Tips for Building Trust & Relationship With Your List

In my experience there are two things that builds trust and a relationship with an email list and that's

1. Writing regular emails with personality and your own voice - being personal and talking like a real human being

2. Using your real name and give your real contact information

So many list owners try to hide behind the brand or website title by only using a generic "reply to" address that looks something like, "ABC Newsletter <newsletter@abcwebsite.com>"

and at the bottom of their emails they sign off with:

Thanks,
ABC Newsletter

That just doesn't inspire confidence or trust with anyone unless you're a huge consumer brand like Amazon or Apple. Heck even then I'd be more likely to read their email if it came from a real person and if I had confidence that if I hit the Reply button, someone would actually read my email and respond with something other than a "cut and pasted" generic corporate message.

Put your name out and write your emails as if you are writing an email to a friend. Tell your list about yourself and use your real name.

I give out my cell phone number under my email on my lists. People are usually shocked that I actually answer it too. And my list is 15,000 strong. I get maybe one or two calls a week. People don't call by the thousands like you think they will. But knowing they can builds trust huge.

I'd really appreciate any product or article recommendations.
To clarify what exactly I'm asking, this is my question:

What are some good courses on building trust & relationship with your list?

What builds trust is consistency. So obviously emailing your list a few times a week will help with that. Another thing you should do is email your list at exactly the same time every week. When you tell someone you're going to do something at a certain time and then you follow through this creates trust and at the same time shows them you have integrity and that you are a man of your word.

Well its all about providing value and giving something worth while to your list. You also can check out the thing in my sig it might help

Thanks for this question, I too have been looking for more ways to build a trusted list. I also have found make it more personable is the key.

There's one on here called Email Infotainer that I thought was good. Just search it in the WSO forum. I'm not an affiliate, I just bought it and thought it had good info.

It takes time to build a relationship with your list, I'm not sure of any courses to suggest to you but I can give you some tips.

• Talk as if you are talking to a friend - Anything to professional will put a lot of your list off, keep your tone chatty and friendly.
• Include bits and bobs about your personal life - It makes you seem like a real person rather than just another email marketer.
• Use your real name - Don't bother with any of this pseudo name stuff, being honest and open with your list is an easy way to get them to trust you.

Hope that helps, good luck!