Growing your Email List with Social Media

Do you want more email subscribers? Are you looking for ways to move social media fans and followers to your email list?

Here are ways to use social media to build your email list.

 

Why Email?

At least 91 per cent of consumers check their email every day. One of the most heavily used communication channels to date, email marketing is considered the third overall most effective channel for lead generation for marketers in 2013, producing 13 per cent of all leads.

To grow your email list, there are ways you can make use of the engagement you have with your social media audience to turn your followers into subscribers who’ll become long-term customers.

 

Here are five tips:

Use a simple sign-up form

Businesses of all sizes should set up a simple email sign-up form on their social channels to make it easy for your most invested fans to easily subscribe to your list.

 

On Facebook, dedicate a tab at the top right-hand side of your page for an email form. Then, people simply have to click on the icon to visit the sign-up form.

 

Make sure to use an image and call to action in this tab to incite people to click and subscribe. There are many different app options to add and set up an email sign-up form to your Facebook page. Typically, email clients have a custom Facebook app that syncs with your list from Facebook.

To add one of these apps to your Facebook page, visit the top right app banner and click on the drop-down menu indicated by a number with an arrow pointing downwards.

 

It isn’t possible to host a landing page with an email sign-up form on Twitter or Google+. To encourage your followers to subscribe, it is recommended that you add a link in the bio and/or About section on Twitter or Google+ to the email sign-up form you host on your website.

Your Twitter bio has limited space, but there’s room to add a shortened link to your email sign-up form and a link to your website.

 

Your Google+ page has an extensive About section where you can include a shortened link to your email sign-up form at the top of your description.

 

Preview premium content on your social channels

Many businesses create premium content they offer for free once a person signs up for their email list.

 

If you have eBooks, white papers, infographics, long-form articles or other premium content you give away, gate each one with an email sign-up form landing page to generate subscribers from that content.

 

Tweet, post and share excerpts of content from your premium resources on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and Google+ to drive interest and traffic to the landing pages that gate them. Always include a visual component to these updates to ensure you’re receiving the most clicks, engagement and traffic possible.

 

Use concise, intriguing and informative copy in your social updates, as well as a link tagged properly with Google Analytics UTM parameters to track which social media networks drive traffic to your lead generation resources.

 

Share an incentive for newsletter sign-ups

Incentives often help when it comes to driving more email sign-ups for your list. A little push is the only thing some people need to take action and subscribe.

Social media will draw further attention to your incentive.

Many ecommerce stores give shoppers 10-20 per cent off a purchase when they sign up for their email list. A discount, exclusive content, a free sample, a special thank-you, a coupon, etc., are all things your business can share on social media to encourage people to subscribe to your email list.

Be sure to include an image and a strong call to action when posting about one of these incentives.

 

Host webinars to gain subscribers

Hosting a webinar about your business or industry is an engaging way to share the human side of your business by presenting a person from your organisation to discuss a relevant topic with your audience.

 

One of the goals of a webinar for your business is to capture leads in the form of email subscribers.

If you host your webinar on a Google hangout on air, be sure to share links to resources that have a landing page sign-up form to collect emails from your efforts.

 

Use social media posts to drive traffic to these sign-up forms and your email list will grow.