Today, I would like to talk about email marketing and 11 powerful tips for growing your blog and business.
Everyone who wants a profitable blog knows just how important it is to build an email list a.k.a. subscribers, or members, as we call it. Email marketing is one of the most important aspects of growing a blog and a business nowadays.
Think about it. You already have an email list of your subscribers who may be interested in what you have to offer. So why not sell them related stuff via those email lists? After all, they gave you consent to use them for communication. Of course, you should know your limitations too, but that’s another discussion altogether.
Of course, you don’t just come up with a list of emails. It takes time and the consent of the people.
You can have 1,000 views a day on your blog, but there is no one to subscribe, to for an instant.
Of course, having visitors is great. They might read half an article, and if you’re lucky they might even click on an ad or two. Then, forget about your blog.
Retaining readers and turning them into potential clients is the ultimate goal if you would like to make a profitable blog.
11 tips for email marketing
What is email marketing?
According to the description on Wikipedia,
Email marketing is the act of sending a commercial message, typically to a group of people, using email. In its broadest sense, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing. It involves using email to send advertisements, request business, or solicit sales or donations. Email marketing strategies commonly seek to achieve one or more of three primary objectives, to build loyalty, trust, or brand awareness. The term usually refers to sending email messages with the purpose of enhancing a merchant's relationship with current or previous customers, encouraging customer loyalty and repeat business, acquiring new customers or convincing current customers to purchase something immediately, and sharing third-party ads.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Email_marketing
Email marketing isn’t just for businesses or selling products. As bloggers or small business owners, you should use email to build a relationship with your subscribers and leads by providing relevant, valuable information that will help them take action on their goals.
Email marketing isn’t just about you, or your company. It’s about your readers.
There are many strategies and tools, and we will discuss them later on. Today I would like to focus on tips for email marketing. I hope, these 77-tips will help you build your list.
5 reasons why you need an email list
2. 11-tips for email marketing.
1. Blogging is the most important thing.
More precisely, regular blog posting is important.
Starting a blog of your own can be easy or difficult, depending on how you go about it. The hard way would be to start one from scratch using good old web page coding – which is more trouble than it is worth really. The easy way is to use some sort of automation in the setup.
WordPress is one such tool of choice. It works on plug-ins and templates, so you can create a customized look without the problems that go with all the coding that you would need otherwise.
Are you starting a blog? You can read the article titled “The Ultimate Guide For Beginners: Start A Blog Step By Step. to follow through with creating your dream blog within 1 hour.
Most of you already have a blog, how often do you post a topic? If you can post a blog entry once a day, then you are doing well enough.
That means that you will be generating leads and adding them to your list every day.
If you are interested in planning your content schedule and how to plan your blog posts, please read our post “Have you created a blog plan?”. Also, you can get a free blog plan workbook.
Free Printable Blog Plan
Do you have a Blog post plan for your blog?
Subscribe and get a free blog plan workbook.
2. Stay relevant topic on your blog.
Whether you are posting blog entries or sending emails to your subscribers, you need to stay on topic – that is, maintain focus on a thing or topic that got people interested in you in the first place.
When you stray too far from the topic of interest, people will start skipping over what you send them. Later on, they will start marking your messages as spam, and you can kiss their patronage goodbye. It’s okay to make a few side comments, but overall you need to stay on track.
If you do mention something on the side, make sure that it is easily skippable without destroying the essence of the whole. Using proper paragraphing can achieve this effect. Additionally, inserting these extra bits in footer sections can work too.
3. Make a proper lead magnet for email marketing.
A lead magnet is a simple straightforward web page built to get the visitors to give you their e-mail addresses (It is known as “opt-in”).
Remember that the lead magnet is not for selling your products. A lead magnet is engaged with visitors. Therefore, you can save the actual links to sales and purchases for later. All you need to put into a lead magnet is the premise of your service and a little bit of pre-selling. Think of it as posting the headlines and first few lines of the newspaper.
4. Do not add the video on Landing Page.
Why not add the video? You might ask?
Isn’t video a good way of generating leads and convincing visitors?
Well, yes, but think about where you put it!
