If there is one thing in business that we all know it’s the importance of gathering leads and starting the process of transforming them from prospects into customers and then into repeat buyers.
This is fundamental and should be the cornerstone of everything we do online yet so many people put it off and never make the kind of progress that they want. This can often leave them discouraged and eventually they give up and go on to the next “shiny object” which lands in their inbox.
But this can all be avoided if you just start building your email list today. It doesn’t have to be hard and it doesn’t take a lot of effort but it’s important to take that first step. You may choose to build a squeeze page or install an opt-in form on your blog like I’ve done.
Taking that first step is often the hardest and after that with each sign-up you see it gets easier and easier. There are many cliches about list building, many of which I won’t mention here but I would like to highlight some of facts and some of the real reasons why you should be building your list.
Even if it’s just a couple of subscribers a day in the beginning, they soon mount up and before you know it you have a couple of hundred people on your list that you can market to and monetize.
Lead Generation
Think of it this way, for every email address you capture online you are adding one extra lead to your funnel that you can market to and turn into a customer or a fan of your work. In the Offline world leads may pass through your store all day and you have no way of capturing their details unless they buy something. But that’s not the case online so take advantage of this and start capturing some leads.
It’s a Valuable Asset
It’s important to note that you own your email list and when used properly it can be a really powerful asset to your business. Imagine having the power to send 100 clicks to any page in the world with the click of a mouse? The earnings potential you have with email marketing are huge and that’s why you should be building your list from the start – no excuses!
Permission Marketing at it’s Finest
When someone signs up to your list they are telling you that they are interested in what you have to offer. They want to get more valuable information from you, so give it to them! But beware this is not an excuse to pummel your subscribers with affiliate offers, this is the fastest way to kill your list. Instead give them value and only send them details on offers that may genuinely help them.
Build a Good Relationship
If you look after your list and don’t kill it with offers then you can work on developing the relationship with your list and turning your leads into diehard fans who look forward to hearing from you. This will allow you to build lasting, longterm bonds with these people who will look up to you as an expert and buy from you again and again.
Guaranteed Traffic
Imagine having control over a large amount of traffic and being able to send it anywhere over the web whenever you choose, well that’s exactly what you have when you’ve got an email list. We all read about how to increase traffic to our sites but one of the simplest ways to do this is simply to build and email list and then send that traffic wherever you want at the touch of a button.
Sustainability
Every big business in the world uses email lists so why not you? Do you ever notice that when you purchase something online and click through to the checkout there is always the little box that you have to tick (or un-tick) if you want to receive their newsletter.
These huge companies spend vast amounts of money on their email management systems because they add value to their business. It allows them to keep in touch with their customers and paves the way for longterm sustainability. Remember that the most expensive customer to acquire is the first-timer but after that it get’s easier to sell to them again and again, and that is the real benefit of building an email list.
There is no such things as “Push Button Profits” but when you have a well functioning lead capture system and email marketing campaign you can really just send an email and then watch the payments find their way into your Paypal account.
It takes work, I won’t deny that, but the benefits are really worth it so I highly recommend that if you’re not building a list of subscribers that you start – today!
Thanks for reading,
Noel.
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A nice blog post Noel. I focused on building just 10 verified optin subscribers per day. It can be done easily with a visitor count of 40-50. 10 per day is 300 per month. 3600 per year 🙂
BTW, you should use thesis theme or genesis framework for your blog. Watch your SE traffic get a boost with those themes. OP is best for landing pages and squeeze pages only. Not for blogging. (Though it looks good.)
Great points Deepak and it shows how you can build a very respectable mailing list by hand full of opt-ins by working consistently.Cheers for your tips 😉
– Noel.
Hey Noel
As usual a full on article giving us valuable and useable information.
Personally my rule of thumb is send 3 emails giving value and 1 making some sort of offer.
