List Building Advice
In this post I will be focusing on list building advice. The first question is, should you be collecting emails from people in your niche or not?
Does it work for all niches, if so what ones? In this post I’ll be discussing my opinion on that matter and sharing what has worked for me.
Depending on who you have been influenced by in your internet marketing career, you’ll have different views on whether to collect email addresses or not.
I for one collect emails in some niche markets and in others I don’t bother. The internet marketing niche is obviously one of the ones I have the largest email list in, and this niche is a classic example of one that it is a good idea to do so.
What Niches Work Best for Emails?
A niche market who’s customers have a keen interest in a subject where this interest will be ongoing and which potentially has a large number of quality products available. Anything that is hobby related can work well, because people in this niche will usually be interested in their hobby for some time and have some degree of passion towards it, which means they will most likely spend money on products .
Other classic niches are ones where people require ongoing education, whether it be a hobby or more of a business focus where they welcome information from other people involved in the niche itself, of course the IM niche is a good example of this (although I despise they way so many people do it in this niche).
What Niches Should You Avoid Using Emails For?
I have quite a few niche markets I’m in that make me great money and I don’t ever collect a single email and I never will. The reason is that these niches usually solve a specific problem for people and the problem is not something they are interested in long term, in fact they couldn’t get rid of the problem fast enough, so they hardly want to be reminded of it via emails again and again.
Therefore it would be a waste of time for me to collect emails and write all the auto-responder sequences and manage the list, because it would simply not bring me in a good return on time invested.
The other thing to note is that in order to really monetize an email list properly you have to be collecting a decent number of leads everyday, as you can’t just rely on the same contacts and leave it at that, you always need new people coming along. So if you’re in a niche and you are not able to collect regular leads, then again I personally wouldn’t bother with it.
How to Collect Emails?
I assume the next logical question is, how do I get people onto my email list in the first place?
Well before I answer that, I think a more important question is, once people are on my email list what will I be offering them? What will I be able to do to help them. Far too often people want emails so they can make money off people, but I don’t like that approach, of course it’s ok to sell stuff, I mean your email list is not a charity list, but you have to think about quality first.
So with that said, in order to encourage people to get on your email list, you need some form of quality incentive. For example, I recently created a free wordpress theme for people to use. However you can create anything, but again make sure it’s quality. Videos go well, free reports, just make sure they are actually useful. You see, first impressions count, and if people sign up to your list and you promise them something amazing and you deliver something terrible, you have immediately given a bad impression of yourself.
So once you have good stuff ready, you now need to get people opting in. There are a few ways to do this, you can have a flying pop over on your site, which I am about to put on this blog, and then drive SEO traffic to the sites pages, and collect the leads this way.
You can also leave a link in your forum signatures and link it to a squeeze page. Another idea is to create Youtube videos and link off to your squeeze page from these. Yet another idea is to create a product in the niche you are in, this is more for info product markets, and then you can get affiliate marketing JV’s to drive traffic to your product and collect leads this way.
It’s also not a bad idea to have an exit grabber on certain sites to entice people to opt in before they leave. I have one niche where I get about 30 people a day from this alone. Some list building advice is to use paid traffic methods for gaining leads, but you have to track everything carefully. I don’t collect leads from paid traffic much anymore these days, although I have done so in the past.
Creating an Opt In Gift
I thought I might just add a little on some practical tips for creating an opt in gift. I find video works well, but not for every niche, so if you want to do video, then you can always use the free screen capture software called Jing. Another option is to create a PDF free report and again one free tool that can easily make PDF’s for you is Open Office, a free tool that is pretty much the same as Microsoft office, but it has a PDF creator built in.
I don’t use private label rights stuff very often, as I find the quality is usually absolutely terrible and I don’t want to hurt my reputation by giving out garbage, but if you can find some decent PLR content, then this can also work.
At the end of the day, remember that email marketing is about building relationship with your list. Not everyone will like you, some will down right be rude, but that’s ok, just keep providing as much good content as you know how and monetize your list in an appropriate manner.
