If you've been involved in this internet marketing world for a
while, you've probably heard the saying, "The money is in the list!"
quite a few times already. If you're just getting started with internet
marketing, be prepared to hear it a lot! It's being said so much
because it's true! The money IS in the list; the email list that is!
You've probably heard of big-time internet marketing gurus making
hundreds of thousands of dollars in very short periods of time. They
can do this because they have huge, targeted, highly responsive,
quality email lists. The only work required by them is writing a
persuasive email promoting a product that they highly recommend and
clicking "Send". That's it! Everything after that is totally automated.
Their autoresponder (a system that manages your email list and ensures
that your emails get past spam filters) sends that email out to their
whole email list. The people on that list receive, open, and read the
information contained within the email. These people know and trust
the person who sent out the email, so they value his or her
recommendation as gold. They know that the product will benefit them
and give them what they need. So, they have no problem shelling out
some cash in order to obtain that product. In return, the person that
sent out that email makes money. The amount of money made depends upon
many factors, but the one factor that mainly determines that amount of
money made is the <u>size of the list</u>. Generally,
larger lists will result in more money made. Let me provide an example
to give you a better understanding of what I mean...
I'm going to use two lists to compare, one containing 50,000 prospects
and the other containing 5,000 prospects. The list containing 50,000
prospects will be List A and the list containing 5,000 prospects will
be List B. An email promoting a random product is sent out to each of
the lists. Both of the lists receive only a 3% response rate. 3% of
50,000 is 1,500 and 3% of 5,000 is 150. Now, let's say the product that
was being promoted costs $25. List A just made a whopping $37,500
and List B made only $3,750. Now, this was not only to show you that
bigger lists generally result in more money being made, but also the
money potential that only email lists can give you. You see only 3% of
the prospects in List B bought the product that was being promoted, but
it still resulted in $3,750 being made. I'd say that's amazing
considering the only work involved was sending out an email. Imagine
YOU making that much money everytime YOU sent out an email? Think it's
impossible? Not with an email list, it isn't!
Now, that you know what an email list is and understand how it works,
I'm going to help you start and build one of your own! The process of
building a list takes a bit of time, but in the end, it's well worth
it! So, let's get started! First, you will need an autoresponder.
Again, the purpose of an autoresponder is to manage your email list
and ensure that the emails you send to your list get past spam
filters. There are many autoresponder services out there, but you will
want to go with a company that is reliable, has an excellent reputation
and a high email delivery rate. A high email delivery rate is
EXTREMELY important because if a percentage of people on your list
aren't getting your emails, you could be losing lots of money! So,
email deliverability is an important factor to consider when choosing
an autoresponder service. That's why there are only two autoresponder
services that I personally highly recommend. Those two services are GetResponse and AWeber.
Both services have excellent reputations, have been in service for
years, and have 99% email deliverabilty rates. They both offer an
unlimited amount of autoresponders and excellent training and support.
And best of all, both only cost mere pennies a day! So, if you are
interested in starting, building, and maintaining an email list, GetResponse and AWeber autoresponder services are the perfect place to start!
Now that you have a reliable autoresponder service, it's time to start
building your list! There are three ways people can opt-in to your list:
1. By filling out a form created by you
2. By sending an email to your autoresponder email address
3. By you adding their email address to your autoresponder
Most of the time, lists are built primarily by people opting in via
forms. And in order to allow people to opt-in to your email list via
forms, you will need to create lead capture pages. A lead capture page
is basically a webpage with a form on it where people can opt-in. The
lead capture page can be promoting a product or service or just simply
providing information. As long as it has a form on the page, it's a
lead capture page. And, in order to create your own lead capture page,
you will need your own domain and hosting. GoDaddy is the leading domain registrar and you can register a domain for as low as $8.95 a year! GoDaddy also offers great hosting, but I recommend Hosting Zoom. Hosting Zoom
provides very reliable hosting for the low price of only $4.95 a month!
Building lead capture pages may be a bit difficult for those who don't
have basic knowledge of HTML, so if you need any help at all on
creating your own lead capture pages, feel free to contact me via
comment on my blog (link located at bottom of this article) and I will
be more than happy to assist you!
Now that you've created your lead capture page, it's time to advertise
it! In recent posts, I've discussed many different ways you can
advertise. Below, I will briefly discuss ways you can use these methods
of advertising to build your list. For more in-depth information on how
to use these methods of advertising, you can refer to my previous posts
on my blog, to the right under "Previous Posts". I've categorized them
into three categories, free methods of advertising, cheap methods of advertising, and pay-per-click advertising.
Forums - Are you involved in any forums yet? If so, are you
using your signature after all of your posts? If not, then you could be
losing out on many potential prospects for your email list. Forums are
a great place to get targeted prospects on your email list. Everyone
on the forum shares a common interest with you so they will most likely
be interested in joining your email list. So, add a link to your lead
capture page in your forum signature(s) and watch your list grow!
Blogs - Blogs are also a great place to collect targeted
prospects for your email list. Just add an opt-in form somewhere
alongside of your posts and let people know that they can receive more
valuable information from you through email by filling out your form.
Articles - If you write articles, you should know that with
every article you write is a resource box included at the bottom where
you can put information about yourself. Resources boxes can also be
used to advertise your lead capture page. Place a link to your lead
capture page in your resource box and let your readers know that you
have more valuable information to offer them if they opt-in to your
email list.
Traffic Exchanges - If you read my post on traffic exchanges, which can be found here,
then you know what splash pages are. Lead capture pages can be used
within traffic exchanges just like splash pages. Traffic exchanges are
PERFECT for building your list because most traffic exchange users are
looking for freebies. The information you can provide to them if they
join your email list is a freebie, so they will be happy opt-in on
your lead capture page!
Ezine/Newsletter Ads - When purchasing ad space in newsletters
and ezines, include a link to your lead capture page where people can
go and opt-in to your email list. Remember to only purchase ad space
in newsletters and ezines that are targeted to your niche. That way,
you will experience a much better response and receive only highly
targeted prospects!
Pay-Per-Click Ads - Pay-per-click ads is a perfect way to send
targeted traffic to your lead capture page. And targeted traffic means
targeted prospects for your email list!
Now, I've just discussed to you what email lists are, how they work,
the money potential of them, where to obtain a reliable autoresponder,
what a lead capture page is, and how to promote your lead capture page.
There's only one thing missing... ACTION! You will not be able to
accomplish a thing without ACTION! Remember, if you need any help or
have any questions, feel free to refer to my blog and leave me a
comment. I will be more than happy to assist you with starting,
building, and maintaining your list! Good luck!
