How To Dramatically Increase The Size Of Your List

I mentioned in an earlier article that one of the keys to encouraging people to sign up to your list is to offer them an incentive…what some people might call a bribe.

You want to give them something of value and in return they give you their name and email address.

It is entirely up to you to decide what you think would work best in this situation based on what you know of the needs and desires of your prospects.

Some examples of incentives you could offer include:

• Coupons: after they sign up they receive a special coupon that gives them a larger discount than they would be able to get any other way.
• Entry into a draw: people love to enter competitions. If you offer a monthly prize to anyone who signs up to your list it will not only encourage people to sign up, it will also make them more likely to open your emails, just in case they’ve won
• Free gifts: maybe you’ve got some excess stock that you could give away for free, or you can negotiate with a rep to get some of their promo stock.
• Your time: if you are in the service industry you could offer to do a free consultation or a free session. This is known as a soft offer – you can apply a value to it, even if you don’t charge that value. For example on this web site I offer business owners a free SEO analysis, which is valued at $200.

Then there is the information product.

I believe this is one of the most effective incentives you can offer…and the best thing is that it costs you nothing to give it away

Over the next couple of articles I’m going to be giving you some ideas and tips on how to go about creating an info product that is valuable enough that you could sell it if you wanted to…but you will more likely give it away as an incentive to join your list.

An info product will generally take the form of a digital ebook – but can also include audio and video files that are easily downloaded from your website.

No matter what industry you are in, it is almost a certainty that your customers and prospects will have questions…and your info product can provide the solution

• A gardener could offer a free report that gives 7 tips for setting up a veggie garden.
• A personal trainer could offer a recorded interview with a dietitian talking about the strengths and weaknesses of all the fad diets that are currently popular.
• A hairdresser could have an ebook that offers tips on maintaining healthy hair
• An accountant could compile a list of the answers to their most frequently asked questions about end of year tax reporting.

I could go on and on – once you realise the potential you’re options are only limited by your imagination

Now at this stage there are probably a couple of questions floating around in your head:

• If you could sell it, why would you want to give it away?
• If you’re not a writer how can you create a book?

The answer to the first question is simple – in the majority of cases you will earn more from the person as a subscriber on your list, then if you were to sell them your info product.

Your info product gives you the opportunity to gain their trust and makes them more likely to become a repeat purchaser in the future

As for the creation of the product, I’m going to be giving you some simple strategies you can use to do this yourself, as well as showing you how you can get it done by someone else without having to pay a fortune.

So what you should do between now and the next article is start thinking about your target market – what problems do they have that need to be solved?

Can you give something away for free that solves that problem in exchange for their email address?

Craig