HOW TO: Build A Successful Email Marketing List

Gone are the days of promoting and marketing your products and services through flyers or word of mouth. As any student in a marketing program or in an online marketing course will tell you, email marketing is the way to go in the Internet age where everyone has an email account which they have constant and instant access to via their smartphones and other mobile devices. But who do I send emails to and how do I get those email addresses, you may ask.

This is when you need to build an email marketing list so that you have a base of potential customers to communicate with. There are several ways you can do so; just take a pick from the list of methods below according to the ones that suits you best.

Put up a “sign up” form

Ever notice that upon arrival at certain sites like Groupon, a window pops up right before you even had a chance to catch a glimpse of the site? This window is a “sign up” form that allows site visitors to register to receive updates or newsletters from the site. Most will just exit this window but you’ll definitely be able to get a number of people signing up. They might think “Ah, since this appears, I might as well sign up”. This pop up window is the most convenient way for people to register, rather than having to search for the contact form on the website.

Assure subscriber’s privacy

Now that your site visitors have signed up to receive emails from you, you need to assure them that their personal details are safe with you and that you would never release them to other parties for whatever purpose. Putting a statement such as this on your sign up form does assure subscribers that they can trust you with their information. This will most certainly increase sign up percentage!

Give involvement options

Some might want to receive every single news you have but there are those who just want to know about the latest promotions. There are also others who are only interested in freebies. Give your subscribers the option to select what they would like to receive. If this option isn’t given, it might turn them off from subscribing altogether as they don’t want to receive more emails that they prefer to.

As for news and updates, it would be great if you can let your subscribers decide how often they want to receive them – daily, weekly or fortnightly.

Attract them with freebies

If your Business is new or doesn’t have a loyal fan base yet, dangle some freebies in exchange for their email addresses. Everyone loves a giveaway and they wouldn’t mind providing their email addresses for a discount or a little token.

The freebie doesn’t have to be a big one. Kill two birds with one stone and give a discount coupon for your store in return for an email address. This way, your subscribers are inclined to return to your site to utilize the voucher and voila, you get an email marketing list, sales and brand awareness! I have to admit that I do give out web hosting coupon codes on my website too, for those who are interested, do come to have a look.

Get email addresses physically

If you are taking part in a seminar, product launch, car boot sale or just any event at all, bring along a mailing list sign-up so that the people you meet can register on the spot. This technique is quite easy as the customers would have already interacted with you and no further introduction of your product or service is needed.

Buy an email list

When all else fails, turn to this last resort. The downside of this method is that unlike the methods above where the subscribers have indicated interest, using a purchased email list would mean that you would be blasting thousands of people with emails with the hope that they be interested enough to purchase. But before that, they would first need to open and read your email and of course, your email must not end up in the spam folder.

You need to be careful too as this method could backfire by portraying yourself as a spammer or a non-reputable business. No, this is not a method which I like. 🙂

Conclusion

With six tips or methods listed above to help you create an email marketing list, you should be able to do so with little problem. Once you have built a list and are ready to embark on email marketing, remember that the key point is the content of the email itself. So make sure that your emails are engaging enough to retain the subscribers that you have so difficultly obtained. Well, I will most likely come up with another article on this subject in the near future, do stay tuned!