This is the fourth post in the email marketing series. Check out the other three first, if you haven’t already:
- What is an Email Autoresponder and Why do You Need One?
- Setting up Your Email Marketing Campaign
- Creating Your Welcome Email
Getting someone to hand over their email address takes more than just setting up your subscription box and adding it to your website. You’ll need to sweeten the offer with a free handout, booklet, checklist, or eBook – a sign-up incentive. You’ve probably seen them yourself and maybe entered your email address to get something for free in return. You wanted whatever it was they were offering, and you were willing to give your email address in exchange for it. The free offering was something you valued. So, what can you offer your potential subscribers?
The best things to offer your potential subscribers is something of value that you’ll hand over for free after they enter their email addresses. It should be something related to your online business. Make it relevant. For example, for a website on local farms, that might be a free printable recipe book or downloadable farm map. Yes, you’re bribing your subscribers!
An Adesta survey of more than a thousand marketers showed that about 85% of subscribers sign up for an email newsletter expecting a discount or promotion of some sort. Subscribers want financial incentives, useful incentives, or to stay on top of new services and products.
Make it fun, exciting, valuable, relevant, and, most importantly, free. What is a solution for a common problem your website visitors have? If you can answer that, you can provide them with the solution, and watch your list grow exponentially.
10 Incentive Ideas for Getting More Opt-in Subscribers:
Check out these awesome examples of irresistible incentives!
- Time-Saving Cheat Sheet
Example:
Jon Morrow’s 52 Headline Hacks - Handy Template
Example:
Sample Proposal - Toolkit
Example:
Free Launch Planning Workbook - Videos
Example:
Venture Superfly offers over 25 free videos on entrepreneurship - Free eBooks
Example:
Make a Living Writing offers free eBooks as incentives - Discount (free shipping, dollar-off coupons, percentage off, or free trials)
Example:
Free Monthly Photos - Free Report
Example:
Brendon Burchard has dozens of free reports available, including a popular manifesto - Persuasive Blueprint
Example:
The Definitive Blueprint for Lead Management - Audio Training
Example:
Marie Forleo offers free audio training on how to get anything you want - Free Webinar
Example:
Amy Porterfield has a free webinar on how to create webinars!
There are examples here, but use them to help you brainstorm ways you can make some of these your own. How can you make any one of these incentives relevant to your business?
Promote Your Incentive
Social Media: Create a social media campaign to promote your opt-in incentive to get more traffic to your website and more subscribers for your list. Post snippets on all of your social media channels: Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram, Pinterest, Linkedin, and YouTube.
Pop-up Ads: Use a pop-up box to get more subscribers interested in signing up. When they mouse over to close your website a pop-up ad comes up letting them know all about what they’ll be missing out on if they click away without subscribing. It’s controversial but has been shown to work!
Call-to-Action: Create a call-to-action for the top of your Facebook and Twitter pages. That’s the first thing your social media fans will see, and they’ll be more likely to sign up.
Guest Posts: Use guest posting as an opportunity to link to your incentive in the author’s bio. Writing guest posts for websites within your industry is an excellent way to gain traffic and subscribers.
Email Ads: Run ads in email lists where the readers would be interested in what you have to offer.
In Person: Collect email addresses at in-person events such as trade shows, seminars, conferences, and panels.
Partner up: Ask a colleague to run a promotion at the same time, either on their website or via email, and advertise each others’ sign up incentives.
Webinars: Host an online webinar and collect email addresses for the webinar’s registration.
Print Marketing: Add a scan code to your printed marketing materials (business cards, brochures, sales letters, direct mail, flyers, etc.) with your incentive.
Track Your Results
Use the statistics you get with your email marketing company (ConvertKit, GetResponse, Aweber) and with Google Analytics to track what’s working and what isn’t. There is no sense in continuing to use and pay for something that isn’t bringing in any more subscribers. Put your money with the marketing tactics that are working.
Continue to offer various irresistible incentives. Try new, different incentives. See how one works better than another and why. Getting more subscribers is an ongoing endeavor, not a one-off effort. You’ll gain subscribers and lose some, but the point is to always be bringing in new opt-in subscribers to grow your list continually.
How do you gain more subscribers? What has worked for you?
Share in the comments below!
