Listbuilding: How to Add Over 3,000 People to Your List in 5 Months
Over the past six months we've added over 3,000 people to our mailing list that are still around (i.e. didn't unsubscribe), which has allowed us to do multi-five figure launches, multiple successful product releases, and allows us to drive high volumes of traffic to this website when we need to!
For Those Wondering Who "Us" Is
Listbuilding is one of the most important pieces of your online business puzzle, not just because "the money is in the list" as they say, but because it allows you to actually build your customer contacts.
No matter what happens with Facebook or Periscope or Instagram, you have full control over contact with your audience. (And you have full control over reach, and full control of what message they receive).
One of the top goals we have at Heart Soul & Hustle is always to be growing our mailing list. It allows us to release products, offer services, and get the results that we want when we need them.
In this post I want to give you several actionable ideads that you can use THIS WEEK in order to get more people joining your list and start growing your list at the level you've always dreamed.
1. Give a Call to Action on All of Your Periscope Broadcasts
On every broadcast that I do, I make sure to direct people to take action. Not limited to but including:
- Signing up for my paid Periscope training
- Download my FREE Facebook Workbook
- Send me a text message for an opt-in (a new feature from LeadPages)
While I may not always have hundreds of people on my scopes, I can always grow my list by offering something for free on each broadcast.
Not only does Periscope allow me to grow my list, but it also allows me to grow a "healthier" list in my opinion, because people already know who I am before I ever send them something for free.
Periscope to your list is a logical progression because it simply allows you to continue the relationship building process via email.
Also, on Periscope, because it is so personal, you generally get a much higher conversion rate when asking people to opt in than you do on, say, a blog post or a Facebook post.
2. Host More Live Events
We've done everything from full-blown webinars to simple workshops. People seem to LOVE live events, and they can work really great for list growth and sales! (We regularly make thousands from our webinars now.)
The best part about live events is they can be as intensive or as simple as you want and because live events are hot right now, running Facebook ads allows you to get a ton of people into your live events.
But even if you don't want to run Facebook ads, you can promote your live event for free in all kinds of ways, and ultimately end up with amazing results.
We've done webinars with ZERO paid promotion and still had hundreds of registrations, I can tell you first hand that live events work on so many levels.
Hundreds of people on your list for no/low cost? YES PLEASE!
3. Add "Content Upgrades" To Your Blog Posts
There's a new idead floating around the internet marketing world, "content upgrades."
Content upgrades are amazing because they allow you to get readers on your blog further engaged by joining your list.
On this blog you will see the opportunity to download my weekly listbuilding checklist. In that content upgrade I'll give you ways that I drive more traffic to my list and grow my list every week in my business.
Why are "content upgrades" so great?
Much like Periscope, this allows you to get people who are already interested in you taking the next step and joining your list. Additionally, because people are already reading your blog, it doesn't take extra steps to drive traffic!
If you're already driving traffic to a post, you might as well give people the opportunity to join your list.
These content upgrades are incredibly effective and have allowed me to add hundreds of people to my list since I've started implementing them.
If you don't want to make brand new pieces of content for your blogs to grow your list, you can also link to free offers that you have within a blog post.
In past blog posts I've linked to my Periscope workbook and my Facebook ads workbook when I didn't have content upgrades already created. That allowed me to continue to grow my list even further from my blog post.
Content upgrades are a worthwhile time investment, especially if you're already driving traffic to your blog.
4. Facebook Ads
Of course I have to mention Facebook ads.
I know that I teach about them and I'm sure you've seen me talk them up. That's because they really are amazing and they've done fantastic things for my business.
If you're not running Facebook ads, you're really missing the chance to automate the growth of your list.
I can't think of any marketers that have done six or seven figures in sales that are not leveraging the power of Facebook ads to grow their list.
Not only do I use Facebook ads to grow my list, but I also drive people to download freebies and enter my sales funnels, which means that once people join my list, they go through a series of emails that ultimately sells one of my products, services, or programs.
