List Building and Email Marketing

Remember the overall Roadmap of the Niche Site Process. Click the image to see the full version.

Many people build their whole businesses around email marketing. It is hugely successful when it is done the right way.

A friend just told me about why he’s working on email list building right now. He developed a successful niche website. In a single year the site had over 100,000 unique visitors. He was NOT capturing email addresses.

A conservative estimate of email opt-ins would be about 2% – so that’s 2,000. Imagine if you could email about 2,000 people that were interested in a specific niche to let them know about a cool product from Amazon.

Pretty cool, eh?

I didn’t get into building an email list for a while. I knew it could be powerful but honestly, I wasn’t ready yet.

We can only focus on a certain number of new things at one time, and it’s usually fewer than we think too. Anyway, it took a little while to get started.

Here are the steps:

• Create a lead magnet
• Set Up Aweber (or another email provider, affiliate link)
• Write an Autoresponder Series to build trust and authority
• Install Sumo or a similar app.
• Send Out Broadcast Emails Regularly

There is a lot of information related to building an email list. We could write entire books and develop an entire course on each of the steps. We will keep it high level here.

Create a lead magnet

This should be directly related to the niche or topic. Don’t give away a free iPad if your niche site is about 2-Way Radios.

The lead magnet should attract people interested in the topic so a better option would be “The Top Five 2-Way Radio Resources (the best one is free).”

The lead magnet should be short, to the point, and provide value to the would-be subscriber in less than 5 minutes.

What about creating a eBook, course, or video series?

It’s usually better to create something that can be consumed fast. You want the person to get value from you as soon as possible. I have a bunch of free eBooks or free courses that I never even looked at. Then, I forgot about the person or the blog.

You want someone to optin, then learn something from you so they’ll remember you. That’s why shorter is normally better for lead magnets, not to mention it’s faster to create something short versus something long.

Set Up Aweber (or another email provider)

Aweber is a popular platform and you can get a trial month for $1. I use Aweber personally and really like it.

Mail Chimp is another popular option that is free up to a certain number of subscribers. However, the free Mail Chimp account lacks the autoresponder feature. (We’ll get to that in a minute.)

There are other more advanced email providers, like Infusionsoft and tons of others, that have WAY more functionality. It’s too much for most people and it’s very expensive, too.

Stick to Aweber and you’re going to be fine. Aweber integrates well with nearly any app, platform, etc… that you may use.

Write an Autoresponder Series to build trust and authority

An Autoresponder Series is a set of emails that is sent to your subscribers automatically. Once you set it up, the emails are sent out to the subscriber automatically and you can specify when they are sent.

For example, if a new person signs up, they will receive the 1st email in the series. Then you can configure the 2nd email to arrive 2 days later in the morning, the 3rd email to be sent 4 days later in the evening, and so on…

Write 3 to 5 emails for the autoresponder.

• The 1st email should introduce the new subscriber to your brand/niche site. Be sure to explain what they should expect in the emails and how often they will receive emails.
• The rest of the emails should provide some value related to the niche.
• You can provide the content directly within the email or link to a specific page on your niche site. I like to do a combination of the two.

Install the Sumo Application or something else

This is a free suite of tools that help you build your email list. I have personally used the List Builder, Scroll Bar, Share, and Smart Bar. They boosted my opt-in rate significantly.

Again, it’s free so there is no reason NOT to use the SumoMe Tools. The free versions have “Sumo” branding visible, while it’s not terrible to have, it’s not ideal. I recently stopped using Sumo because the prices went up for some basic functionality.

It’s a good first option, but I’d recommend OptinMonster or Leadpages if you’re serious about your email list. I use Optin Monster on Niche Site Project and my affiliate sites.

Send Out Broadcast Emails Regularly

You should send out a broadcast email on a regular basis. You can decide the interval but I suggest keeping it to either:

• Once a day
• Once a week
• Once every two weeks
• Once a month

It’s probably best to pick once a week or every two weeks.  Daily emails can be a little annoying, but if they are done correctly, then you will make more sales.

It’s true that more people will unsubscribe if you send more frequent emails. However, you actually don’t want to have people on your email list that are not engaged. If someone is actually making a decision to unsubscribe then at least they’ve taken some action.

The broadcast emails can serve a couple purposes like:

1. Driving traffic to your newest posts
2. Publicizing a sale price for a product
3. Continue to add value related to the niche.

• Select a Niche or Market
• Build Out the Framework
• Develop a Content Management Plan
• Plan Your Niche Site SEO
• Execute an Outreach & Promotion Campaign (PREVIOUS)
• Execute an Email Marketing Campaign (You are HERE)
• Continue Growing the Niche Site (NEXT)
• Frequently Asked Questions about Niche Sites
• Aged Site Case Study: Done-For-You, Ready Made Site [in progress]

Go back to the Introduction to Amazon Affiliate Marketing Niche Site Process and Overview

• See real examples of Amazon Affiliate websites.
• What are typical Amazon Affiliate earnings?