One thing I’ve always spoken about is the importance of building your email list. And with everything going on in the world right now I want to share why I believe building an email list is more important than ever.
Let’s get into it.
**This post may contain affiliate links. The services I share are the services I personally use and honestly recommend to anyone. No extra costs are incurred for you; the referral commission simply contributes to bringing you valuable content.
If you run a business and you rely solely on social media for connecting with your potential clients, you run the risk of losing your entire audience if the social media giants choose to shut down their platform. Or a platform gets banned, or censored, or who knows what else these days.
Is Freedom of Speech on Social Media Dead?
You don’t control social media. But your email list is yours. So if a social media platform did shut down, you’d still be able to stay connected with your audience, which is absolutely crucial if you’re running a business. This is something I’ve always said.
But it’s becoming more and more apparent how real the possibility of being shut down actually is.
Freedom of speech is basically non-existent on social media right now.
We are in unprecedented times. Countries can ban use of social media apps (USA vs TikTok). Other social media platforms are blocking, banning, censoring, and even deleting people’s accounts if they don’t agree with what they’re sharing.
In Australia our Google & YouTube searches are now at risk of being monitored and having our data handed over to news media businesses.
So what’s the solution? Cower away in fear and don’t speak your truth because you don’t want to be next?
Or, be proactive and build an email list? I know my choice. Email list always!
If this is foreign territory for you then thankfully I’m here to break it down for you. I’ve always said your email list is the lifeblood of your business. And I’ve published many posts about this before. But with what’s going on I thought it was an important topic to revisit.
So, let’s dig into it, shall we?
Why is Building an Email List Important?
Aside from the obvious reasons I just stated above, allow me to share a few more.
1. Your Content is More Likely to Actually Reach Your Audience
Think about how much engagement is forever changing on social media. Half your content may not even be seen by your followers because of the way newsfeeds are controlled (the general reach is about 2% of your audience on social media). One day you could be doing really well on Instagram and Facebook, then an algorithm changes and bam, crickets.
But when it comes to your email list it’s a whole different ball game. 90% of emails actually get delivered to the intended recipient’s inbox. So basically once a subscriber has opened one of your emails, they’ve confirmed they want to hear from you. And that means every time you send an email, it is going to hit their inbox. So there’s no guesswork, you hit send, it hits their inbox and is ready and waiting for them to read it.
Not to mention there’s actually a LOT more email accounts than social media profiles. So all in all email marketing actually has a higher reach than any social media platform. In 2017, the number of worldwide email users topped 3.7 billion. By the end of 2021, the number of worldwide email users will be over 4.1 billion. Approximately half of the worldwide population was using email in 2017. You need an email to sign up for everything (social media platforms included).
2. It Gets in Front of Your Readers Regularly
The key to establishing a powerful personal brand is through consistently connecting with people.
Back to the above point, because 90% of your emails hit your audience’s inbox. If you have a good email strategy and are sending out regular emails then this is a great way to stay front of mind for them. Which will turn them into much more loyal and engaged followers.
Chances are the person reading your emails found you on social media. They may have read a brief post, saw a pin, or liked your page. But does that really allow them to get to know you? No…
And in their busy lives they’ll just move on and probably forget about you. And because your social media reach is only 2% they may never see one of your posts again.
But…
If you have a way to capture their email while they’re on your social profile this is your chance to keep in touch. Your emails are a way to really strengthen your connection with them and build a genuine relationship. The more they hear from you, the more the reader gets to know you, like you, and trust you. This eventually leads them to wanting to work with you. And that is a huge reason why building an email list is so important.
3. It Will Help You to Increase Your Traffic
One of the most important measures of personal brand success is traffic. Especially for bloggers and influencers trying to score sponsorship deals, work with large brands etc. Those brands are going to want to know you have a good flow of traffic. And unless you’re an SEO genius and know how to get ranked on the front page of Google every single time, getting views on your site can be tricky. Especially when you’re just starting out.
You could share your posts on social media. But again… You don’t have anywhere near the reach you get when sending an email to your list.
