Are you wondering why no one is subscribing to your email list? You’re producing fantastic content, services, and products that people love but no one wants to discover more.
Then you probably need some email opt-in ideas to help increase your email list.
The thing is, you are asking people to give you their contact details and sometimes this can be harder than getting blood out of a stone.
Our email inboxes are crazy busy, with all the latest news, products, sales pitches, and the occasional email from an African prince who wants to give you all his money. If you just send him the 16-digit number on your bank card…
Therefore, it’s always good practice to give your readers a reason to part with their details. If you just have a sign-up box on your website, 99% of your visitors will give it a stiff ignoring.
How do you build that all-important email list and increase your click-through and open rates? By having an irresistible opt-in offer your readers simply can’t refuse and building an effective automated welcome series.
If you have read –
Why Building an Email List for Your Blog is Extremely Important
and
How to Get your First Subscribers and Build an Effective Email Marketing List
you will know the power of email marketing and why you need it for your blog and small business.
Email marketing is the most important thing you can do for your business and if you haven’t got a strategy in place already, now is the time to do it!
What is an Email opt-in offer I hear you ask
An email opt-in offer, or lead magnet, is an offer you put up in your sign-up and pop-up boxes with offers your readers can’t refuse.
If they are already on your website, they have come here for a reason and will more than likely want or need what you have to offer.
The opt-in offer could be anything from a PDF document, a cheat sheet, an eBook or a mini course that thanks your customers/readers for signing up to your website.
The email opt-in offer can be sitewide – like a checklist PDF document for new bloggers, or a more niche opt-in which is relevant to the blog you are reading at that point in time.
Why do I need an email opt-in offer?
Everyone likes freebies right?
Like I said in the opening paragraph if you are just asking people to leave their name and email address and merrily go on their way, what incentive do they have to do it?
They may like your content enough to sign up. But, I have to admit, I very rarely sign-up for anything unless I get something out of it in return.
My time is precious and so is my email inbox.
The only time I sign up for a subscription to a blog or website is because they are offering to send something valuable to my inbox. Something I will read and want to find out more about, so I am more likely to open the link and go back to their website.
What are the best email opt-in offers?
- Offers that are quick and easy to make!
- You don’t want to be creating another blog post or course and send it to your readers. Why would they then come to your website to get this information?
- Downloadable content that your target audience will find informational and useful.
- A quick manual or eBook. What are your most visited blog posts? You can condense them into a manual for your readers to follow.
- Giveaways. You could give your audience a chance to win a service or product. However, as with Instagram giveaways, be extremely cautious with this offer. You might find a huge influx of new subscribers, but they’ll quickly abandon you once you start sending them more emails.
- A resource library or a member-only section. You could have an area on your blog that is a password-protected page with all your downloadable content. Or a member-only page where they get free access to the latest news and services, your courses and much more!
10 email opt-in ideas to get you started
If you’re still scratching your head trying to come up with ideas after the list above, here are 10 email opt-in ideas that should help increase your email list and get more readers.
You need to know who your target audience is first so that you are tailoring your opt-ins to the right people.
1. A Checklist
This is a quick and easy downloadable piece of content to make for your subscribers.
Depending on your niche, you could give them valuable pieces of information that they can follow in their own time.
Example:
I could create a checklist of how to start a blog. This would include things like – Find a Niche > Choose a Domain Name > Choose a Host and Content Management System > etc.
2. An eBook
This is a hugely popular opt-in offer and I can see why.
Blogs can be messy and contain a huge amount of information. Sometimes this can be a bit overwhelming for new visitors trying to find the information they need.
An eBook could be just the thing they’re looking for. You don’t want to go too much into detail on a subject as this could potentially be a course or a one-to-one session.
Example:
You could start with a 10-page eBook with a step-by-step guide on how to do something.
For this website, I could take a beginner blogger through a detailed plan of how to start their blog, and what tools they will need and guide them through to publishing their first blog.
3. A Daily Challenge
Everyone loves a challenge! If you can present this challenge as something that will also help your reader, you have got a 2-for-1 opt-in offer!
Example:
Create a 30-day challenge to get a blog up and running. The challenge can give your customer a daily to-do task to take them through the process of building a blog.
The challenge could include linkbacks to your website to help them with the process every day.
4. A Downloadable Product
This applies to every niche!
It could include a meal planner if you’re a food blogger, a print or illustration if you’re a designer, a workout sheet if you’re a fitness blogger or a spreadsheet which could cover all niches.
Example:
I could create dozens of different Pin templates for Pinterest and let my readers download them for use on their blogs.
5. Discount
Probably one of the most popular ways to create an opt-in is to give your customers a discount on your products.
This doesn’t have to be for just product-based businesses. If you are a service-based business or blogger, you could give discounts on your courses or eBooks.
Example:
I could offer a Pinterest Pin template bundle and if they were to buy 2 bundles, I could give a 3rd away for free.
6. A Course Taster
If you have courses on your website, or you are about to launch a course, offering a little taster of what your course is about is a great way to market your new course and lead to people subscribing to your email list.
Example:
If the course has several modules, let the subscriber have the first module for free!
7. Quizzes
I love a quiz! Especially if it helps me to understand more about myself or what kind of service or product I should buy.
These are quick and easy with instant results, a fantastic way to increase your email list!
Example:
I often have people asking what my interior style is over on melaniejadedesign.com as it can sometimes be hard to define an individual style.
I could create a Quiz with people answering questions about their homes which would point them in the direction of their closest interior design style.
8. Video Training
I have watched a lot of YouTube in the past to get my blogs up and running. I spent hours figuring out how to build my Pinterest account and how to build my website.
Visual training is always easier to follow than reading it on a blog.
Example:
I think one of the hardest things when setting up a website, is knowing where to begin! There is so much information out there, even YouTube can become a tangled web of data.
I could send a video file of a step-by-step guide to setting up a website from the very beginning and help my subscribers finally set up a blog or website of their own.
9. A Giveaway or Prize
I think you have to be careful with offering a giveaway as an email opt-in offer, although they can still work!
It all depends on what you are offering.
I have had many giveaways on my Instagram account, and it leads to lots of new followers. Thankfully, I don’t tend to have a huge influx of unfollowing after the giveaway has ended. Although it is hard to track where the people who unfollow came from in the first place! If you keep your giveaway relevant to your niche, you should be OK!
Example:
I could run a giveaway offering a lucky winner a large bundle of Pinterest pins, cheat sheets, an eBook and access to my blogging and social media courses.
10. Resource Library
A resource library is where you can find exclusive content that is not available to all on your blog or website.
This could be in the form of a members-only page or a subscriber club.
Example:
With so much information to take in on the blog, I could create a subscriber club where they could find all my advice and free downloads in one place, with a forum for subscribers to chat and interact with one another.
The above are just a few examples of an email opt-in offer to get you started and help you build your email list. There are so many ways you can make subscribing more appealing to your audience and readers.
We all love free stuff!
What next?
You should now have a good idea of what content you can provide to make your opt-ins more appealing. Now you need to create them.
Depending on your email service provider (I recommend MailerLite – you can read why here) you will need to upload your PDFs, spreadsheets, audio files etc to their platform so that it can be sent directly to your new subscriber once they press that subscribe button!
The hard part is coming up with ideas and creating them.
Once you have that in the bag, your email service provider will do the rest and your opt-in ideas to increase your email list are good to go!
More on Email Marketing…
Why Building an Email List for your Blog is Extremely Important
How to Get your First Subscribers and Build an Effective Email Marketing List
