If you are involved with internet marketing you most likely have heard by now one of the most important proverbs of online business: “The Money is in the List”.
The phrase describes the relationship between large email lists and long term internet marketing success (ie making money online). Only recently have I started focusing more on building lists for my websites, and the results have revealed that the list is indeed a powerful tool.
When building your lists its important to view them as a long term business assets rather than a method to make a quick buck. By building a relationship and trust with your subscribers, and nurturing it over time you create a resource that is packed with potential.
Your broadcasts should supplement and even offer exclusive value that you are already providing on your website. If you are building a list for a blog or affiliate site, then include extra information that only newsletter subscribers can receive.
There are numerous “list building tactics” that promise gazillions of opt-ins with little effort. You could build huge lists this way but how responsive will they be? I’d rather have a few thousand active subscribers than tens of thousands of subscribers that ignore my messages.
Attracting subscribers to your list by highlighting the benefits of joining, Do not trick them to join.
Years ago people would search for newsletters to join, now most are seen as a nuisance and are quickly deleted. The trick to building a large list is to draw attention to your list’s benefits, with an incentive. Entice your visitors with a free ebook, video, or other form of exclusive content.
By focusing on drawing attention to your list’s benefits, you can filter out the ones who would only join to get the incentive.
Money will come with time, first provide value to your subscribers, then find targeted situations that will benefit your subscribers. The worst thing to do is spam a new list with affiliate offers.
Below are a few tips that could help you save time, energy, and money when building your list.
Broadcast consistency is important, if you wait a few months to send messages, your subscribers might have forgotten they voluntarily joined and mark your email as spam. Send out mailings daily or weekly, bi-weekly and monthly are stretching it too far apart.
Providing consistent value is the key to keeping subscribers. If they are not benefiting from your messages, they will opt-out quickly.
Ask your subscribers for quick testimonials about how they have received benefit from being a member of your list.
In your regular content, mention your list and value current subscribers are receiving.
Take the benefits, testimonials, teasers, and an incentive and organize them into a sales page for your mailing list.
The more information that you request, the fewer subscribers you will get. Aside from the email address, decide what information is crucial.
If you have not started building a list of targeted subscribers, What are you waiting for?!
I build stuff, like Narien, the Useragent API and the Email API