So what if you sent out an email every time you published a new post? That email hits your reader’s inbox, they click the link, and that counts as a view on your site. The bigger your list grows, the more people clicking through to your blog in a short amount of time. And that is a way to improve your SEO and start to get ranked on Google.
Not only is this important for bloggers and influencers, but any small business owner trying to build a personal brand and name for themselves. If your site is getting more traffic there’s more chances you’ll start to be recognised by more of your ideal clients, or even start getting noticed by companies who want to hire you, or PR agencies contacting you for press opportunities.
An email list can help you get in front of more people, much faster.
4. Email is the Best Way to Sell a Product
According to a study conducted by VentureBeat. For 10 years in a row email marketing has reported to generate the highest ROI for marketers – For every $1 spent, email marketing generates $38 in ROI. And even if you don’t have a product to sell right now, you might do in the future.
Imagine having a very warmed up email list that loves you to send that product to once you do. I never would’ve had the success I’ve had if it wasn’t for my email list. The fortune is in the follow up.
5. Fortune is in the Follow Up
It’s all well and good to have fantastic content, but the fortune is in the follow up. So the real key to success is to start building an email list as soon as you can.
People need to get to know you, like you, and trust you and a great way to do this is through regular email contact. By sharing what’s going on in your life, plus lots of free value, your leads will turn into raving fans who will buy anything from you.
Ok, now you know why it’s important. How do you go about doing it?
How to Start Building an Email List
I think the biggest misconception when it comes to building email lists is that it’s hard. Or you can easily grow a following on social media so why bother? But like I’ve said before, social media is borrowed land.
Your email list is yours for life. So when it comes to raising brand awareness and building a community of raving fans, you really need to be focusing on this.
So how do you do it?
Start by creating a great lead magnet.
A lead magnet is a free resource people can receive in exchange for entering their email. An email is precious so you best be giving them something valuable in return.
If this is something you’ve left in the too hard basket. Now is the time to dig it up and get started. And fear not my lovely, I’ve got you covered with my 5 top lead magnet ideas. Once you use these you’ll be wondering why you didn’t start building a list sooner!
Share your lead magnet
Once you’ve created your lead magnet, the next thing to do is to start sharing it anywhere and everywhere. In your social media bios, content, blog posts, podcast episodes etc.
To do this:
- First think about the platform/s you’ll be sharing it on. Can you display links, do you need a banner (if it’s going on your blog), graphics for social media posts, fun videos etc.
- Create a compelling call to action that makes people want to click on your link.
Create a quality landing page
Once you’ve got your lead magnet you don’t just share that straight on social media. You’ll need a landing page which is where you capture their email. There’s many platforms that you can use for this, it just depends on your needs.
Here’s some examples of ones I have used:
My favourite platform for creating landing pages is Clickfunnels as I find they convert much better and were easier to customise. The first one is a Clickfunnels example. You can try it out for free right here.
The second one was made in Kajabi which is the platform I use now because it allows me to do lots of other things as well. But personally, I still prefer Clickfunnels pages better.
Set up a welcome email
If you’re offering a freebie, the last piece of the puzzle is to make sure you have an automated welcome email set up. If you set it to go out as soon as they opt-in then they’ll be more likely to open the email.
This shows your email platform they want to receive emails from you and will mean there’s more chance of your emails ending up in their main inbox rather than spam folder. You can also set up an automated sequence to keep following them up for a few days (or as long as you see fit), and then move them to a different sequence to receive your regular newsletters.
Make sure you’re using a high converting email marketing platform for this. My favourite is GetResponse. You can access their 30 day free trial right here.
*I’ve recently made the switch to Kajabi, purely because I’ve started creating courses and this is an all in one platform so it made sense to move my landing pages and emails there as well. Otherwise, I have been very happy with Clickfunnels and GetResponse. Both are super user friendly and have great support and I still use them for a lot of my clients. However, for myself, I am loving the ease of having everything in one place with Kajabi. They also have a free trial if you wanted to make this decision for yourself.
And if you’re really looking to take your list building efforts up a notch, check out this free masterclass my mentor Amy Porterfield recorded.
Happy List Building!
As usual, thanks for reading. And if you enjoyed this post please feel free to like, comment and/or share. Your support means the world to me.
Jade xo
