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Building Your List through Opt-Ins

Building a list of email addresses saves time when you are trying to reach your target market. You have a dedicated group of individuals or companies that you already know are interested in your product. But, how can you get these people on your list to begin with?

What are Opt-Ins?

You have seen them before but probably didn't know that they had a specific name. When you visit a site and they offer you a reduced rate on a product or something free, they usually ask for a name and email address so that they can send it to you. When you volunteer this information, it is called "opting in."

Opt-ins is one way to build your list of targeted customers. People protect their personal information very carefully. If they decide to even give you an email address, then they have demonstrated right there a level of trust that will be the backbone characteristic of your list.

The trick is getting people to opt-in in the first place. For this, there is no trick. But, what you might want to do is to include a disclaimer link on your opt-in forms to let those who sign up know exactly how their information will be used. Without one, you will be considered a spammer if you send unsolicited information to them. With one, you assure people that you will not sell their information to others to build paid lists.

What type of opt-in offers will you promote? It all depends on your niche market and what these potential customers want. One thing that everyone wants on the Internet is information. Helpful information can take your business places that you can't reach in other ways.

Much of the info on the Internet is recycled over and over again. Offering a mix of original, up-to-date resources and content with common sense tips can be your ticket to creating a successful list of email addresses. This includes content on your website and your blog.

Types of Opt-Ins

So, what will you offer? Think free. Everyone loves free stuff. On the Internet, the free stuff shouldn't be just any stuff but relevant information that they can use.

For example, if you have a website that sells homeschooling products, consider giving away a free report on how to teach algebra to pre-teens. This is only an example. What you want to do is create a freebie that is relevant to your target audience. If they already homeschool their kids, then tips on how to do it more efficiently will most likely peak their interest.

You can also offer longer pieces like eBooks. Usually, if you offer a valuable eBook, then it is not your first opt-in offering. You are pretty sure that the ones who will sign up for it are going to buy something else. Maybe use the eBook as a freebie for customers who have bought once, to help encourage them to buy again.

Opt-in pages are a popular way to gain trust and encourage buying from your visitors. Whatever you decide to offer, be sure that you follow through on your promise. Better yet, over deliver on it!

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Why Do You Need to Build a List?

Most business owners would agree that without a plan, their enterprise doesn't stand a chance. It is like firing a shot in the dark hoping to hit a target. Part of that "road map" you build your business upon includes finding people who will become the base on which you will grow.

List building is essential to finding your customer base. Why do you need a list? Without it, there is no way to predict what the outcome will be month to month, let alone year to year.

One school of thought says that if you have a big enough campaign people will come. That may be true, but they will only come once. Even making a million dollars on one promotion won't sustain your business forever if none of those customers ever comes back again.

Now, we aren't talking money like that (at least not yet). So, to keep things real, one-time sales are not the stuff of solid business foundations. Building relationships with people is the key to a sound future for your enterprise.

What a List Can Do for You & Your Business

Let's say that you want to sell a product door-to-door. The first time through the neighborhood, you visit every house on the block because you don't know who might be interested in what you are selling. After chatting a few moments, you quickly learn which people are interested in your product enough to buy. From those customers, you ask for further contact information.

A month from then, you decide to offer a new product. Instead of canvassing the entire neighborhood again, you visit the people who purchased the first time. In addition to information about the new product, you also bring a flyer offering them a free gift if they can recommend two friends who would be interested in the product. Now, instead of twenty names, you have forty more to add to the list in your hand.

This is roughly how list building works online. Your first efforts will cast a net over a larger group of people. The catch will consist of people interested in your market, but not necessarily the product you want to provide. Through marketing efforts on your website and through other sites, you will weed out those who are really outside of your market. Leaving you with a group of people who ARE interested in what you have to offer.

For subsequent offerings, you can go straight to the most interested parties and make your pitch. Each time, you can find more and more people to add to your list.

List building takes the guess work out of marketing. The money you spend is more effective if you know where to concentrate your efforts. Once you build a substantial list, it can seem like you make the sale every time. Sales will increase, but not because you are lucky - it's because you were smart. Like a fisherman, you learned the best place to find what you are looking for, so you dropped your line and came up with the catch of the day!

Why are Relationships with Readers Important?

How do you build trust with others? You get to know them and find out what they are all about. It is easier to do that face to face, yes, but it can also be accomplished in cyberspace if you are willing to work at it. But, why do any of that anyway?

Building relationships with your readers is vital to your business. Remember that your goal is to make money and for that you will need people to visit your site. But, visiting is not enough in and of itself.

Think about it in these terms. Let's say you launch an incredible new product. You advertise everywhere that you can think of. In the first months of your launch, your unique visitors go up 100% (it's possible!) AND the sales go through the roof.

In your bliss don't forget that the journey towards one-time sales is a short trip. If you made six figures in each of those months, it still wouldn't compensate for the next eight months of basement stats because none of those customers came back. That's no way to run and grow a successful business enterprise.

Instead, strive for repeat visitors every month of the year. How do you do that? You build a relationship with each one of them. No, you don't have to know them all by name, but you will want to pay attention and give them what they want to keep them coming back.

Readers are more than just people who come to hear what you have to say, they are looking for something. It could be your product but they won't stay where they are not appreciated.

Here are a few reasons why reader relationships are so important to your site:

1. They have friends. You never know who is visiting and reading your site content. One thing that you do know is that they have a sphere of influence with someone. That sphere can be yours if they are satisfied with their relationship with you.

2. They have money. What started out as simply a visitor can be converted to a customer who uses your products or services if they trust you. Now you have the potential for repeat business.

3. They represent a portion of the population. Whatever their connections, they can be useful to you in building a better business. Online business owners can provide organic backlinks for you; bloggers can ask you to guest post for them; avid social bookmarkers can help lift you to expert status by linking to your content.

Readers are not just numbers; they are people who are important in their own right and to your business. Connect with them.

Social Bookmarking and Reader Relationships

Who wouldn't want to be viewed as an expert in their field? It can mean more traffic, more sales, more credibility and greater visibility. Your readers and social bookmarking sites can help you there.

When you find something that you love to read, you want to tell everyone. You also want to be able to find it again if you needed to. That is part of what a social bookmarking site is all about.

When you provide good quality content, your readers are happy. They are sometimes so happy that they will bookmark your content on their favorite social bookmarking site.

There are bookmarking sites for just about everything. Readers can tag content, videos, pictures and more. You can create your own account with these sites and add icons to your blog or website content pages.

The sites don't copy your content but index a link to it when someone bookmarks it. The bookmarked content or media is voted on by other members of the site. You could even be featured on the front page. That could bring you more readers.

There is one crucial point: Readers won't bookmark your stuff if you don't try to build relationships with them. Listen to what readers say in surveys and make changes on your site or to your products. Knowing that they are being listened to is a feather in your cap.

But, don't stop there. Your readers may be writers in their own right. Endeavor to find to what your readers are interested in. if they have blogs, read and comment on them. Bookmark posts that you find interesting. If you see any of their bookmarked content, leave comments when you vote.

Reply when readers post on your blog. Use your responses to start a conversation with them. It can be as much a fact-gathering mission as curiosity about those who read what you write or buy your products.

When your loyal readers see your stuff bookmarked on a site like Digg or StumbleUpon, they will vote for you. Social bookmarking is one way to drive traffic to your site and help build expert status. Choose social networks that cater to your type of content.

If readers like and trust you, they may be more inclined to use social bookmarking to interest others in your work too. Reciprocate by visiting their blogs or websites and tagging their work. Again, the reader/business relationship has proven to be mutually beneficial.