Grow Your List

The marketing holy grail these days is building your email list.

If you have a big list you have tremendous marketing leverage. But there's no single way to build your list; there are several ways, and if you combine them you can build a list of subscribers, many of whom will become customers and clients.

Here are the strategies that have been successful for me:

Getting More Traffic to Your Site

In the good old days it was a lot easier to get search engine positioning. Use the right keywords in the right place on your site and you'd appear at the top of Google.

But nowadays, the best keywords are more competitive than ever. Everybody wants them and more and more people are optimizing their sites. So I'd recommend a different direction.

Get Your Information Online

For years I've promoted the concept of writing articles. And the more articles you get out there on web sites, the more exposure you have. Your articles on complimentary web sites will drive qualified traffic to your site.

But finding all these sites could be a full time job. Your best bet is to get your articles posted and distributed by syndication sites such as www.thephantomwriters.com and www.isnare.com. You give them your article and they'll get it distributed to online networks who are looking for articles.

Another way to get information out there is through the use of online press releases. This has emerged as one of the most powerful ways to drive traffic to your site. I'm about to launch a program myself and will let you know the results. In fact the person who's working with me will be co-leading a teleclass on this topic on April 25th (noon Pacific). So mark your calendars!

Presentations Build Subscribers

I built the first few thousand subscribers to this eZine through giving talks and presentations to professional groups. At the end of each talk I'd offer a free report along with a subscription to my ezine. Don't want to be on the list? No problem, but I can't give you the report! I'd get a lot of signups from this technique alone.

But when I took my business more virtual, I started to give more teleclasses and got invited to give teleclasses to other groups. My only condition is: At the end of the teleclass I get to offer my report and eZine subscription to attendees. And just as with live talks, teleclasses helped to build my list.

Converting Visitors to Subscribers

What good is it to get a lot of people to visit your site if they don't sign up for your eZine? Let me tell you a secret. The ONLY real purpose of my site is to get new subscribers. So my home page, navigation, sign-up page - everything - is geared to visitors getting my Marketing Plan Workbook and signing up for this eZine.

Take a look at your web site. More often than not, it's difficult to find out where to subscribe. And if you do have a subscription form, where's the free report? Very few people will sign up for an eZine by itself anymore. Everyone gets too much email already. But they will request information if it's perceived as valuable.

So make your primary offer your report or white paper or assessment, or whatever you call it. And don't just say: "Get this free report" You need to sell it. That is, you need to offer several benefits of getting this material. Yes, even giving stuff away these days is a challenge!

This Biggest Seller of the eZine?

When I used to do workshops, I'd ask how people learned about Action Plan Marketing. I knew they were all subscribers, as that is the only group I promoted the workshop to. But how did they become subscribers? I was rather surprised to learn that the majority were from good old fashioned word-of-mouth.

Someone else had told them to visit my web site and suggested they subscribe. And why did that happen? I like to think it's because the eZine is useful, the workbook is valuable, the web site contains a ton of useful information and the products and programs perform as advertised.

In other words, success in this vast online world comes down not to things like hype and flash and questionable joint venture partnerships. It comes down to things like quality and consistency, good products, programs and customer service.

Want more subscribers? Develop a solid business and put your focus on getting valuable information out there. I promise that all that work will ultimately pay off.

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The More Clients Bottom Line: Make it a marketing priority to build your email list; get your information out there far and wide on the web; optimize your site to convert visitors into subscribers; and then maintain quality and consistency to build positive world-of-mouth.

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How are you building your subscriber list? Please share on the More Clients Blog.

Comments

[Shel Horowitz]

Hi, Robert,

For me, the single best way of building not only my newsletters but also my client portfolio has been participation in online discussion groups. This brings me newsletter subscriptions, marketing consulting and copywriting gigs, the attention of experts in my industry (who refer clients and endorse my books), book sales--and a lot of expert advise from other listmates, at no cost except time.

Shel Horowitz - Marketing Strategic Planning, Consulting, and Copywriting
focused on Ethical, Affordable, Effective Approaches
413-586-2388, http://www.frugalmarketing.com
Sign the Ethics Pledge: http://www.business-ethics-pledge.org

[Craig Valine]

Robert,

We share similiar marketing teachers, such as Tom Antion and Jay Abraham, to name a few. I enjoy your writing and teaching style and borrow a lot of ideas from you. :)

The best way I've gotten subscribers to my ezine is by writing articles and ending with a "blurb" at the end inviting readers to subscribe to my newsletter.

When I started out, my website was called "AwfulMarketing.com". I would end my articles like this: "About the Author: Craig Valine is the publisher of the AwfulMarketing Alert Newsletter: 'Where you learn good marketing from those who do it really bad.' To subscribe to his free newsletter, go to ....."

I had great success with this.

I don't have this website anymore, but I'm using the same strategies for my current website and ezien at www.craigvaline.com

Craig Valine

[Zoe]

Hi Robert

I have been reading your newsletter for a while now and also have the Action Plan Marketing Manual. I loved it and it has been really valuable.

Two things I have done that have helped boost subscribers are pay for Google Ads - I have been running a little ad now for a month and it has generates consistent, focussed traffic and sign ups.

The other thing I did which creates big results in sign-ups is offer a give-away as part of another person's book promotion - it helps the perceived value of their book, and I tap in to a whole new market. This strategy has dramatically increased sign ups - my list doubled through two of these ventures alone.

Lastly, I use my list for two reasons - to share my throughts and reflections and to connect with my readers. I love building this community!

[Virtual Assistant]

At my organization, our goal is not to sell anything, but rather to better educate our marketplace. To build our list, we use many, if not all, of the strategies you mention. In addition, we have formed a volunteer "Street Team." These are members who have agreed to diligently get the word out to whatever venues they have been assigned whenever a new issue of our online newsletter is issued or our monthly teleseminars in upcoming.

--Danielle Keister

[Lynne Lee]

I began building my website on 11th January.
I have optimised my pages, I'm submitting articles to directories and I have an opt in form on my home page with the offer of a valubale freebie.
I'm turning up on the first page of Google. 75% of my traffic comes through the resource box that accompanies my articles. It's very early days, but I'm getting around 25 visits and 2 sign ups a day.
I'm still getting articles out there - you really do get traffic from articles - it's worth the effort.
I'm submitting my own articles at the moment. I'm expecting things to snowball when I get around to using a submission service!
When my first eZine goes out towards the end of the month, I have people lined up who want to read it.
The only thing I haven't tried is speaking -I'm gearing up to that.
Robert, I started of with Action Plan Marketing & bought The Website Toolkit.
This stuff works.
I'm one of those who recommend your products and services. I've learnt lots of really useful stuff. Thanks.

Lynne
http://www.christianlifecoaching.co.uk