One final thing I want to reinforce is, if you do your best to provide as much free, and quality content to your subscribers, you will get them opening more emails that you send out. More opening emails is a good thing for obvious reasons. I have spoken to people in the IM niche, who’s names I will not mention, who tell me they get a 5% open rate on their emails, and that they were happy with that!!! Can you believe that, 5%!! I almost feel off my chair, that is appalling if you ask me.
It was after that conversation in particular, that it dawned on me, this guy didn’t focus on providing quality and did nothing but sell, sell and more selling to his list. My open rates are 6 times higher than this guys, and although he has more people on his list, I get more people reading my emails. I tell you this to explain the power of quality.
That’s all the list building advice from me,
Thanks
Matt Carter
Related articles
Hey Matt,
Thanks again for the quality post! If you have a squeeze page that is just one or two pages deep, is it still possible to rank number one in Google? I know this is a broad question, but do you know of many people who get traffic to their squeeze pages from organic traffic as opposed to WSOs, forum signatures, or links from videos on youtube? Obviously the more competitive niches would be harder to do this, but how much emphasis these days do you think Google puts on websites with at least 15-30 pages inside?
Matt Carter Reply:
December 5th, 2010 at 8:15 am
HI Ryan
that is a good question, and I think if you are just trying to rank a squeeze page, I would atleast make sure it has all the bell and whistles of a normal site, such a contact page, privacy, disclaimer etc…and also I would add more content to it, even if it is just PLR articles, I would set up a blog on the domain and add 20 PLR articles to it over a period of a few weeks. This will make the site look more authetic and should help you to rank for the squeeze page. You can spin the PLR content, but as long as it is not used for backlinking it doesn’t matter.
All the best with it
Matt
Hey Matt, great overview, thank you!
I have a separate email address I use specifically for the IM lists I am on, and for the most part have been quite disappointed with the quality of the emails and the over-the-top pushy sales tactics. While at first I didn’t like this, I now see it as a good opportunity to stand out in the niche by providing really high quality emails.
This may be an impossible question, but have you calculated the average value of a subscriber (monthly or lifetime) across your lists?
Cheers!
– Devin
Matt Carter Reply:
December 5th, 2010 at 8:12 am
Hey Devin
Great to hear from you again.
As for you questions on the dollar value per subscriber, it really depends on the ‘kind’ of subscribers you are looking at. By this I mean, if you have someone on your list who has just bought a product or recently anyway, they are considered to by very active and classed as a BUYER lead. I have worked out that a buyer lead in the IM niche can be worth on average $10. Other leads that you gain from the search engines for example, may or may not be buyer leads, so these are not as valuable and somewhere in the range of $2-3.
Hope that helps.
Matt
This is a great overview. I’ve always been meaning to get into email marketing but it seems overwhelming like most things if you aren’t familiar.
As for 5% open rate. 5% of 1M is a whole lot of targeted advertising. I almost fell off my chair when I thought about this. It just depends who you are talking 5% with. 😉
Great post Matt, thanks as always pure quality!!
As always thanks matt
Hope your sleeping 🙂
All the best
Paul
Good post again. Thanks for the info. It is a good reminder of what is important
Hey Matt . As for Creating an Opt In Gift I was actually working to set up an ad in my blog to give away a plugin i had written for me called WP Comment Bonus. It allows you to give a bonus to commentators after a certain amount of comments they make in your blog.
Thanks for the great article . I’m learning a lot from you mate!
Hey Matt
Thanks for this info. I always find that I’m torn between the 2 decisions: to build or not to build. I know that a lot of people say that you don’t have a real business if you don’t have a list, as this becomes one of your core business assets.
I am putting some sites together in the baby and kids niche. My plan was to have some sites purely as sales sites and others devoted to list building.
Do you think that this is a good niche for list building? Personally I think that it is, as there are a lot of smaller niches where I could build more targeted lists.
Just wondered what your thoughts were on this.
Thanks
Dave
Matt Carter Reply:
December 5th, 2010 at 11:14 am
Hey Dave
Yes I think that is a good niche, because parents will buy stuff for their babies for a long time, as they sell a lot of products!
