Five quick ways to grow your email listlaunchgrowjoy.com /grow-your-email-list/

Are you tired of hearing how important it is to thesuccess of your online store that you grow your emaillist and “market to your list”?

Yeah, me too. But guess what? It’s not just important –building and communicating with your email list iscritical to the long-term success of your onlinestore. Of course, if you haven’t begun to build anemail list, or if your list is relatively small, you can getfrustrated at the lack of response.

And if you don’t yet have a list, start now! MailChimpprovides a free account for your first 2,000 signupsand it integrates with almost every online shoppingplatform out there, making it easy for you to startcapturing email addresses from your web visitors.

Before we get to specific steps you can take to growyour email list, let me give you a BONUS TIP:

BONUS TIP: Don’t ever expect something for nothing . If you think of an email address as currency,you’ll understand this concept more fully. They have it and you want it, right? So, give value for value. Thebest way to incentivize visitors to your site to share their email address with you is to give them something:a FREEBIE that has real value and is a clear benefit to them .

Not sure what to freebie to offer? Click the button below to download a PDF document with more than 150ideas from some of today’s best online stores.

Here are five quick ways to grow your list

1. Offer a Freebie in Exchange for the Email Address – on every page and at every opportunitythroughout your site. Decide what has the most value to your visitors, whether it’s free shipping, afree gift item or a discount, and give it to them for their email address. It’s really NOT rocket science– but it works – and your list can take off like a rocket!

2. Offer a Downloadable Guide – and make sure that it is related to the products you offer. Forexample, if you’re selling swimsuits, you can offer a downloadable guide on how to care for yourswimsuit, or on how to get ready for beach season. If you sell jewelry, you can give away adownloadable guide on to how to clean and maintain jewelry. If you sell baby products, you can givethem a free downloadable guide on breast feeding, easy diapering, or safe activities for kids, etc.The idea is to keep your Freebie related to the product niche in which they’ve shown an interest.

3. Run a Contest on your Website – and give away a gift certificate to your online store, or anactual product, in exchange for their email address. Their email address is their entry to the contest,along with a guarantee that they’ll receive it in a reasonable amount of time. Just make sure youfollow through and actually give it away, then announce the winner on your site.How do I know thisworks? I once ran a promotion at my online organic soap store where I gave away a year’s worth ofsoap (24 bars) in exchange for their email address. It was very successful and the winner wasecstatic! (You can also run a contest on your store’s Facebook, Pinterest and pages.) Not tomention that I got almost 400 email addresses during the first month that I ran it!

1. Do a Product Review or Contest with a Blogger – work with bloggers who are in your niche todo a product review, as well as a special contest, for their readers and require them to submit theiremail address to enter the contest. You can check out this past post on connecting with bloggers.

2. Use a Popup Opt-in App or Plugin – I know that many people hate even thinking about thisoption, but it’s a great tool to help you grow your email list. Need proof? Take a look at this articleat Shopify.com, explaining Why You Should Be Using Popups on Your Online Store . Still needmore? “In one test,” performed by Aweber , “popups drove 1,375% more email captures vs. asidebar opt-in form.”Here are a few easy-to-use pop-up apps that you can install to help grow youremail list:

LeadPages – This is my absolute favorite and I personally use it on all of my sites currently

Pop-Up Window – if you have a Shopify store, this is a great option

Smart Popup Box – Allows for email capture and social follows to reveal discount for your Shopifystore.

Popup Architect – Works with any website or platform and is 100% customizable

The importance of email marketing simply cannot be over stressed. For so many online businessowners, including me and my business, email marketing is the #1 way that you can increase sales. Even if your online store is brand new and you are not sure what or how often to get in touch with those on yourlist, you should still focus on collecting addresses to grow your email list for future mailings.

BONUS TIP #2: Perhaps the most common myth about email marketing that you may have seen is that“the money is in the list”, meaning the size of your list gives it value. For me though, this is NOT true. Iprefer Quality over Quantity in my email list – it’s far more important to have a smaller list with qualitypeople than a bigger list with non-qualified prospects.

Your turn! I’d love to see your optin or popup on your website. Leave a link to your website in thecomments below and share it with me and the Launch Grow Joy community.