 Building a high-quality, responsive mailing list is hard work. It takes more than just slapping a few thousand email addresses into your database and then blasting out offers. If that was all you had to do, everybody would have one. Truth is, acquiring addresses is just part of the --
--process. You must also recognize that you have a relationship with the person behind each of your addresses. When you manage that relationship well, that address will become a more valuable part of your list, strengthening it in the process.
Email list building is a lot like dating and marriage. If you start off wrong, you could kill any chance for a rewarding relationship between you and the subscribers. On the other hand, if you prove yourself worthy to your list, you could look forward to many happy years together.
Effective email list building has three key components:
1. Where and how you acquire the email addresses
2. How you welcome each new email subscriber
3. How you manage the relationship after the email opt-in
Each component needs to be managed correctly in order to increase both the subscriber's value to your business and your email program and your value to your subscriber.
Where and How to Acquire Email Addresses
Believe it or not, this is actually the easiest part of email list building. Although there are many tips and strategies for list building, there's really just one overarching principle:
Never add an email address to your database unless you have the owner's explicit permission to do so.
This is the fundamental rule of permission email marketing. Violate it and you risk violating the U.S. CAN-SPAM law regulating commercial email, a host of proven email-marketing best practices, and perhaps most importantly, your customer's trust. Without that, your database will eventually become nothing but a graveyard of dead email addresses.
Here is a sample list of strategies for collecting email addresses, both online and offline:
Online:
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Provide the opportunity to sign up for your email by posting a link to your registration page at every place where you meet your customers: for example, on every page of your Web site, and in each transactional or customer-support email.
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Use paid search to reach higher positions in the search engines and post the link to your email sign-up page prominently on the landing page.
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Investigate alliances with similar or complementary businesses in which you promote your partner's program to your list, and vice versa.
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Offer a relevant incentive, such as an email-only discount, free shipping, link to white papers or reports.
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If you rent a mailing list to solicit business or subscriptions, make sure the email comes from the list owner and only goes to recipients that are clearly marked OK for receiving third-party emails.
Offline:
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Ask for email addresses from everyone who visits your business, on-site and at trade shows; instruct telephone sales and customer-support workers to ask for addresses where appropriate.
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Publish the link and a short benefit statement in all printed material: on bags, flyers, store signs, customer-feedback forms and satisfaction surveys, in ads and catalogs; provide registration blanks through the store.
How You Welcome Each New Email Subscriber
Remember the days when email was so fresh and new that you opened every single message you got just to see what was in it? No, neither do we. You have to work hard to persuade subscribers that they can trust your email messages and will find it worth their time to open them.
The email welcome actually begins right at your Web site's registration or preference page, where you explain your content, frequency, benefits and the like so that subscribers know what they can expect from you. A good email welcome program has these elements:
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An easy-to-navigate email opt-in page that asks for just enough information to get the relationship going without asking for too much. Four fields are enough to start: email address, first name, last name and format preference (HTML or text). Below this, add optional forms to solicit clearly relevant details: frequency, demographics, interests or preferences.
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A thank-you page that loads immediately afterwards. This confirms both the information the subscriber just handed over and any steps needed to complete the opt-in such as replying to a confirmation email, thanks for the opt-in, repeats or expands on the benefits of subscribing and provides a link to a more detailed preference page.
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Optional but recommended: A confirmation email that validates the address' accuracy, links to the preferences page, repeats or expands on the benefits of subscribing and can also provide a first welcome to the program if you do not send any other email messages until the first regular mailing.
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A welcome package (labeled as such in the subject line) that repeats the subscriber's opt-in data, provides more detail on subscription benefits, links to the preference page to encourage more detailed information, and can also include a sample or current e-newsletter or offer, any special subscriber-only offers or reports and any email incentives the subscriber could have used to sign up. Never send an incentive until you have gotten the email address confirmed via the confirmation email.
How You Manage the Relationship After Email Opt-In
Okay, now you have the email address. You might think your work here is done, but it's really just beginning.
What you do with the address will in large part determine whether your subscriber sticks with you over the long haul, opens and responds to your email messages and updates their information with you as the relationship evolves.
And you have to manage that intimate relationship correctly.
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Honor your subscriber's preferences, especially if you want to expand your email program beyond what your subscribers agreed to when they opted in, including increasing frequency, changing the content, renting the list or participating in co-registration with a third partner or other major changes. Permission is not transferable.
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Watch your email list statistics carefully to look for trends in bounces, unsubscribes and inactivity, especially as you expand your program and add new lists or subdivided your master list into stand-alone segments.
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Stay in touch by occasionally emailing special offers or other material, or survey or preferences-update invitations.
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Combat list stagnation by periodically segmenting for inactivity within a certain period. For example, look for people who have not opened or clicked on your emails for three months after opt-in. Send a message acknowledging the inactivity and an offer either to come back and renew or to unsubscribe from the list.
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Perform list hygiene regularly to weed out invalid addresses and those that have not responded even to follow-up or query email messages in a set time.
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As you can see, building your email list takes time and energy. But it's worth it, because a robust, healthy and growing mailing list really is the essential building block for an email marketing program that delivers the ROI you need.
The list presented here just scratches the surface. For more details on these and more tips, strategies and advice:
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