a squeeze page only for Adwords with NO outgoing links, yes it will drop your quality score. There are a couple of options here. Option #1 that most people do is to add some small links at the bottom of the squeeze page to other content on the site. You don’t make them obvious, but they are still links people could click on.
A second method is to do a “2-step” where you actually have the landing page be a short one with a little content which simply asks them to click to the next page. On the 2nd page you do the opt-in. I spoke with Glenn Livingston yesterday for over 2 hours about advanced PPC methods. That is one of the methods he goes into more detail on. That interview will be given to subscribers of the Monthly Mentor Club this month.
Wow quick answer! Thank you Terry! Looking forward you next news letter
Semmy
I’ve tried it all… The best is PPC and the worst being anything that has to do with social — yikes! Still haven’t figured out what we’re doing wrong
Mike
http://www.wannadevelop.com
Thanks for the post Terry! And while I don’t comment much, I am still popping back and forward checking out what’s new, and and things I can jot down as a keeper! – Saying that though, 99.9% of things are a keeper!
I am very interested in the reasoning for you going to move this blog over to a new domain! And I’d take a guess that you’ll blog about this either after the move or before, so I’m keeping an eye on you 24/7 now.
This is the part were I could go on and on about my blog, and how I wish my name had ben available right from when I started online. The current owner has just parked it ever since it was registered, and you wouldn’t believe what I might go to to grab it! HEHE
Enough from me, and speak soon!
Thanks
Mark
Great article. I am just starting to build my list(s) and it isn’t going as quick as I would like – need to adjust the opt-in pages I guess.
I’m seeking a mentor and I talked personally to Joel Christopher and since he no longer mentors he said I should look at Terry Dean since he is who he bought his first product from.
So far I have looked into about 15 and have it narrowed down some but have yet to find 1 person that talks about how to structure the BUSINESS side of it so many gurus say do this & do that. Point is 95%+ know that they do not do it all themselves but will not say who to hire 1st,2nd 3rd 4th etc AND what degree of knowledge/skills should they have AND where to find them? I’m a licensed Gen eral contractor & R.E. Agent in Mn and am planning on moving to Dallas or Phoenix in next 3 mths and I have 100k to start a business. Can anyone explain those things to me? I build homes and I know I need Plans drawn -Carpenters-Plummers -Electrical etc. Again why when they ALL outsource and have in house can’t they explain key principle people needed?
Lastly I’m not that great on the computer and although i have very good ideas I need to hire & team up with someone to help teach me and implement the things I’ll learn. What are Terrys 3 strongest areas? Email marketing – automation -outsourcing OR?
I need a hands on type mentor is Terry the guy?
I’ m new to this site and to be honest have not taken the time yet to review Terry. Any feed back would be great and e-mail me if you like. Thanks & have a GREAT Christmas ALL!
I think the idea of the ‘on exit popover’ is excellent. I for one hate having these pop up boxes all over what I am trying to read and automatically close the window on them. I agree that you need to be able to read the whole page without interruptions to establish whether you are getting value or not. I shall definitely be following your recommendations and hope for a similar rise in income to that mentioned by one of your commenters.
http://www.paullhamilton.com
Terry – Are you still planning to move to another domain? Just curious.
Ryan
Hi Ryan,
I did intend to move over to a different domain, but this one ranks on Google so well on quite a few phrases. So that put the brakes on wanting to move after positioning this one so well. I will integrate a few things into MyMarketingCoach.com more, but moving the entire blog – probably not at this time.
Terry