List building: quantity vs quality?

You are right it is all about quality. I try to give a lot of quality for free before asking for the email address so that by the time I have their email address, they are ready to buy!

No, i mean that english is not my first language (and it's not the second too ), so i can fail sometimes when i try to translate what is in my mind into suitable words, into suitable english...

Sure, these questions are based on what i've learnt here, there and above all, on my little experience.
I'm not sure if i understand what you mean by "your own question" since there are really no brand new questions (i think) but just the same questions asked other and other again in different ways; i also think that's the humanity's story. But let pass.

OKAY,

We assume that prospect= potential buyer.

Now, let stay focused; let's come back to our question.
How will you define the quality of a prospect?
What make a prospect valuable and an other not?
How can you know that a prospect will buy your product or not?

It's the same question.

Unfortunately (for me) you've showed that List Building is about quality. The goal here is to show how to measure that quality.
You earn more with 15% than 45% with the same traffic. What exactly make that your squeeze page opt-ins are bad quality?

P.S Sorry if i'm missing something again.

Now, Have a good night/day according to your location. It's time for me to... Sleep.

Many thanks and stay blessed again.

That seems reasonable as the people who are opting in via your blog, already know what kind of information they are going to be receiving via email as they can see samples directly on your blog, where as the person on a squeeze page is opting in based on a promise of good info.

I'd rather have a reader as a subscriber than a freebie seeker (coming in from a squeeze page) any day as that person is already convinced that what I have to say is of value. But, as you said you can't really tell if that person opting in is a freebie seeker or potential customer.

I define the quality of a prospect by their behavior.

Are they engaged?

Do they open my emails, and more important to me, do they interact with them (and me)?

Do they click links, take surveys, leave comments on a blog or social media page?

Ultimately, do they buy stuff, at which point they become buyers?

Is this because the email providers will think your sending spam?

Almost right. Focus on quality first. Once you have a source that shows it provides quality prospects, then look for ways to find more subscribers like them.

The obvious answer to building a buyer list is to sell them something. Once someone buys from you, use your autoresponder's automation rules to remove them from the prospect list and move them to the buyer list.

You should also be coding your subscribers with where they came from, so you can tell which sources are providing the best prospects.

As time goes on, you'll notice patterns that you can take advantage of.

Don't worry. You're doing better than some of the native English speakers on this forum...

That's probably true, Alex, but it's also slightly misleading, in one sense, because at the point at which people opt in for a freebie, you don't actually know whether or not they're "just freebie-seekers". Some people who opt in for a freebie are also ready and willing quality buyers with their credit-cards ready, but there isn't a way (at that moment) to tell them apart - and there doesn't need to be, at that point. Giving a good, potentially buying customer a freebie doesn't turn him into a freebie-seeker.

The reality is that the "10,000 freebie-seekers" to whom you refer in your statement above are actually a mixture of freebie-seekers and "better customers", with no way to distinguish between the two groups. That isn't necessarily, at that stage, a bad thing; and you may therefore make more money from the 10,000 "freebie-seekers" than from a much smaller number of "buyers".

The theory of what you say is impeccable, and its superficial logic very appealing, but the results can still sometimes be rather different from that expectation.

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I agree with your point. Quality is better than quantity no doubt. A quality list of 'buyers' is more superior than massive list of 'freebie seekers'. It will convert much higher of course compared to your freebie list.

That's why every internet marketer should what they call a buyer's list or a 'Super List' as other marketers call it. These are people you know have purchased a product. Because a buyer is a buyer, and will always be a buyer. These are the people you will want to have in your list.

A very realistic and reasonable thought: it's never too easy to add much that's helpful, once John has posted.

Yes, some (many?) people do exactly this, I think. They're actually a mixture, almost always (as mentioned in my post just above), but it's very easy to say to yourself "The reason I'm not successfully monetizing is that they're nearly all freebie-seekers". It may or may not be the case, in reality. But if you don't monetize them, you won't really find out.

It's clearly true that a list of 1,000 buyers is worth more than a list of 1,000 people who have opted in for a freebie. Whether it's better than a list of 10,000 people who have opted in for a freebie is a different proposition altogether (and in reality, not one that's easily provable, either way ).

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Hello folks.

Thanks for your example. I also appreciate that you let me choose which list i would want but i can't. I can't choose.
So, please, choose and justify your choice.
I don't really know what you mean by "freebie seekers" and "buyers"...so please again, make it clear for me.
Thanks again.

Allow me to clarify. A list of 1,000 people who have bought something from you is more valuable than a list of 1,000 people who may someday buy something from you.


Yes. This.

Unless you're actually renting a list from a company of their proven buyers, there's no way to know which members of your list will be buyers until they buy something from you. At which point, you now know one thing they will give you their money for, so you segment them off and explore how you can offer them more value in exchange for more money.

True "freebie seekers", and they are out there, never take that next step.

I agree with you; No one should be neglected.

Thanks.

Depends on how you're populating that list.

Example 1:

You start buying random co-registration or so-called 'clickbanking' traffic and convert them by offering a chance to win a free iPad or something else generic, but desirable.

Yes, you can weed them out using your sequence, but you have to do a lot of weeding and it's tough to keep upping the ante to grow your list faster.

Example 2:

You use your lead magnet as the filter. In your case, it might be a free report on a parenting issue, say a growing problem.

You send people to your lead magnet by paying for a mailing to one of the big parenting magazines' subscriber list. Odds are, you'll start with a test mailing to see if the traffic converts.

Yippee! They convert very well, both as subscribers and later as customers. You ramp up the quality by doing more mailings (or emails) to more of that list. When that's exhausted, you try another mailing to another magazine's subscriber list.

Rinse and repeat.

If you're more into so-called "free" traffic, the same approach applies to guest content and /or syndication. If one source works very well, look for ways to increase your exposure to that source and look for more sources just like it.

Bingo. You've started with quality and ramped up the quantity.