Did you know that 60% of consumers say they make purchases based on emails they receive from businesses?
While you’re terrified of scaring away your followers with your newsletters, 60% actually say they love receiving promotional emails – and they want them weekly!
Still think it’s not worth building an email list?
If you want to make your brand visible, I recommend you start investing time and energy into building your list. What’s the first step?
Define your Ideal Client
Everywhere you hear or read that you should grow your list to over 10,000 subscribers because that’s good.
Yes, that’s really great, but an email list isn’t meant for casual correspondence with people. The subscribers on your list will be the ones who purchase products or services from you.
Who will subscribe to your list? Ideally, your ideal clients. However, you need to know exactly who they are. If you don’t know who your ideal clients are, you can’t create the products, services, or gifts that will attract them to your list. That’s why it’s important to understand who your ideal clients are – your target audience.
Why target audience matters
If your emails aren’t directed at your target audience, your list will work against you, not for you!
This isn’t a big secret, but you probably already know that sending newsletters costs money. Many service providers have free limits so you can take initial steps and start collecting subscribers.
For your invested money and time to pay off, you need to fill your list with your target audience. If the subscribers aren’t your ideal clients, they won’t buy from you. It’s that simple.
Imagine paying to send emails to people who will never purchase from you. People who aren’t interested in what you offer. People who only subscribed because they wanted something free but have no connection to what you do. That’s not a list – that’s wasted money.
The second step: A Lead Magnet
A Lead Magnet is a free gift for which your ideal client gives you their name and email address in exchange.
What can be a Lead Magnet?
It can be an e-book, video, or for example, an exclusive podcast episode. It can also be a 10-15 minute consultation, test evaluation, webinar, etc. Anything that helps immediately solve part of your clients’ problem. But it’s very important not to try to solve all their problems.
The Lead Magnet is a taste. A small help. A quick win. After which they say, “Wow, this really worked, I wonder what else there is.” And then you come in with your paid offers.
Also make sure the Lead Magnet is evergreen. Anyone, anywhere, at any time of day should be able to subscribe to your list, not just at a specific time. For example, not just at Christmas or only on your birthday.
When your Lead Magnet is evergreen, you don’t lose opportunities when someone discovers you at 2 AM on a Tuesday and thinks “okay, this interests me, I’ll subscribe.”
The next thing you need: A Landing Page
A landing page is where your target audience provides their name and email address in exchange for your free gift.
What should the Landing Page contain?
A crystal-clear title
What the free gift is about. Exactly what help the gift contains and what problem it solves. What subscribers will receive in exchange for their name and email address. (List all this in bullet points.) How it will solve their problem, what they’ll learn, what they can do with the information you provide.
Introduce yourself
Tell them who you are, what you do, why they should listen to you. Build your authority and position yourself, because the people who see your Lead Magnet know nothing about you.
Many entrepreneurs make the mistake of assuming people already know who they are. They don’t. Your landing page might be the first time someone encounters your brand. Make it count.
CTA – Choose button text wisely
These need to be strong CTAs (Call To Action – a call to action) because these will increase your conversion. Don’t just use “Submit.” Use “Download Now!”, “Get It Free!”, “I Want My E-book!” – something that prompts action.
The difference between “Submit” and “Download My Free Guide Now!” can be significant in conversion rates. Strong, specific CTAs tell people exactly what will happen when they click and create urgency.
The next thing you need: A “Thank You” page
This is a page where your target audience arrives after providing their email address and clicking the CTA button. Here you can confirm that they’ll receive the promised Lead Magnet and how. For example: “The e-book is on its way. Open the incoming email and click the download link there.”
This is a simple but very important step. This is where you can say: “Thank you for subscribing, here’s what I promised, and you’ll hear more from me soon.”
The Thank You page also serves another purpose: it sets expectations. You can tell them when to expect the next email, what kind of content you’ll send, and how often. This transparency builds trust from the very beginning.
Tools
Building an email list isn’t complicated. However, you need a system that provides automation. I really like the Sales Autopilot system (which has both Hungarian and English versions), but besides that, numerous excellent options exist: MailChimp, ConvertKit, ActiveCampaign – all are excellent choices.
At first, these systems might seem complicated, but you can learn them quickly. Most offer tutorials, templates, and customer support to help you get started.
How the system works
So a member of your target audience fills out the form with their name and email address. Upon subscribing, they immediately receive a message – which you need to set up in your newsletter sender. This is a welcome message. It doesn’t need to be complicated. For example: “Thank you for subscribing, here’s the link to download, watch the video, or listen to the podcast, etc. I’ll be in touch soon with another email.”
With this, we’ve reached the point where you start sending out your newsletters – the Lead Magnet subscribers enter this email list, and you’ll send newsletters to this list.
Set up your Email Funnel
Set up how often you’ll send emails to your list. Your sent emails will behave as a so-called email funnel. This email funnel will help you connect with your target audience, address them, and make offers for your services or products.
The first three emails are critical
First email: Introduce yourself. Present your story, your brand. It’s important to position yourself and your brand as an expert.
Don’t assume they know who you are just because they downloaded your Lead Magnet. Many people download resources from multiple sources. Your introduction email is your chance to make a memorable first impression and establish why they should pay attention to future emails.
Second email: Share a bonus tip or gift. For example: if you work with social media, let the bonus be a free, downloadable planner. Or link one of your popular blog posts, videos, or podcasts that shares valuable information about something truly valuable to your target audience. This further positions you as an expert who supports their audience in solving their problems.
This second email reinforces the value you provide. It shows that subscribing wasn’t just about getting one free thing – it’s about ongoing value and support.
Third email: Present your related service or product. Here you can also offer a discount on the given service or product and include a link where they can find it.
From here, subscribers move into the general newsletter system, where every week you send them the link to your latest blog post, video, or podcast, and promotions.
Finally – Marketing
Your target audience won’t just find your Lead Magnet and the subscription opportunity on their own. Your email list brings you revenue, so you need to think about expanding it. You need to talk about it. You need to promote it, and you can do this in two ways:
Passively
- With a pop-up window or banner on your website
- In the BIO on your Instagram page
- With a banner on your Facebook page
Actively – Leveraging the Power of SEO
- Pinterest posts
- Blog posts
- Social media posts
The bottom line
With this, you’ve created a very simple, 3-step email funnel.
Remember: 60% of consumers make purchases based on emails. Your email list is one of your most valuable business assets. Unlike social media followers, your email list is yours – no algorithm can take it away, no platform can change the rules overnight.
Start building your list today. Define your ideal client, create a compelling Lead Magnet, set up your landing page, and begin nurturing those relationships. The investment of time and energy will pay off as your list grows and converts into loyal, paying customers.
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