Marketing professionals are often heard saying that an email subscriber list is one of the most—if not the most—important, valuable elements of a business’ marketing strategy. Sure, you can post on social media platforms, run print and digital ads, and blog about your products or services. And while these are all worthy marketing approaches, none of them are direct lines of contact with your past, current, and future clientele, whereas your mailing list is (or can be!). That said, let’s talk about ways you can beef up your company’s email subscriber list in order to reach a larger share of your intended audience.
Email Marketing: Covering the Basics
Before we get ahead of ourselves, if your business doesn’t already use email marketing, we encourage you to consider several things before diving in headfirst. This includes who your target audience(s) will be for these email campaigns; types of content you’ll have available to promote in the emails; which email marketing platform will work best with your business; and if you’ll have the time, energy, resources, manpower, etc., to successfully launch and continue with email as part of your marketing strategy. Check out the several blogs we’ve written surrounding these topics to get you acquainted:
- Match Your Business with Email Marketing Platforms (Part 1 of 2)
- Match Your Business with Email Marketing Platforms (Part 2 of 2)
- Setting Up a Company Newsletter for Retention Marketing
- How to Use Email Marketing for Customer Retention
- How to Write an Email Newsletter Your Customers Want to Read
- Personalize Your Communication with Email Marketing Automation
Four Ideas to Grow Your Email Subscriber List
Many businesses collect email contacts during the final stages of the sales process, like when a customer is checking out on their website or completing a transaction at the store’s register. But ideally, you shouldn’t only be waiting until someone has already made a purchase before you start emailing them. Below are four other ideas for how to increase your number of email subscribers.
Build a Pop-Up Opt-In Form
If you send email campaigns, you should absolutely have a subscribe button or link on your website already. But if you really want it to stand out, you can create a pop-up announcement on the site that leads people to opt in. Whether they’re about to make a purchase, looking to learn more about your business, or trying to find your contact info, there’s a reason someone has landed on your website. And there’s a good chance they’re interested in your products or services and would find value in email communications you send them.
Collect Email Addresses at Events and Engagements
If you often find yourself doing public speaking engagements, like hosting workshops or webinars, use those events as opportunities to gather more email contacts. Provide attendees (both virtual and in-person) with a link or QR code pointing them to the subscription form. If in person, you can take the old-school route of bringing a hard copy sign-up sheet on which people interested can fill out their contact info. Just be sure to make clear what you’re collecting the info for and how it will be used; you need to comply with personal data and digital property protection rules.
Promote Your Mailing List on Social Media
Active on social media? You might craft posts designed to remind your followers that you have an e-newsletter they should sign up for, then link them to the opt-in form. If you want to reach people outside of your current following, consider running ads on Facebook or Instagram that will also link to the opt-in form.
Talk About Your Mailing List
Don’t forget that word of mouth (or word of keyboard?) can also be helpful in adding to your mailing list. Maybe you already have a blog, maybe you host and appear on podcasts, or maybe you’re part of a networking group or similar support system of like-minded business professionals. Whatever the case, you should feel confident spreading the word about your emails far and wide. Explain why the content provided in your emails would be useful or of value to the folks you’re talking with, so they’re more inclined to sign up.
Thinking about starting a company newsletter or launching email marketing in general, but need some support to get things going? Vision can help with that. We’ve created email marketing campaigns for all kinds of clients in a range of industries—from restaurants and life coaches to manufacturers and other professional services. We can work with you to build your email subscriber list, as well as strategize, copywrite, design, send, and monitor metrics of your email marketing campaigns. Interested? Contact us today.
