Mouprise.com

29 ways to build your home email list

In 2011, email will grow even more, as it has in the last decade. As email providers get tougher on spam every year, marketers need to focus on building their internal permission-based email list and employing email marketing best practices to ensure they’re protecting your customers and future customers.

If you’ve been thinking about starting an e-marketing strategy or have a strategy in the works, having the right home listing is vital.

We’ve all heard that there are three keys to an e-marketing campaign: list, creative, and offer. If you don’t have the right list, you can forget about creativity and supply as they don’t matter. Going after the right target audience is your first key.

To celebrate the coming new year, we’ve put together a helpful list of 29 things you can do today to increase your target home list tomorrow.

The acquisition imperative

Every day more companies “discover” email marketing, decide to get in the game and start sending emails to their customers and prospects. At the same time, hundreds of other companies are sending authorization emails to a subscriber list that, according to industry averages, is experiencing attrition of about 40 percent per year. At that rate, an initial list of 2,500 emails shrinks by nearly 1,000 addresses in the first year of existence. This only includes bounces. There is another group you should consider: unsubscribe.

Because you’re competing with legitimate marketers and spammers, the e-marketing practices you use can result in you getting a new customer or spam list, being blacklisted by ISPs, and getting fined.

Whether starting a new email marketing list or growing an existing list, acquiring new subscribers is a marketing imperative no business can ignore. A growing list of subscribers is critical to supporting the reach and effectiveness of your email marketing initiatives.

Strategic Foundations

Before you pursue acquiring new subscribers, you need to develop a strong email marketing strategy and the unique value proposition of each email or email marketing campaign.

As you well know, there is no shortage of articles on “email marketing strategy”. So, in an effort not to bore you and seem redundant, we won’t give you another recipe for success. However, you are competing with your potential audience’s time and need to give people a compelling reason to subscribe to your email communications.

In other words, by giving you their email address, it is your responsibility to give them what you promised, email communications that will help them. The specific reasons may depend on your strategy, your business, and the makeup of your readers.

In addition to providing valuable content, consider rewarding subscribers with a free gift or enticing them with offers and incentives that are only available via email. And don’t forget to get their feedback – their feedback will help you improve your communications and retain them as a loyal reader, future customer, or existing customer.

endless opportunities

If you’re ready to offer or producing an e-newsletter or other electronic communications for your business and have committed to email as a strategic e-marketing initiative, now is the time to offer every opportunity for people to subscribe to your list. of houses.

In addition to building your list of houses, the email addresses you get are potential customers that you can carry through your buying cycle.

We often find interesting newsletters and spontaneously go to your website to find a way to subscribe and read more. If visitors can’t easily figure out how to sign up, most will simply leave.

Here are several ways to make it easy for people to sign up for your email communications, generate leads, and convert readers into subscribers, both online and offline.

Remember, getting the email address is the first step, convincing them to receive your email communications is the next step.

29 Online and Offline Ways to Build Your Home List

Online:

• Don’t forget your website. Put your email communications signup form on your home page so people don’t have to go looking for it. Also, embed the sign-up opportunity on every page of your website. Remember, the back end after they sign up. Initially, ask for just the basics, like name, email address, and zip code. Anything else will make them suspicious. You are developing a relationship and you are in the courtship phase, so you should go on a date before you get married. Include autoresponder messages like “thank you” for signing up and reconfirm what they signed up for and the frequency of the messages. You can also include “confirmation” messages to confirm the single or double opt-in mechanism you are using.
• “Send this page to a colleague” forms. Allow people to forward your communications to other people.
• From “Send this page to a colleague” emails. When that “colleague” receives your friend’s link, offer a “subscribe directly to our newsletter” link.
• collateral download. Every time someone signs up for white papers or other guarantees from your website, ask them to sign up
• Links within your RFQ or RFI forms. Ask people to sign up for your newsletter when they request information.
• “Out of office” emails. Have employees feature the newsletter or other communications in your out-of-office email message.
• Footers and email signatures. Using a program like Tumbleweed, you can insert marketing messages into every email sent from your company.
• Cooperative web programs. Partner with complementary sites that link their newsletter signup forms to yours. Respond in kind with a subscription option for your ezine on your site.
• Online ads soliciting subscribers. Offer an incentive, such as a white paper or a free invitation to a webinar. Don’t forget to match the incentive with the audience. You’re trying to qualify leads in this process, so you don’t want to attract people who are only interested in the offer. Advertise only in areas where your target audience is likely to see you.
• A simple subscriber email address. Let people simply send a message to “[email protected]” to sign up.
• Co-registration. Put a checkbox for your newsletter on other sites that reach the same target market. Essentially, your subscription is supported by another subscription or registration form elsewhere.
• Include in your shopping cart mechanism. Include a way to opt out of your communications after a purchase has been made, or even if it looks like they’re going to abandon the purchase or come back later.
• Search Engine Ads. Don’t forget about search engine optimization on your subscription pages and consider running PPC ads for words directly related to your content.
• contextual advertising Place ads not only on search engines, but also on specific sites that offer this service.

Disconnected:

• brochures. Put a simple web address for people to search for “regular updates and information.”
• Product registration and warranty cards. Have a checkbox for the latest product and company updates when signing up for electronic communications.
• Direct mail campaigns. Give customers the opportunity to continue the discussion online.
• Catalogs. Place the newsletter subscription URL in the footer of each page. Offer incentives and discounts by email only.
• Product packaging. Place the URL of your email newsletter conspicuously on the package.
• Fair stands. Let people provide a business card in a bowl or have a computer kiosk for them to check in “live.”
• Print ads. Present the newsletter subscription URL somewhere in the ad.
• Billing inserts. Request subscriptions through inserts in your monthly statement.
• Business reply cards. Be sure to include a checkbox and a line for email.
• Promote via voicemail. Record voicemail and message waiting announcements soliciting e-newsletter subscriptions.
• Distribution and sales channel partners. Ask them to promote the subscription as a way to stay “connected” directly with the company.
• Make sure your sales, customer service, and field engineers are asking customers about their electronic communications.
• At the retail point of sale. Make the purchase part of the checkout process. Talbots is good at this.
• Final comments to a customer service call, including online chat. Write an electronic communications subscription argument at the close of your call.
• Don’t forget about radio or television broadcasts. If you use them to drive traffic to your site, why not mention the availability of a newsletter and position it as an added value?

Finally, consider offering subscribers the ability to choose what information they receive by offering segmented and targeted communications. This option puts them in charge and provides you with detailed customer segmentation data. Every year, send a message that will allow subscribers to update their profile, including contact information and preferences.

The way to get the most out of email is to segment your database and target content to those segments. Email makes this easy, especially since new subscribers can be segmented.

These are just some of the possibilities for acquiring email addresses. We’re sure there are many more you can dream of that relate directly to your own industry.

Remember, if your newsletter is hard to find, let alone subscribe to, you’re only producing half the satisfaction it should and defrauding your customers of potentially valuable information.

2011 is the year to “jump” headfirst into the email marketing game. Using best practices to build your home listing is your recipe for success.