9 Ways to Grow Your Email List
Ah, email marketing. The copy, the subject lines, the analytics, the open rates and CTR…
None of that matters if you don’t have a list.
Whether you’re building a list from scratch or looking for ways to increase your email subscribers, there are a number of proven ways to grow your email list from skinny to bodacious. 9 ways, in fact. And you’ve found exactly the right article to tell you how to do it.
Read on to discover 9 easy, doable and fun ways to grow your email list:
1. Write good emails
Okay, this one should go without saying. But if you don’t send out the good stuff, people won’t respond by sharing it with others, via forwarding or social media. Worse, they might even unsubscribe. Missing out on this crucial aspect of email marketing can damage your campaigns no end. Always make your content unique, highly valuable, shareable, and engaging. Doing so will help you gain exposure, whether through digital means or word of mouth.
2. Encourage sharing
That said, you should always give your readers the opportunity to share what you send out as easily and quickly as possible. Include social sharing buttons and a Send to a Friend button on all emails, and make sure those processes aren’t broken and are as easy as possible to complete – for example, by making sure the Twitter status or subject line is already filled out, and they just need to hit Send.
Doing this will give you swift access to recipients’ friends, colleagues, and networks. Some of those people might subscribe, and send to others, like a beautiful viral phenomenon. The bottom of your emails is the perfect place to do this. Include a “Subscribe” button at the end so that people receiving the forwarded emails can easily opt-in too.
3. Segment your lists
Segmenting your email list will help you create targeted content so that your readers feel listened to, and that you’ve personalized content just for them.
Your readers are most likely to click through emails which are more specific to their interests. Try giving your readers the option to sign up to daily, weekly and monthly newsletters, for example. If you create multiple subscriptions, you’ll increase the chance that visitors will subscribe to the one they prefer. In fact, marketers who used segmented campaigns saw as much as a 760% increase in revenue. And that’s bonkers.
4. Clean out your list
Like trimming your split ends to keep your barnet nice and healthy, you should prune your email list to keep it invigorated. Counterproductive? No. Regularly scrubbing out bots and actually encouraging people to unsubscribe if they’re no longer enjoying your emails gives you valuable feedback on what’s working and what isn’t. Not only that, but it helps give you more accurate metrics, so you can concentrate your marketing efforts on where your list needs it most.
5. Refresh with a re-opt in.
Do you have an old list, getting mouldy in a corner? Create an engaging opt-in message and send it to your old list and encourage contacts to re-opt in if they’d like to – and also promise to remove all contacts who don’t respond. Again, removing the dead wood from your email list can improve your deliverability and increase the odds of your email being shared with those outside your current list.
Why not offer a nice lead magnet to tempt those who are on the fence?
6. Add a CTA to your social media
If you run an email newsletter, chances are you share the same kind of content on your social media. So be sure to always promote your email newsletter wherever you are: add a CTA to your social profiles, regularly share newsletter updates, and tease gated content to your followers that they have to subscribe to access.
7. Try a competition
Nothing gets subscribers flocking in like a free giveaway, especially if all they have to sign over for a chance of winning is their email address. Will they unsubscribe straight after? Possibly – but through all the noise, you’re likely to get a handful of real, decent subscribers who love what you put out.
Make sure to choose a prize you know your existing subscribers will love, and which will tempt a lot of others to sign up. Promise to share who won in an upcoming newsletter so that people will stay tuned.
8. Run a paid ad
Use Facebook or Instagram ads to drive traffic to your opt-in landing page. These advertising methods are still pretty cheap for what they offer, and the numbers of people you can reach are truly huge. Offering an extra incentive like a lead magnet is an effective method of getting even more signups, but in a lot of cases, the content you promise to deliver should be more than enough to tempt people into subscribing.
9. Guest post on blogs
Submit guest posts to popular blogs which serve your target market and include a call to action in your author byline with a link to your opt-in landing page. This helps grow your subscriber base by networking with other professionals in your industry, as well as helping you to demonstrate the kind of content your readers can expect every week (or day) when they sign up to your regular newsletter.
Found a strategy for growing your email list that you’d like to try? Why stop at one? The best way to grow your email list is to leverage multiple techniques at once, helping you to reach your audiences from different angles and increase the chances of growing your list.
As you grow your list, don’t forget to nurture those fresh leads with more offers and levels of content that allow you to convert those prospects into customers!
What do you think of our tips? Let us know in the comments!
