My List Building Plan - Please Help!

8 replies
Hi everyone!

A few months ago I started list building. In around a month or two I got 400 subscribers. Sounds great, eh?

Well out of those 400 subscribers, when I'd blast out an email, my best open rate was an astonishing record of 9.6% (if you can't tell, i'm being sarcastic). So out of all these subscribers there was only a few active ones that actually opened my emails.

To be honest I know where I went wrong and blame myself entirely. I only had one goal with the list, to make money with it. I didn't care about sending out quality content. I only cared about making money, so all I done was try and sell to my subscribers in each mail i sent out.

Despite reading TONS of content on email marketing I just ignored all the advice. I wasted two months building a list.

This time I'm going to do it different, I'm going to take a whole new approach. Instead of focusing on making money, I'm going to focus on sending out high quality content that my readers will enjoy and benefit from. I am still going to try and make money from my list but it's not my main focus.

My Plan

1000 subscribers over the next 2 months. Only roughly 16 new subscribers every day, so it shouldn't be hard reaching my goal.

Set up an autoresponder, 2 months of content. Send out 3-4 emails every week. In every third or fourth email I will be promoting a product, and the rest will be high quality content, e.g list building strategies, ways to get traffic, ways to make money online, etc.

My main goal with my new list will be to build a relationship with the subscriber and try help him/her with their online business as much as possible.

Any advice or suggestions on my plan will be greatly appreciated! Thanks in advance.

Happy marketing,
Adam
#building #list #plan
  • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
    Banned
    Hi Adam,

    Originally Posted by adamreilly1997 View Post

    Set up an autoresponder, 2 months of content. Send out 3-4 emails every week. In every third or fourth email I will be promoting a product, and the rest will be high quality content, e.g list building strategies, ways to get traffic, ways to make money online, etc.

    My main goal with my new list will be to build a relationship with the subscriber and try help him/her with their online business as much as possible.
    It sounds good to me, in principle, depending on your traffic demographics, and so on. But it's a winning approach, in principle.

    (As long as you're not making any basic/fundamental mistakes like promoting ClickBank products to people who are themselves ClickBank affiliates and will buy through their own hoplinks rather than through yours, of course! The only alarm bell I hear ringing is where you say "their online business". If you're in "IM/MMO-related niches", then you need to know that open-rates are typically significantly lower in those niches than in others, and that there are reasons for that, usually largely to do with the traffic demographics. The problems are circumventable, though, and list-building and subscriber communications can work, and work well, in those niches.)

    Originally Posted by adamreilly1997 View Post

    Any advice or suggestions on my plan will be greatly appreciated!
    I strongly suspect that a major factor in your open-rates, responsiveness, attention-rates and eventual income, from your list, will be the extent to which the "free report" (or whatever you're giving as an incentive in exchange for the email address) in specifically designed and created to serve all the purposes mentioned in this post.

    And the minor factors may well be the ones discussed here (but you already know this): http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...ml#post6123982

    And good luck!
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    • Profile picture of the author adamreilly1997
      Thanks for the replies Alexa and Horacioplus. I didn't know the rates are lower in the IM niche Alexa, this is something I will definitely consider in future projects.

      I will also try and target newbies, not experienced marketers, thanks for that point aswell.
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      • Profile picture of the author TheNewGuy2010
        Stop "basting" out emails and start providing something people want.

        As it relates to the offers, are they congruent with your free offer?

        Example: If you're giving away a free report/course on traffic generation, are your paid offers about traffic generation?

        I see marketers "blasting" out offers all of the time and the offers have nothing to do with the free product that they gave away.

        If I signed up for a free blogging course, please don't send me offers about mobile marketing. Instead, send me offers about WP plugins, SEO, WP video tutorials...etc. See how all of those paid offers are congruent with the free offer?

        Sell people products that they are looking for. Does that make sense. You're more likely to get less unsubs and more sales.

        Also, make sure your free content is very useful. Don't just send out crap. Even if it's PLR, buy the good stuff. Don't buy some $3 report. I buy EXPENSIVE plr. I'm talking $97-$200 PLR.
        It'll pay for itself if you are building your list the right way.







        Originally Posted by adamreilly1997 View Post

        Thanks for the replies Alexa and Horacioplus. I didn't know the rates are lower in the IM niche Alexa, this is something I will definitely consider in future projects.

        I will also try and target newbies, not experienced marketers, thanks for that point aswell.
        Signature
        Retired Internet Marketer.
        Gone Fishing....
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  • Profile picture of the author Horacioplus
    This happens to many marketers who only think about making money. Just think about it, when they join your list. They probably fallow other marketers as well, and only the smartest will make money.
    That is why i used Fb instead, after 3 months i hit $5000/mo thanks to my Fb team.
    I have a list but i never sent them a email telling them to buy from me. Because i hate people sending 1-2 emails a day with affiliate links..What i usually do is the opposite, people will send me emails asking me for my affiliate link.
    When you help them and they get results! They will respect you and help you too.
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  • Profile picture of the author Fazal Mayar
    adam that's actually impressive. My question is, I also want to build a list in the MMo niche, why is it a bad idea to promote clickbank products? Then what should I promote?
    Signature

    Blogger at RicherOrNot.com (Make Money online blog but also promoting ethical internet marketing)

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    • Profile picture of the author VinnyBock
      LOL, most of us are wired the same way it seems. I did the same thing in the beginning, and it wasn't until value was my main objective that my list started become the asset we all hear so much about. Unfortunately there's a lot of things in life we can't learn from hearing/reading, we have to experience it...

      I think the product you give away has a big effect on your future open rates. YOU ONLY GET 1 1st IMPRESSION. If you give away a high quality product that people can use and be productive with, they'll watch for your future emails. If your squeeze page says "learn how to make money online for free" and you send them a report that only defines CPA/affiliate marketing, they're not going to open your future emails...

      1 more thing I've noticed, my unsubscribe rate has dropped an insane amount since I've started sending 1 to 2 emails a week tops. The only time I send more than 2 is when the 3rd is an unscheduled newsletter/broadcast, most weeks its only 1...
      Signature

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    • Profile picture of the author Vector Graphics
      Originally Posted by Fazal Mayar View Post

      adam that's actually impressive. My question is, I also want to build a list in the MMo niche, why is it a bad idea to promote clickbank products? Then what should I promote?
      You can still promote Clickbank products. What other people are saying is that some unethical people who are already affiliate of CB products will create their own affiliate link when they find out what you are promoting is from CB. Then they click their own link and steal your commissions. It does happen but I'm not sure if that should be enough to keep you from ever promoting anything on Clickbank.
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  • Profile picture of the author Hypno mind
    Offering quality is the most important thing, I'm a newbie and I started my first project as well, I took 2month just to make my follow up e-mails full of high quality value and I only promote a product in the fifth message and then on the ten message, which mean I don't send too much promotions comparing to the amount of quality content in the messages, but I haven't build my list yet to see if my strategy does work, so I would love to ask you what paid method do you use to get traffic in order to build your list? Thank you so much.
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