Targeted traffic is the lifeblood of any online business, and a healthy and well-maintained email marketing list allows you to pull in engaged visitors almost at your leisure. However, building up your subscription list is the obvious hurdle you need to clear to put yourself in this happy position.
How can you attract new subscribers as easily, quickly, and cheaply as possible? Here are five proven methods.
1) Guest Posting
Guest posting on a third-party website is widely used for building a brand, driving traffic, or generating links, but there’s no reason it can’t also be employed to grow your email database. If you can arrange a guest spot on a heavily trafficked site with a user base that matches your own customer demographic, then including a sign-up call to action is an effective use of the bio area beneath your post.
2) Contests
Everyone likes something for free. Take advantage of this universal fact by running a contest or sweepstake with the price of entry simply a subscription to your list. For the best results, the prize needs to be genuinely useful to attract entrants, but also highly aligned with your ideal subscriber’s interests so that targeting is kept tight.
3) Lead Magnets
Lead magnets offer an even more direct variation on the ‘something for nothing’ theme. Offer new list subscribers an exclusive download, access to premium areas of your site, or a free trial of your services, and watch your subscriber count soar.
4) Leverage Social
Some marketers see social media as the natural replacement for email, but the more holistic view is to recognize that both channels have much to offer. When building your social presence, why not take a little time to boost your email list alongside? Both Facebook and Instagram profiles allow a direct email sign-up form, while on other platforms such as Twitter and LinkedIn, entering a sign-up URL with a strong call to action into your bio area can be highly productive.
5) Niche Collaboration
Lastly, it can pay rich dividends to partner with other businesses within your niche – so long as they’re not in direct competition. Paid advertisements on another company’s email broadcast can open up new markets, while closer arrangements with jointly-promoted offers can also work brilliantly, developing a shared audience which benefits both partners.
All savvy marketers should be looking to build a strong email subscription database to round out their online strategy. The benefits are simply too great to be ignored, no matter how fashionable other channels may be. The efforts you put into attracting subscribers now will pay reliable returns long into the future, giving you the option of on-demand traffic whenever you have a new message to spread.
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