Email is a marketing strategy that’s been around for decades and isn’t going anywhere. It’s a tried and true method to attract, convert, and retain customers for any business. However, many business owners get stuck on how to build an email list. So today, we want to break it down for you. We’ll discuss the overall website journey, tips to build an email list, the best email marketing tools, and how to maintain your list once you’ve built it.
Consider Your Website Journey
Consider the journey you want a visitor to move through when exploring your website. When they land on your home page, what’s the next page you want them to visit? And what about the page after that? Considering your website journey is crucial to building a quality email list.
A well-planned website journey attracts and retains visitors and converts them into email subscribers. By focusing on user experience, delivering value, and strategic placement of calls-to-action (CTAs), small business owners can build a robust email marketing list to drive growth and engagement.
Don’t forget to analyze the journey you create. Monitoring the website journey provides valuable data on visitor behavior. You can use tools like Google Analytics to see the steps people take after landing on certain pages of your website. This data can be used to optimize your website, improve user experience, and increase the effectiveness of email list capture strategies. If they aren’t taking the journey you intended, you may need to edit your website copy or calls to action (CTAs). By analyzing the website journey, you can understand what content resonates most with your audience.
3 Tips to Build an Email List
Let’s talk about some ways to build an email list. By implementing these tips, you can create a long-term marketing strategy that will continue to work for you.
1. Easy Sign-Up
No matter where you place an email list sign-up form, a seamless sign-up process is critical. Your website should have prominent email sign-up forms, making it simple for visitors to join the list.
The email marketing list form on your website should be short and sweet, only gathering the information you need. The longer the form, the less likely people are to take the time to fill it out. I recommend including fields for their first name, last name, email address, and maybe their business name if you need it.
There is a caveat to this rule, though. The better the value proposition, the more information you can gather. For example, if you’re hosting a webinar, you can ask for more information upon sign-up because they will receive a ton of value for free. If you just have an email marketing list signup form on your website, keep it as simple as possible because you aren’t providing value to them yet.
2. Include Strong CTAs Throughout Your Website
Every page of your website should include a CTA to sign up for your email list. Back to the website journey, a visitor could land on any page on your website, and that might be the only page they see. You want to give them a chance to sign up for your list before exiting your website.
These are some ways you can include strong and unique CTAs throughout your website:
- Simple sign-up form
- Lead magnets
- Pop-ups
- Dedicated landing pages
No matter what method you use to build an email list, communicate the value of joining your list. Showcase the benefits (exclusive offers, valuable content, updates, discounts, etc.) to incentivize visitors to sign up. Consider what would convince them to hand over their email address.
3. Build Quality Lead Magnets
Lead magnets are one of the best ways to build an email list. You’re providing free value in exchange for their email address.
There are tons of different lead magnets you can choose from:
- Ebooks
- Videos
- PDF guides
- Webinars
- Templates
- Checklists
- Free trials
- Free audits (contact me for a free SEO audit!)
- Quizzes
- Resource libraries
- Exclusive or early access
- Reports or research
- Memberships or communities
- Exclusive podcast episodes
- Contests or giveaways
- Infographics
There’s no excuse not to have a lead magnet with so many options! Pick the resource you think your audience will see value in. No one will download your freebie if they don’t see value in it.
When building your lead magnet, make sure it aligns with your services. It wouldn’t make sense for you to offer a PDF guide on the best photography locations when you offer SEO services. Build one that makes sense for your business and audience needs.
Email Marketing Tools
There are a lot of email marketing tools out there, so we’ll give you a brief overview of the ones we recommend.
1. Mailchimp
We use Mailchimp for a few of our clients. It’s an easy-to-use platform that has great workflow capabilities. There’s also a free version if you’re just getting started with email marketing.
2. ConvertKit
We use ConvertKit for our email marketing efforts. We find that it has all the capabilities we need and more. One of our favorite features is that we can archive emails and send links to them later on. Many people use Substack for this, but ConvertKit includes that feature in their subscription fee.
3. Flodesk
Flodesk is an inexpensive option for those just getting started. It has a ton of design features to make your emails unique to your business. It also has great workflow features, so you can target messaging to certain audiences.
When picking an email marketing tool, it comes down to how the platform aligns with your needs. On the basic level, they all allow you to create email lists and send emails. Anything beyond that is preference-based. We encourage you to sign up for some free trials to see what platform you like best!
Maintaining Your Email List
Now that you’ve built your email list and have some subscribers, it’s time to make your list work for you by emailing your list regularly. There are a lot of different strategies for what to email your list (more on that another time), but consistency is what will make your email marketing efforts worth it. We recommend weekly emails, but if you can’t keep up with that frequency, try biweekly or monthly. It’s important to stay top of mind and continue to give value to your email subscribers.
Ready to get started with email marketing? Email marketing services are part of my digital marketing retainer packages, and I would love to help you build an email list for your email marketing efforts. Review my packages and contact me to book a discovery call to learn more!
