Don't Overlook These 5 Simple Email List-Building Tips
As a busy solopreneur you have a lot on your plate and many marketing tasks are calling your name. I get that growing an engaged email community can feel like a super slow process; but every effort we make adds up. Are you taking advantage of the easy, plug-n-play, or nearly set-and-forget ways to build your email list? Here are at least 5 email list-building tips you don’t want to overlook.
Let’s simplify marketing, not over complicate it. We KNOW we should be using email marketing and building our list, but many small business owners struggle with HOW to build. Or they don’t have a simple plan to show them where to go. Take small chunks of time each day to start with the little things that can work for your business 24/7/365 and add on the efforts that bring in new people in bunches as well.
Don't Miss These List-Building Tips:
One: Your Email Signature
Add a compelling description of your free gift to your business email signature.
You probably send dozens of one-to-one, personal emails daily. Why not get a little extra boost from each by including not just your website, but a link to a great email opt-in gift in every one of those emails?
There’s even software and plugins for your email that will make your signature look better (and convert better), like WiseStamp. You can see email signature examples from them here. Also see the tool NewOldStamp for branded email signatures – more ways to add a call-to-action in the emails you send every day. And YesWare has a few more tips and examples on how to create a more effective email signature.
Also add a link to your free gift landing page to the signature field for any non-social media forums or groups you are in too! [below is a pic of my profile in an online forum where I can share a bio and add a link to an evergreen free gift landing page]
Two: Your Social Bios
Add a ‘link in bio’ area to your social media profiles that links to a landing page for your free gift.
There are apps and software like LinkTree, Lnk.Bio, FeedLink, Later (a great IG social management tool- has a free ‘link in bio’ option) or others that can make this easier, especially for sites like Instagram where there are no active URLs in posts or captions. LinkTree and similar options make it easy to share more than one link, when you only have space on a social profile for a single link.
BETTER …. make your own super basic ‘link in bio’ landing page on your website – that way YOU get the benefit of that social media traffic to YOUR site, not LinkTree.
Create a page with a short name, like yourcoolsitename.com/connect
That page has a top resource, or your most recent top social posts/videos, or your book, a video, could be an Amazon affiliate link to a product you talk about on social, your other social accounts, but most importantly – your email opt-in freebie link.
And, this way you don’t have to change out the link in your bio every day (ugh who on earth does that?!) over on IG if you are promoting or sharing different things. You send them back to one page on your site – and THAT is where you put the most up-to-date offers.
You can use any page-builder plugins or tools you already have for your site, such as: Elementor, BeaverBuilder, ThriveSuite; or tools like LeadPages.
Here's an article with step-by-step instructions on using Elementor to create a ‘link-in-bio page.'
Keep the page simple, mobile-friendly, easy to click, and don’t miss out on opportunities from that social media traffic.
[Note: No, I don't have a landing page that looks like this, mostly because I don't use IG for business, only personal use. But if I were using IG I'd go the route of making my own page with Thrive vs. spending for a 3rd party tool. If you aren't comfortable creating your own landing pages – by all means use one of the apps!]
Three: Make It Easy for Your List to Share with Friends
Be sure there’s a signup link in the newsletter itself – great for if a member of your email community forwards your email to a friend.
Why not also use that as a CTA (call-to-action) in your next email – ASK your people to forward a great email from you to a pal who would be interested.
Bonus related tip from your email software:
Use the archive feature in your email marketing software to share the page for a sample issue of your regular, newsletter-style emails (like when I send a #ThursdayTips with the area for Tech-Tools-To Read). There should be a link on that page to your sign-up form in your email software.
Another Bonus Tip:
If your friends or colleagues are part of your ideal client audience, have you invited them to your list yet? Use the app for your email marketing software or their tools for gathering contacts legally, offline, and ask the next time you see them. Or forward them one of your great newsletters – that has that link to sign up – and ask them to join. OR … send them to your free gift page and ask them to sign up that way. Make it easy!
Four: Putting Your Link in All Your Videos
Do you mention how to join your email list on all your social media videos, live chats, or YouTube videos? Is the URL to your best-converting landing page in the description of each video on YouTube? Don’t forget that the world’s second largest search engine … is YouTube!
Use simple video editing software to add in a graphic during your video or at least at the end of your video with a call to action to get your free gift and show the URL. Make it short and easy to remember.
My preferred video editing software is Filmora – it’s pretty easy and intuitive to use and has lots of goodies built in (like title graphics, lower thirds, music, etc). But you can do simple edits with the Video editor built-in to Windows and even YouTube has a simple editor.
Did you know I make simple animated intro/outro video clips for clients? I just made a simple outro animation to go at the end of all videos and remind viewers to Like-Comment-Subscribe AND it has a link to an evergreen free offer for my client. Contact me to learn more!
Here's a still from an outro I use in videos to remind people to join my Mighty Marketing Mojo Facebook Group. I have others with my blog, landing pages, or other CTAs.
Five: Your Most Visited Pages
Look at your website analytics – what are your most visited pages? I’ll bet that over a year or more, your About page, services page, the category pages for blog posts, your resources or recommendations page – all get a ton of the percent of traffic on your site. Do you have attractive, attention-grabbing, and relevant opt-in forms on each of those pages to connect and convert those visitors to members of your email list?
While you’re working on opt-in forms on your website – if you want to check out 3rd-party opt-in form tools (this means NOT the kinda ugly forms built-in to AWeber, ActiveCampaign, MailChimp etc) – 2 of the stand-alone tools I have tested and recommend are: Sumo and OptinMonster. Sumo has a Free Forever plan worth checking. OptinMonster is super robust, but plans start at $9/mo.
My preferred tool that I’ve paid for happily for years is ThriveLeads and its part of the great set of tools in ThriveSuite. You get access to all their conversion-minded tools and plugins in ThriveSuite. I personally like the analytics and color-coded dashboard that shows me how each opt-in form or lightbox is doing. But ThriveSuite is way more than just an opt-in tool and it might not be right for every biz owner.
I know these tips can seem basic, but every bit helps. And we shouldn’t forget about the easy, very nearly set-n-forget ways we can build our communities while we’re off doing other great things in the world.
