List building is the easiest and the hardest thing to do. A real Jekyll and Hyde scenario. It takes very little physical effort to build a list. Sit down at your computer and go at it. Yep it’s that simple. But once you sit down and start, where do you start? And what is the most effective way to build a list?
1.) To build a list you need somewhere or something to keep that list on or in actually. An auotresponder is a must. Without an autoresponder, you will spend all your time personally responding to optin requests. And that my friend is actually impossible to do and build a strong list. eWeber and Get Response are the only two I would even consider.
2.) To build a list you need to have a portal for people to enter and let you know that they would like to be on your list. While they might not really want to be on a list, you need a way to capture people who are interested in the same area you are marketing in at least. So an optin form must be available for them to provide you with their name and email address. You can create a form in one of the two auto responders I mentioned earlier. That form will have to go in a web page that you set up and publish on the Internet.
These things I have mentioned are the most basic items. Most people already know about these. But I put them in here because they are crucial to building a list. And some people reading this article might just be real newbies in marketing.
3.) A squeeze page in some form or another is a must. You can’t just leave an optin form laying around somewhere and hope people will find it. They need a website to go to to be able to fill in your optin form. Squeeze pages come in all kind of configurations. From the plain one page short pre-sales page, to the more intense video page. Depending on what type of offer you are promoting and your skill set that is what will guide you to choose what type of landing page you end up with.
4.) A freebie is essential. On your squeeze page, it is important to offer some sort of incentive to get people to hand over their name and email address. A crucial piece of the list building pie. A free pencil won’t do it. It has to be something of real value to your website visitor. Your optin rates will directly correlate to the perceived value of your bribe, which is another term for free offering. Put something up for free that is cheap and ordinary and your optin rate will suffer tremendously.
What you offer can be just about anything, but it must relate to what your website is about. If you have a dog training site, offering an eBook on dating just won’t do. Many people offer a 3, 5 or 7 day course on the subject at hand. You can write and produce this eCourse on your own or you can outsource it. or some times you can find a ready made course and just buy it and then set it up in your autoresponder to have it delivered that way.
5.) Traffic is second most important thing you must have to when list building. While it may seem as the most important, there is one thing even more important than just traffic. But no traffic means no list. It is that simple. Traffic can come from anywhere. There are tons of ways and places to get traffic. But not all traffic is the same. It’s akin to people who drive a Mercedes versus a person who drives a Volkswagen bus. Which one is more likely to have money to spend? The Mercedes guy right? So where does the best traffic come from and how do you get it?
That’s the most important aspect. The answer (here’s a hint) starts with an M and ends with an R. Follow the link below and discover just what I mean.