Matt
I’ve studied/bought some 20 different products, services or systems during the past 6 months. Haven’t learned/profited much so far. Yet, your advice is sound and it works. I cannot but admire you for giving us so many priceless tips for free. Thank you! Keep on rocking.
I agree with you about the power of quality. That’s very good for long term perspective.
Thanks Matt!
Hey Matt, as always, great information, great value.
Iv got a question.
In terms of conversion, what do you find is better. A full on squeeze page that gives the user an option to only optin or an optin box underneath good quality content on a page?
Matt Carter Reply:
December 5th, 2010 at 11:13 am
Hey Asim
Now that is a good question!! I personally can’t stand a squeeze page that makes you opt in without giving you something first to prove you are worth opting in for. The only exception I have is when there is a free report on a topuc being offered, in that case I have done it, but usually I have a video with good content and showing the viewers something and then giving them the option to opt in,
Thanks for a good comment
Matt
Hi Matt,
Great tips and advice as I have always wondered about when to focus on list building and when it’s a waste of time. It was nice to see my own suspicions were correct.
Regarding PLR stuff, I agree there is a bunch of “less than desirable” material out there but I have found some material that is “okay” and a sometimes a great starting point then concentrate on “kicking it up a notch” so to speak.
I hope all is well with you and the new-comer and that you are managing a little sleep at night 😉
Best always,
Jim H.
Hmmm, 5% sounds quite good given the unending sales pitch rubbish that passes for email marketing with some in IM.
Present company excepted of course, Matt Carters are one of the few we open each time 🙂
Hi Matt,
Love the content, I’m just starting out with affiliate marketing and enjoy the hits and tips you share.
Thanks heaps.
Fred
(Melbourne)
Matt Carter Reply:
December 5th, 2010 at 11:10 am
Hi Fred
Great to see you here on the blog and good to see you getting into affiliate marketing, its a lot of fun and quite a journey also!
Cheers
Matt
Another great post! Thanks for the advice and your honesty is always appreciated.
Cheers,
Gerard
Not having created an email campaign yet I can’t attest to the length of time it takes to set up and maintain the list and the email campaign. I’ve always read that it’s relatively quite easy.
I would think that the extra sales you get from putting those who didn’t buy the short term solution product into your email campaign would be worth the few hours it takes to set the autoresponder up.
Am I wrong here or am I missing something?
Thanks.
Mike
Matt Carter Reply:
December 5th, 2010 at 11:09 am
Hey Mike
You are right IF the niche works well with the email, otherwise you end up putting a lot of time into the list and the return is not great.
Thanks
Matt
Hey Matt,
I open 100% (pretty sure) of your emails because you offer good advice/value and I like your style, which is not too over-the-top and pushy. I imagine pushy may be something you want to test if making money is the main goal though!
Being new in the im space, I have been spending alot of time constantly reading all the spam mails I get from a vast number of gurus and I am beginning the process of “unsubscribing” and have learned to stop scrolling down the yard long sales pages. I have to shift from being prey to being the hunter.
When you mentioned “flying popover” for your site I have to admit I had a sinking feeling. Every time I visit Zac Johnson’s site I get these, but I get it is part of the business and must be tolerated.
Thanks for another good post!
Earl
Matt,
Thanks for the input, that’s very helpful. Given that you’re a new Dad, I’m surprised you’re still posting at regular intervals… those first few months can be tough!
That’s encouraging to hear you mention the $2-3 value, I’m planning on $1 per subscriber across all lists, and those are gained through search engine traffic.
I realize there are too many variables involved to take anything as gospel, but I *really* appreciate your input and I wish you a great December and 2011!
– Devin
Hi Matt,
could you throw more light upon the following subject:
“You can spin the PLR content, but as long as it is not used for backlinking it doesn’t matter.”
What does this mean? No Google Slap for doing it?
Matt Carter Reply:
December 5th, 2010 at 1:37 pm
hey Mirko,
I don’t think there is any google slap for plr, it just might not rank well itself, although often it still does,, but doesn’t hurt to alter it slightly…but don’t use plr fo backlinks as the links will be devalued.
