Building an email list is the cornerstone of your business marketing activities, especially if you have a service-based business. Your email list is made up of your target audience who has an interest in the solutions you provide. If treated with care and marketed to the right way, some of the subscribers on your email list will buy your products or programs or become a high-paying client.
In order to get people to sign up, you need to offer something of value, for free and provide an opt-in form to collect the data and deliver the free lead-generating offer (freebie). Some of the email marketing programs that I recommend to set this up are: Mailchimp.com, Aweber.com, iContact.com
People get quite a bit of email these days. So they are not looking for much more. That means that your free offer has to be enticing and compelling to attract your new subscribers. So I will describe below, “How to create a juicy freebie to build your email list”.
- What is your target audience’s most desired result? What is the service that you provide? What is it that your prospective clients need the most? Do your clients want to lose weight? Do your clients want to be more productive? If so, your free offer could be “3 Killer Strategies to Be More Productive & Live up to your fullest potential” or “The top 7 Strategies to lose weight the healthy way without starving yourself to death”. You get the picture, right? Don’t worry about giving away the store. Your freebie should be of value, equipped with your best tips in a digestible form so that your new subscriber can implement and actually achieve some results. This will give them a taste of your expertise and it will actually motivate them to want to work with you on a paid level.
- How can you break down their most desired result into actionable steps? Brainstorm the top 3, top 7 or top 10 things that your new subscriber can do to achieve their most desired result. This will be the outline for your free opt-in offer.
- What is the method of delivery with the highest perceived value? There are many ways to deliver information online. Here are a few: e-book, e-report, webinar, teleseminar, livestream, video series, podcast or a combination of some or all of the above. Think about the best way to deliver your information from points #1 and #2 that would be of high value, easy to learn and fits your personality. For instance, if you are very comfortable with video, you might consider a video, series of video, livestream or webinar.
Your free opt-in offer should include actionable steps that your new subscriber can implement. At the same time, it should not be an overwhelming amount of information. You need to focus on giving the ‘dessert-style’ version. A more in-depth solution can be delivered in your coaching sessions or however you deliver your service. I hope you have found value in these tips and will implement them in designing your first or next freebie for building your subscriber list. If you have anything to add, please share it in the comments section below. I would love to hear your feedback and will personally respond to each comment.
Great tips on creating a free offer, Stephanie. And if they want to take it one step forward and really increase their sales they can set up an autoresponder series to move people along the path to becoming a paying client or customer. If your email service provider does not have the autoresponder functionality, just be sure to stay on top of new leads so that you can personally follow-up.
Thanks for the comment Tiffany! You’re absolutely right. After the opt-in, follow-up and relationship-building is key.