If you're still hesitant about running Facebook ads, you should consider the opportunity that sits in growing your list on autopilot (well, sort of on autopilot).
Lots of people spend hours and hours trying to find the free ways to grow their list, and yes, there are lots of free ways that can work very well.
But, the more time you spend on the "free" promotional stuff, the less time you can spend working on other activities in your business. Facebook ads allow you to semi-autopilot the growth of your list and create really amazing results.
If you need more help growing your list with Facebook ads, you can definitely check out my high-converting Facebook ads workbook that will help you write the first ad or next ad!
5. Regular Organic Social Media Promotion
I think it goes without saying that posting on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc., can create amazing results for your list. The problem that I see... most people are doing it wrong.
Lots of people go out and post about their content once or twice and then they let it die. I make an effort to promote one of my free offers or blog posts at least once a day on a social media platform, minimum. This might seem like a lot, but in reality it's not.
Each of my social media platforms grows every day, as should yours. That means that every single day new people are being introduced to me and may not know that they can download free workbooks, checklists, etc.
It's really important that we consistently be sending out information on how to get our free offers. We have to let our audience know on a regular basis how they can get the free lead magnets we've created.
You can't assume that people will go searching for your free offers. You have to bring it to them.
If you're not already, I would challenge you to take some time today to schedule out some promotional content for your list-building.
6. Create a Challenge
While creating a challenge is not for the beginner or the faint of heart, it can create amazing results for your business. We just recently did a seven days of list-building challenge over on Instagram that gave us over 500 Instagram followers, grew our list by over a hundred people, and ended up making us multiple affiliate sales for products that we represent.
That means our from that challenge we grew our list, added to our bottom line, and expanded our social reach. You can see how the benefits of a challenge can be amazing.
All of that being said, a challenges do take some work. We had to plan out the content, schedule a Periscope broadcast daily, and be ready to field an influx of emails, questions, and comments on our social media channels.
The great thing about challenges is that you can determine the amount of promotion you want to do. For our challenge, we did no paid promotion.
We only promoted on Periscope and with a couple of Facebook posts and still got amazing results.
I know what you may be thinking. "Zach, you have a large reach on Periscope. That's why you got such amazing results." While it's true that our reach on Periscope is amazing, you could easily duplicate the results we had by posting on Facebook, tweeting, and being more consistent and persistent with your promotion.
In reality we didn't promote that much at all!
For our challenge, we did very minimal promotion and got very maximal results. While your results may vary, I would highly encourage you to take a swing at doing a challenge.
7. Promote in Facebook Groups
If you know me, you know that I'm all about adding value. Value first, no questions.
All that being said, you can easily be promoting your free offers in Facebook groups on a regular basis. How, you might ask?
Many Facebook groups give you the opportunity to promote your free offers once or twice a week. For example, in my community #HeartHustlers, you can easily promote once a week on our Tuesday promotion thread.
My group is not the only group that allows a promotional thread once a week.
Here's the secret that most people aren't telling you. These promotional threads are useless if you're not a valuable member of the group.
What do I mean?
Well, when I post on a promotional thread after I've been active in a group for a week or two, I get amazing results. I get multiple opt-ins. I may even get program sales and signups.
What most people do is show up once a week on the promotion thread, share their stuff, and then question why no one cares about them. The reason no one cares about you is because you don't care about them.
Take some time over the next week to really get active in a group that has a promotional thread. Then, after you've helped multiple people, people get to know your name and people start to recognize you.
Only after you have added value to the group will the group give value to you. That's the "secret" of really leveraging Facebook promotional posts that most people don't tell you.
Those are my best list-building tips, but make sure you download my free list-building checklist that gives you ten things you can do today to start growing your list.
Simply click the link below to download your free checklist today. Of course, don't hesitate to leave a comment below and let me know what are the best ways you build your list.
What are the secret tips and strategies that you've used in your business that have allowed you to get amazing results? Comment below. I'd love to hear from you.
And of course, don't be afraid to share these secrets with your business friends.