Matt
Nice tip. Thanks for sharing.
Very interesting post Matt, written in an easy to understand way.
I have trouble understanding autoresponders, maybe I need to sit down with someone who knows how to use then so they can explain it to me.
Love reading you posts
Neil
G’day Matt,
Once again good sound advice. For the people who don’t
would you be able to tell us the steps for setting up a
download page.
I like the advice you gave about not collecting emails as well
because some people tell you, you should collect emails all the time.
regards
Daniel
Yep some good points there Matt. The main ‘take’ for me was on delivering quality. When you stop and wonder how to stand out from the crowd, I think that’s a big move in the right direction; Deliver Quality. And by quality I mean something that your list will find useful and of value.
Whether it be a service, information or a product, if you can focus on “how will this benefit my subscribers” you will build your list and it will be a responsive and loyal one as long as it is receiving Quality Content.
Thanks for the advice!
great advice! thanx
Hi Matt,
While reading this post, i was thinking will not it be good if we charge a token money (say $1 or less) for the report or video we set out for list building purpose. ( I am thinking here of IM nihce).
It will serve two purposes:
1. It will discourage people freebie report seekers who have millions of mail IDs, which are used just to get free stuffs — I have come across such people in forums.
2. It will give you a list of e-mail IDs who are serious about IMs, and this may increase the open-rate of a email communication.
As we all know, on AWeber, the larger your list is the more you have to pay, so shouldn’t this be done to filter out useless mails.
I will soon be starting my IM blog on http://www.webopreneur.com so was thinking on this line for list building.
I am thinking of $1 or less to use to filter out crappy mail IDs from the list.
What is your view on this? Will it be a good move, or crazy maneuver that will push off even genuine people?
Thanks
Bikram
HI Matt,
Been referred to your site by one of my friends, and have found your posts to be of extreme quality. Thanks for being so generous with your knowledge.
I’m not in the IM niche – my website, as you can see, is about desserts and recipes. I wonder if I should create an opt-in page and start building a list and how I could go about doing this. Your advice will be highly appreciated.
Thanks again for a wonderful website, Matt.
Thanks for yet another very informative post Matt. I have recently been hovering on the fence over putting an optin box on one of my affiliate sites and this has really helped me to decide
Cheers
Mike
Again great post. Matt, I read another blog the other day and it seems marketers get more serious about their “customers”. What I try to say is more and more people realize that quality is more important over quantity. Those who push to buy stuff sending email after email to its list will end up with less subscribers. Sometimes for some reason is difficult to opt-out. In such case there is nothing left like indicate such emails as a SPAM which will go direct to bin. The best way to do business is to put ourselves into potential customer shoes. By the way, thanks for your opinion on PLR. I actually was thinking about it, but as non English native speaker it may be difficult for me to distinguish good written from rubbish. I`d better give up on this.
Hi Matt,
I was really interested to read about NOT collecting emails in some niches. Of course now you say it, it makes perfect sense, but the majority of IM people insist you must collect names “at any cost” and people who know no better will follow that blindly 🙂 Thanks for the useful tips!
Tracey
Matt Carter Reply:
December 5th, 2010 at 9:08 pm
Hey Tracy
Some people say a lot of things but I wonder how much they are doing it themselves,
I used to hear the same thing about blindly collecting emails, but it just didn’t
work for me in a lot of niches so I stopped.
Thanks for your comment
Matt
Hi Matt,
Thanks for a great post. I have become really sick and tired of some of the so-called IM gurus who are simply interested in their list for the purpose of sending out email after email to push something on me.
Some of the so-called “new products” these people are pushing are old products that have just been re-named and there have been no changes, improvements, upgrades to the product at all.
That type of IM is simply garbage. Again, thanks for your advice, suggestions, and quality content.
Thanks for the article Matt.
In your opinion when is the right time to start building a list.
If the traffic is still poor, say 10-20 visitors a day, is it too early?