Cheers
Paul
Hi Paul,
Thanks for feedback, appreciate it 😉 I like your 3:1 rule, always good to give value first – by doing that you’ll differentiate yourself from 90% of marketers out there who just flood our inbox’s with offer after offer.
Thanks,
– Noel.
Hi Noel,
We all need to build a list but I find maintaining it to be quiet difficult. You need to build a responsive list and keep it this way. Email your list too often they unsubscribe, email the wrong things they unsubscribe. Keeping your list really means adding to it all the time and removing any unresponsive names. I had an old lost of around 4,000 names and recently thought I check to see how responsive it was. I got a 1% CTR, loads on undelivered and quite a few unsubscribed. I should have maintained my lists and looked after my subscribers more.
Cheers
Roger
Roger you raise a good point about maintaining a list. I’ve come to the conclusion that I need to add subs to my list faster than they unsubscribe. We will always have unsubs and that’s not necessarily a bad thing because if they’re not interested in our newsletter then they’ll def not add any value to our business so it’s best get rid of them. Some list builders call this “pruning” because they cut out the bad subs and although their list reduces the overall quality of the list increases…
Overall if our growth rate is bigger than the unsub rate I think we’re doing alright for ourselves.
Cheers,
– Noel.
Hi Noel,
Your web presence is your shop window whilst your capture techniques are the entrance to your shop.
Building that all important email list are the customers walking into your shop. By delivering quality info to your email list is the relationship building you need to keep them on board and prevent them from leaving your shop.
Great post Noel.
Regards,
Dean.
Excellent analogy Dean, makes an awful lot of sense the way you described it!
Cheers for that,
– Noel.
Hey Noel,
Great post and I agree the first step is the hardest for sure and that we must build a good relationship is crucial, I signed up to different emailing lists to see how different IM’s go about promoting and I find some overkill it such as they would send an email every day sometimes 2 emails for the day in the end I had to unsubscribe from them it was too much.
Ya, they all have different ways of doing it…I think it’s best to find a happy medium like Paul outlined above.
Thanks 😉
Hi Noel,
You’ve listed some great points for building and maintaining an email list. I only recently got my lead capture form setup on my blog, but the process was quite easy. My plan is to email my list any time I add a new post to my blog. I’m hoping to find a plugin that will help me with that.
In terms of developing a relationship with my list, I plan to send them material (tips, tricks, etc.) that I’m not sharing with others. I know of one guru who’s list I’m on that does this and I have to admit, it kinda makes me feel a little special, warm and fuzzy. He also makes sure you know that he’s only sharing it with you. “FOR YOUR EYES ONLY! No one else is getting this!” I won’t name names but … he’s your “IM brother from another mother”. LOL – sorry, I just couldn’t resist.
Great idea’s to build the relationship with your list. Thanks for sharing that Karl.
All the Best,
– Noel.
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Hey Noel,
Good post and good points on why to build a list. In the past, I was a lot more enamored with SEO and affiliate sites. However, after seeing my affiliate sites perform well and then drop in rankings due to Google’s algorithm changes, I just realized how volatile a beast SEO was. To me, building an email list gives you a direct line to your subscribers and won’t be affected by the next algorithm change. Definitely more of a long term strategy, but far more stable and something that’s my main focus.
– Jeremy
Exactly Jeremy, you’ve nailed it….
Building a list def takes a more long term view of things but the benefits are Huge!
Cheers,
– Noel.
Hell yes! List building is the golden nugget for success online for sure. You hit it on the head there Noel.
I recently started coaching with Alex Jeffreys and his focus is exactly that; list building. I don’t believe saturation is possible. If you build a list, that list is yours. That traffic is yours to play with. It’s warm, and it’s focused… Doing SEO tactics is cool, but nothing really beats building up a list.
Great to see you doing so well with your Blog dude.
To your success.
Joey
Hey Joey,
Well done on joining up with Alex, hope it all goes well for ya!
Cheers for stopping by,
– Noel.
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