Everywhere we turn, Sarah and I hear from another blogger or successful business owner just how much they value their email list. Many cite their list as the reason why their book became a best-seller, why their newest course brought in hundreds of new customers, or why they can sell products week after week without ever paying for advertising.
Since growing your email list is just THAT important for your business, we're devoting two whole weeks to the topic.
This week, we started small. Your challenge was this:
Sign up for an email service provider such as MailChimp or MadMimi, and place your email opt-in box in 4 key places on your site.
Which 4 Places?
(I'm glad you asked!)
- Your Homepage
- About-Me Page
- Designated Landing Page
- The End of Every Post
Sarah and I took the challenge right along with you, and we have some exciting results to share!
1.) Adding a Prominent Homepage Opt-in Box
One of our listeners, Victoria, let us know about a free service called ManyContacts that allows you to add an opt-in box to the very top of your website. We jumped at the chance to use it, and in just under a week, we've added 18 new subscribers just through that bar alone.
The coolest thing about ManyContacts is that it gives you a lot more information about where your subscribers are coming from than MailChimp does. It tells you which website they visited that brought them to you, whether they were on a mobile phone, how many pages they looked at on your site, on which page they subscribed, and whether or not it was their first visit.
What we discovered was that many of these new subscribers had just found our site for the first time through another large blog that had linked to us. It feels really great knowing that every single person who visits our site won't miss the message that we have something fabulous to offer: 52 Weeks to a Better Business. New visitors are now taking us up on this offer, so we can stay in touch!
If you'd like to add the ManyContacts bar to your site, it's really easy. Here's the tutorial video:
2.) Designated Landing Page
This one was huge for us. I know for a fact that having appealing, shareable graphics on our landing page is what helped us to stand out on Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter, and draw new subscribers in. That combined with an interesting offer led to us growing our list from just 33 subscribers 3 weeks ago, to now 106 subscribers. (Yes, we're still very small potatoes, but we're super proud of the level of growth we've had in just a few weeks by taking action, creating a great offer, and making it impossible for our visitors to “miss out” on our offer.)
Another note: When we started 52 weeks, we made it clear that we wanted to hear from you – our listeners & readers and do our best to help you succeed. You let us know that a private Facebook group to share ideas/offer advice/provide accountability would be awesome. So we listened, and on day 1 of the Facebook group, we had over 20 of you join, and we're now up to 37 talented, amazing moms (and one dad!) after less than a week.
Not to mention, you are not a list of numbers to us; you're people. You each have incredible gifts, motivation, and stories to share. Sarah and I are always chatting about the incredible moms in our group and how blessed we feel to have you. We may be small potatoes, but we're a fierce, motivated bunch. Getting to know each of you has been such a privilege!
One thing that also helped was letting our Facebook fans know about the private group. We had several new subscribers jump on board after hearing about the group and deciding that they wanted in.
3.) End of Every Post
It's been harder to track the effectiveness of this one, because MailChimp doesn't offer info about where on the page a subscriber found you. (Unless I'm missing something, and please let me know if I am!) At the same time, though, I think as our Pinterest presence grows, getting people back to our site and engaged in an interesting article is the perfect opportunity to give them a reason to subscribe.
Adding a sign-up form to the end of every post was really easy. Here's our tutorial video:
How about you? Did you sign up for an email service provider? Did you add opt-in forms to new places on your site?
We'd love to hear about your results in the comments! Feel free to embed a video of your progress (like ours below!) so we can get to know you and learn from you!
~ Beth Anne & Sarah
P.S. You may have noticed that Sarah and I have yet to add an About Me Page and therefore, add a subscribe box there. Yep, you caught us! We're still working on this beast of a page, but guess what?! We didn't let that stop us from taking action in other areas. You're never going to be perfect. Don't let that stop you. Continue to set goals, take action, and grow (we're happy to give you a virtual kick in the pants too!)