All the best
Ludmilla
Dear Matt:
I honestly could not believe how much stuff you gave away when I first found your site. I felt like, man — I have finally run across a guy who is actually telling me stuff for free that was much more helpful than what I had purchased, after getting a ton of freebies from you and ignoring the sales stuff, I actually came around to the point where I felt I owed you a sale, how funny is that? And I bought into something I might not have ever done had I not felt like I was picking your pockets and you deserved it. I have bought 4 things now, two bigger tickets ( I hope were through you). You are just a great guy, low key sales approach, and you earn your business. I tuned into one who will remain nameless and after 4 out of 5 high pressure days, the 6th he offered a free copy of his “valuable ebook”. Imagine how I (and others) felt when I saw he was charging 12.95 shipping and handling . Nor had he even changed the copyright symbol in 3 years! this screamed of dead inventory. Keep on spoiling us, you should be proud of yourself.
Great tips in this article. I was able to get in the top 10/20 affiliates for different products with a tiny list of 2000 (competing against giant with list of 30000+). The relationship is what count.
@Ludmilla, I always advise to build your list from day one. I learned this from my first mentor, and it was a very good advice. It’s not too early, start collecting leads now.
Franck
You explain the How, but there is nothing explaining the Why. Why even bother?
Matt Carter Reply:
December 6th, 2010 at 8:14 am
Hey Evgeny
What do you mean “why even bother”? Perhaps I assumed that most people understand the basic reason for email marketing in the first place, which is that you can make repeat sales to customers in your niche.
I ALWAYS open Matt Carters emails.
Once again you prove that you are the type of marketer we all should strive to be.
Over the past six months there were an unbelievable number of “free” downloads, and email “lessons”and as a result I get too many emails each day. It is so disappointing, when the free download or video training course was actually pretty good, but then to get overly whammed with hardsells—- I have unsubscribed from most of them
Even one of the marketers who used to have the reputation of one of the good guys has gone promotional. I have it limited now to only the three or four I purchased something from and have been happy with the quality of the product.
I am modeling my first attempt at an email list after Matt Carter’s integrity.
Thanks!
Sue
Hi Matt,
Some really good information provided in this post. I couldn’t agree more about the need to provide quality to your list, as I’m on your list, and you are one of just a few IM’ers that I believe provide quality as opposed to sell, sell, sell, that you often get from other marketers.
Remember the maxim, “people want to buy, but they don’t want to be sold to” – which I think encapsulates it well.
Kind regards,
Local Web Marketer
Hi Matt,
I was just thinking about how to grow my email list when your message arrived. I currently have two small email lists one for an email series on my men’s health blog, and another for a free health related ebook, but have not figured out how to turn these lists into $$ yet. Any suggestions?
Thanks,
ken
http://www.menshealthcures.com
I never have any luck with PPC with google and adcenter because I get a lot of tire kickers and unresponsive mailing list. these ppc platforms drain our pocket books.
PPC needs to be laser targeted to work and I think Google and adcenter do not offer the demographics that is necessary. Adcenter has a demographic tab that allows for only ONE city and I don’t understand that.
As far as google you have to use the content network to target websites but the google networks suck! The demographics suck because these people who go on these sites are tire kickers and are not what we are looking for.
Does anyone know a good platform for PPC?
Hi Matt;
Thanks very much for this advice. It solves a huge issue for me. I have heard all this stuff about “the money is in the list”
and the best way to monetize is with a list. Well I have a blog at http://www.russianbridefacts.com that I would like to monetize but for the life of me I can’t figure out what I would do with a list content/value wise that I’m not providing on the blog. I don’t get much traffic but hearing all this stuff about lists has left me feeling “on the hook.”, like “I gotta do this”.
But your perspectives are a relief to me, e.g. it’s o.k. to not have a list. So I’ll just keep adding genuine content, try to build up traffic, and search out aff. products to sell directly on the site.
In the meantime, I’m developing other sites that have more broad appeal where a list will be useful.
So thanks again Matt. I feel better now.
Gary.
I have seen I think all your videos so far except one maybe, They are interesting and great lessons. I hope to do as well someday.
