Do you want to earn passive income online? Yes, of course. Are there any easy passive income ideas? Not really easy, but not too difficult either.
If you have spent a lot of time researching how to make money online, I’m sure that you will have heard the expression, “the money is in the list”. 
This is partly true as the world of affiliate marketing through sites such as Amazon may make a list less essential but the basic premise is correct – it is much easier to make money if you have a subscriber base for your marketing.
In my case, when I heard that, I wanted to know:-
- What is the best way to build an email list.
- How to build my email list
Trust – Build It
The hardest part for marketers is getting the people to subscribe in the first place. How do you get them to the point to begin with?
If you’ve been trying to get an email list up and running, most of what I’m going to tell you here will not be earth shattering news, but when I started I needed to get some clarification, and that is what I am trying to give you in a series of articles.
The first thing, and I know it seems obvious, is to get them interested in your site. Then you need to think of how to convince them to give you their email address.
There are two major ways of convincing them to give up their email address:
- You need to have content that really interests them, tells them something new, makes them think and engages them. You will need to show them you know what you’re talking about and that you are selling or promoting products that they want and will get value from, OR
- The offer you have available to them is outstanding – an incredibly low price or you are giving away something of real value. This offer can be a free ebook, some training, a special video, etc. Remember, you need to keep them on your list so make sure that your “free stuff” really is worth something to them. Please always remember to ask yourself this question – if someone does subscribe, what do I have to offer them?
A Simple Start
My initial recommendation if you have little or no budget is to offer a free newsletter. What several people have done is to publish their posts originally as newsletter articles, and then after a few days, publish these posts, as you normally would, on your website. You can even change your blog roll to read “newsletters”. This way, at least your subscribers will feel that they are getting something from you.
Make sure that you have a few newsletters written and “in the chute, ready to go”. You want to be able to build on your relationship relatively quickly, so for the first three or four weeks, you want to start the communication flowing.
Everything still leads to good content on your site. You can drive traffic there through Facebook, Google Plus, Pinterest, Twitter, etc. but without having something worth reading or viewing, it will be a waste.
If you have been able to start your list already, the chances are that if someone has subscribed to it, they already have some trust in you and it is unlikely that your emails will end up in their spam folder.
When they signed up, it was presumably because your website or something on it was of interest to them. It is therefore likely that they will also be interested in anything else that you may send them in the future. In that respect you are halfway there – you just need to make sure that you have something that they feel is valuable to them.
Do not go and buy an email list
You can find sites that will sell you a ready made email list. Please avoid this!
To begin with, the people on this list are almost definitely not interested in what you have to offer, they do not know you, they did not sign up for your emails and in all probability your messages will end up in their spam folder.
More importantly, there is a possibility that you will be flagged as a “spammer”. The email addresses you buy may have been used many times over and, if you’re like me, at some point after receiving numerous unsolicited emails, your messages will be reported as spam.
What’s so bad about that, you may ask. Well, for a start your company will be flagged to the reputable email service providers (AWeber, GetResponse, Mailchimp, iContact among others) who will refuse to operate with a purchased list; they do not want to deal with the complications that will arise. They will demand that you use what is known as “opt-in” customers only. i.e. your customer opted, on your website, to receive emails from you.
In time your email service provider will prove to be invaluable to you as they will be processing your email campaigns, your marketing correspondence and will be operating what should be the “auto-pilot” phase of your operations. You need them as you will require a top class, highly reputable, reliable provider. Don’t screw that relationship up!
Do Something – Let The Pros Build Your List
Many marketers, online or offline, will tell you that a major regret for them was “I wish I had started my list when I began my website or business”.
There are a few fine email providers that can basically get things started for you, among them is “GetResponse”. They will walk you through the setup, work with you on designs and have a myriad of tools available for you to use, such as autoresponders, professional and elegant templates to ensure that your emails look first class and lots more – they even offer a free trial so perhaps it’s best if you check it out for yourself…
