List Building 101

Wednesday, January 27th, 2010 at 11:13 AM

If you have been online any length of time, I am sure you’ve heard said over and over “The Money Is In The List”. Building a list of subscribers with the intent of turning them into customers is the bread-and-butter of your business…

But I imagine by now, you are sick and tired of hearing then NOT being shown how to build and profit from one?

I mean, how are you supposed to build a list and profit from it if nobody shows you are nobody tells you how. You probably asked yourself, “what is it they don’t want me to know?”. Maybe a lot of people in the in the know were scared of having any competition.

The thing to remember is it’s not rocket science, but there is a process that you need to know to be able to be successful. You have to have a plan in place and follow through with it.

So let’s begin…

The Overall Strategy

The first step to any successful list building is you must set out the goal, or mission, to help others first. If you understand that people searching for information online, or subscribing to mailing lists, are looking for the answers to questions or problems they may have. You need to be the one to provide the solution and in doing so you will build a relationship with your subscribers.

Over a period of time they will come to trust you, value your opinion and be more willing to act on recommendations for products and services that you make. In other words, they will be more willing to buy from you, or through you as an affiliate, the products and services that they need. Face it, they’re going to buy from somebody, it might as well be you.

Their Success is Your Success

Your main goal has to be seeing them succeed. In doing so you will in turn succeed from your efforts. That’s why your goal can’t be just making money, but the money will come soon enough. If you come off as only wanting to profit off of your subscribers, they will quickly see this and abandon you for ever.

By helping others and having a genuine interest in wanting them to succeed will…

1) Build Friendships

2) Create A Win/Win Relationship

3) Gain Credibility As Some One to Be Listened To

4) Lay The Foundation Of Trust

5) And Ultimately Will Build VALUE

In the end, people will spend money if they feel they’re getting good value and especially, if they know that you are someone they can trust. With all the horror stories you hear on line about how people get ripped off, then the trust factor becomes that much more important.

Think about it. How many times have you heard of someone getting married after just one day. It takes time to build a relationship where you can trust that person and you know what to expect consistently. You need to let people get to know you first for the benefits listed above to start working in your favor.

That doesn’t mean you can’t build a responsive list quickly. You can if you’re willing to provide insights ideas information and special offers that show you genuinely want to help them.

Get Started Right

When you e-mail your list about something you’re promoting, or a product you have for sale, you need to be able to let them feel your confidence in what it is you’re offering. You don’t have to be pushy with it, but presented in such a fashion that if you believe it, knowing it will work and do what it’s supposed to, then they will feel confident too.

Consider the following guidelines when you write, to hopefully help to get your message across.

1) Be confident enough to excite but never over hype.

2) Have a relaxed, conversational tone.

3) Imagine you’re talking to one person.

4) Use short words, short sentences, short paragraphs – make it easy to follow.

5) Inject your own personality and avoid over used cliches in your niche.

6) Stay on topic and don’t ramble. In other words, get to the point.

7) Always keep to one or possibly two ideas in any particular message.

To put it all together, maybe the best way to look at it is to imagine yourself having a conversation with someone. You’re discussing a topic of interest that you, or both of you, are passionate about. Maybe it’s the solution the person is looking for to a problem they’re having. If you make your point in a relaxed and confident manner, then you stand a better chance of getting your point across and having that person act on your recommendation.

If you could apply that to the e-mails you send out, then you stand a better chance of gaining the trust of your readers and getting them to act on recommendations and solutions to problems they may be having.

What’s In It For Me?

The most important point to remember is that it’s basic human nature to always ask yourself, “what’s in it for me?”. It’s not so much that people are selfish, but they want to know if something will benefit them or situation there dealing with. When you present something to them, you have to ask yourself if you were in their position, how would it benefit you. If you don’t, then they will see you as uncaring and indifferent to their problems.

Face it, you do the same thing when someone is presenting something to you and want to know what benefits you will get out of it.

One Final Tip

As time goes on, and you have managed to turn your list of subscribers into a list of ready-made buyers, consider who they really are to you. I personally never refer to people as customers, I tend to think more of them as CLIENTS.

Why?

It changes the focus and feeling of the relationship to one of trust and advice. Isn’t it much better to be seen as a trusted mentor rather than someone just selling something? Too many people, especially online, come across as a used car salesman only interested in making the deal. And that truly is something you must AVOID!

If you keep in mind that building your list is all about building a relationship with your readers, in time you will see your business grow as soon see the profits come in. Like I have already said, people are going to buy from somebody, it might as well be you.

More to come…