What I’d like to know is how these so called gurus that simply pimp each and every product maintain the size of their lists. Obviously they must have some very high traffic pages collecting the info and growing their lists for them because they must have 100s of people unsubscribing every time they send out an email.
I have a list myself and I give out unique WordPress Templates to them regularly and also tips on free tools and methods that can help marketers and even when I send out a free video giving good advice with a free WP template and no “sell” in sight I still get a few ‘unsubs’ as a result of sending that email.
Matt,
Great post and something which a lot of other “budding” IM’s can benefit from. Keep up the great work.
All the best!
James
Hello Matt
Thanks yet again for this information. Just for that I wont mention the cricket.
Regards
Mike
Good thought provoking advice Matt. I’m pleased to see that you don’t collect emails in all your niches. I also don’t see the point if we have nothing worthwhile to follow up with.
John
Thanks for the great advice Matt. I greatly appreciate you putting things in clear terms that some of us newbies can understand.
Thanks Dude, I think you made a really great point about every niche not needing a capture form and when building a list you should provide quality. You do a great job of leading by example. Thanks
I have been on just about everyone’s list you can think of in the IM market, close to 100s of them. I have learned a little from most of them, even if it is how not to do things, But there is 2 that have risen to the top and I watch and learn (and earn) from, and you are one of the two. Thanks for all your help and I hope someday, like yourself, I will be able to make this my full time profession. I must admit that even though I am involved in some list building it is not my favorite thing to do and prefer niches that don’t require it. Glad to see that someone who is successful dosen’t have to have a list for everything!
Keep up the great job!
Hey Matt, great blog posts and videos. I have a question totally unrelated to anything on this blog. Where do you get your little bubbly white men icons from? They look great! I love them.
Louise
i have a question.
how to create collect an email easy. right now to collect email is not an easy one.
hi I was fortunate to approach your subject in wordpress
your Topics is excellent
I learn much in your blog really thanks very much
btw the theme of you blog is really wonderful
where can find it
Thanks Matt!
As usual, good honest and USABLE information, right on time 🙂 Thanks Again!
Glynn
hi Matt
heard you on Ryans webinar yesterday and came to have a look at your site. Your one of the few guys in IM that seems to be honest and straight about it – a refreshing change
kevin
Matt Carter Reply:
December 17th, 2010 at 7:42 am
Hey Kevin
welcome to our community its great to have you here.
Thanks for your comment also
Matt Carter
very true advice matt…Thanks for sharing a valuable tips..
Thanks Matt for the great article, and even more answering all the questions in the comments; its very valuable!
A 5% open rate is not all that high. Not sure how you can be happy with that. I was afraid of giving away all my best information but I see the value of providing top quality emails.
Thanks
Hi Matt,
Thank you so much for your article about List Building Advice. As an inspiring Internet Marketer, list building is very important since the more you build a list, the more money you will get.
God Bless you more.
Regards,
Kadri
Thanks for the info. Great post.
I provide IM product reviews on my site and provides every single information about the product where most of the review sites don’t tell and just try to create more hype. You know a lot of crap has been released in last 6 months or so and I reviewed most of them on my site.
During the last 6 months I build a list of over 2000 people from my blog and gave them a quality SEO training course when the sign up.
I want to build strong relationship with my list. I would like to know the best way to do this from you. Freebies? Quality Blog posts? What else?
Thanks
Paul
Hi Matt,
Your article actually answered a question I’d been struggling with for a while, namely: “Do I HAVE to build a list and use email marketing? Can’t I just send people to sales pages?”
So thanks for that.
Quick question – you say there are niches in which you don’t bother to capture emails and build a list. Can you give a specific example (or two) of such a niche? (where data-capture is not necessary/useful in your opinion)
Thanks
Adam
Matt Carter Reply:
July 24th, 2011 at 1:38 pm
Hi Adam
Niches where it doesn’t make sense to continually be sending more info to the list are ones that don’t work well. For example “arthritis cure” people don’t want to keep buying products, they want a one time cure.
Adam Reply:
July 25th, 2011 at 8:44 pm
Thanks Matt – I appreciate the help. I think your free course is more valuable than most PAID stuff out there!
Adam