The fact is that most people who visit your landing page and opt in are the impulsive types. That also means that they are not exactly patient. Even with the high-speed broadband that is available nowadays, people still do not like waiting for anything to load if they are not sure they want it.
You need to allow them to load quickly and cleanly. Your visitors can get to read the points right away, and they will fill in the opt-in form.
5. Simple and concise points of message on your landing page
In addition to keeping videos away from your landing page, you should also avoid media that consume high bandwidths. Sounds and music are definitely out since they will hold up the loading process. Make sure to optimize the images that you use on your page.
6. Use video in your posts
YouTube has made publishing videos of yourself a breeze, and it is free. This means you can get a stronger connection with your audience without paying an additional cent!
Adding videos to blog posts makes them more capable of making an impact, especially if you have some good looks. Some people prefer to read, others like to watch and listen. By including a video in your well-written blog posts, you can generate leads from several types of people.
Make sure to make yourself presentable before going on cam.
7. Video Qs&As are cool
Another application of videos in marketing blogs is as a means of responding to the most important questions. It makes your followers think that you really do care about what they think and ask – and you do, considering the effort you took to post videos for them.
Picking out the questions that matter most is the tricky part. It is unlikely that you will be able to answer all the questions when your following grows beyond a certain point. Additionally, you should discuss only questions related to the main topic.
Another way that this could work in your favor is that your responses generate traffic and boost your popularity. Then, people who aren’t following you will check out the videos, and if they like what they see, they’ll check out your other videos, and it snowballs from there.
8. Be a real person.
You need to remember that people are not leads, they are people. If you do not approach them to help them, they will not be likely to bother noticing you. Remember that you are dealing with human beings. Be fair, be helpful, and be human. It will be that much better for you and everyone in the end.
Helping does not mean that it has to be free, but the fact remains that you are offering something that can make life easier for your audience.
9. Freebies offer.
Everybody loves free stuff, as long as you’re not pushy about it. Whatever type of blog or business you have, it pays to give some stuff or services away. Whether it is a regular freebie or a periodic blowout, there must be something you can give away to people.
Many bloggers give away free stuff when people sign up. At times, there are also free items or samples with no obligation to register. Tempting visitors by giving them a taste is as old a marketing strategy as marketing itself. If the visitors are suitably impressed, then you can be quite sure that they will opt into your list.
Here’s a list of some lead magnet ideas:
Checklists
Cheatsheets
How-to guides
Video tutorials
Step-by-step outlines
The first module of a course
Free lesson
Templates
Choose the form of freebie as your lead magnet based on what you think your audience will enjoy and benefit from the most. And make sure it’s something that you’re positive you can actually bring to life.
10. Segmenting subscribers.
It is important to use different calls to action for each section if you have multiple types of content. For example, your topic is a travel and has sub-topics, such as overseas travel, domestic travel, road trips, backpacking, cruise trips, etc.
Sure, it’s easier to create one single report that covers all of the travels on your site, but you could be turning off people who only like one aspect of travel tips. It’s a better idea to segment and creates a unique lead magnet for each topic in order to give you the best chance to get the subscriber.
you can also have segment subscribers, you don’t mix up with the email list to promote specific products or services.
Of course, you could always have a generic mailing list signup box in your sidebar for people who want information about every topic.
11. Multiple internal links
You don’t have to limit yourself to a single internal link in each article. For example, you can have your normal opt-in box at the end of the article, but you could also ask them to view another related article on your site. This would help you get more page views, and also give you another chance to get the subscriber if they didn’t subscribe after reading the first article.
You could also put your subscription box halfway through the article, and then put a call-to-action for a paid product at the end, or vice versa.
In Conclusion
Email marketing has become an indispensable and necessary way to build your online community. To make readers into subscribers, and subscribers into clients.
Retaining readers and turning them into potential clients is the ultimate goal, if you would like to make money blogging that is.
There are many email marketing companies out there. I am using CovertKit. ConvertKit is an email marketing company that was made specifically by bloggers for bloggers. It has all the tools you need to help you gain and retain subscribers. Having the power to deliver freebies through sign-up forms, schedule and send email sequences, tag subscribers in strategic lists, create landing pages, and so on, has really made an impact on my ongoing growth.
Comments