Something you need to consider when you build your first list is the dreaded “S” word – Spam. Many think that email marketing is spam and you’ll sometimes hear people ask others “is email marketing spam”? I’m here to tell you that whilst some consider it to be – and show you how you can do it right.

Let’s start off by looking at why people tend to think that email marketing is spam.

Take a look in your spam box. Take a look at your inbox. I’m willing to bet that you’ve got some form of penis enlargement advert or make money at home scam in there. And this is the problem. People see this and instinctively go into “email is spam” mode, thinking that most of their email is spam.

But when you build your first list, and hopefully continue down the email marketing route later on, if you follow these tips, then you’ll be fine.

Be careful what you type

Open up those spam emails again and take a look at what their actual content is. 99% of the time you’ll find some words like “Free”, “Money and “Sex”. Email providers like Google and Microsoft work around the hours developing algorithms that scan these messages as they come in to your email account looking for these trigger words. Once they see them, the majority of the time they’ll mark them as spam and put them in your spam box.

The way to overcome this is to be yourself when writing out your messages and autoresponders. Instead of saying something along the lines of

10,000 Free subscribers for your list

You would word it like so:

Let me personally show you how to grow your list by 10,000 subscribers at no cost to you

Apart from the second statement sounding much better and adding a personal touch, your avoiding some of the trigger words that might send your email to the dreaded spam box.

But please, don’t think your clever and try to bypass these filters. It might work, but really? You look stupid when your email contains something like:

10,000 F.ree subscribers for your list

This concept should be familiar to you because it revolves around building trust with your email list. It boils down to the fact they gave you their email address with the impression you’r somebody they can trust. If you start sending emails that land in the spam box or ones that have the ‘spam’ feel at all and it’s a sure-fire way to loose subscribers.

A small compilation of these tricks

In my eyes, type an email like this and your begging to loose credibility – are you that desperate to get that word in the email? Now I know I might get some flack for this, and several marketers who do extremely well use this technique, but I don’t care.

Death by hyperlinks

There’s a chance that when you build your first list that your eager to start earning some money. And as we know, email marketing can be a great way to do this. But, there can be such a thing as sending out too much links in your emails. Again, this closely relates to the concept of building trust with your email list, and whilst you may not end up in the spam box for too much links you may end up loosing subscribers because they feel their being spammed with affiliate products all the time.

Let me unsubscribe… I’ll do anything

Another practice that might make subscribers and possibly email service companies classify your emails as spam is how easy it is to unsubscribe. Now it might seem a trivial thing, but spammers are notorious for this, their unsubscribe links only work about .05% of the time. Now I’m not saying that email marketers are the same (in fact in accordance with spam laws they must include an unsubscribe link at the bottom of each email), but some try to subconsciously direct you away from the unsubscribe button by padding out the bottom of the email.

Unsure what this means? Take a look at the following image and all is explained:

Why the need for all that space?

Do you see what I mean? There is absolutely no need for that much space to appear from the marketer’s name down to the unsubscribe section of the email. It’s annoying and something that I hate. If your sending out good, quality content to your subscribers then there is absolutely no need for you to be doing this.

Only scratching the surface

Now were only scratching the surface here, but the two points above are what I consider to be two of the most important point to help make sure your email list isn’t classified as spam – either by your subscribers or the email service companies. Please leave your comments below if you agree, disagree or have something else to add to the list.

When you build your first list a very important aspect to keep in mind is your users trust. If your users have trust in your knowledge and think of you as the expert then they will value your opinion on any services or products that you show them. This will mean more affiliate commissions for you and will make sure you don’t have a bunch of people un-subscribing from your list.

How to Build Trust

In previous articles I’ve already showed you how you should start your autoresponder off and this can help build a lot of trust in your email list. But, it doesn’t end there.

Giving your list free content or products will greatly increase their trust in you and they will want to support you by buying more of your products. When you start building your email list, place emphasis on building up trust with your subscribers and not making some money. Once you have their trust, only then should you start mixing in promotional emails (i.e. promoting your own products or promoting affiliate products). Personally, I’d say for every 3-4 emails you send to your subscribers with free, valuable content, send out 1 promotional email.

Spend time on making your free content actually valuable. Don’t just copy and paste some article you find online, put some thought into it and make sure it actually provides some real value. Building trust is the most important thing you could focus on when you build your first list so do not pass it by. Create high quality information for your list and you will receive high quality conversions and revenue in return.

But it doesn’t end here. Just because you’ve gained their trust doesn’t mean the user will for certain by from you. Let us break this down with an example. Take James Reynold’s blog – Incredible Internet Marketing.

Now, he offers free, valuable, useful content to his readers, but also promotes affiliate products. He goes about this in a way that I think is the best. He uses the trust he’s built up and makes it personal – he uses the word ‘I’ a lot as it tends to make readers side with the author. Take this article for example:

http://www.incredibleinternetmarketing.com/news/james-schramko-traffic-grab-review-bonus/

Here he doesn’t simply say “here’s a product, go buy it through my affiliate link”. This would be stupid and could loose him subscribers. SO what does he do? He writes a good, solid post, talking about his background, the product’s background and what you get in the product itself. He also offers a bonus, but that’s more like the icing on top of the cake.

[note] In short, don’t just blindly promote a product through your list – take the time to build the product up for the users and leverage the trust you’ve built with the subscribers to its full extent. [/note]

Benefits of Building Trust

I’ve already told you about a few benefits, but this can not be overlooked. If your users have a lot of trust in you it could mean the difference between a $10 email or a $100 email. It is actually a lot better to have 100 people that really trust you on your list then 1000 people who you never gave any value to. More people is not always better when it comes to email lists.

Another factor that will build trust in your list is to stay within your niche. If you build a list on how to lose belly fat then don’t send some promotional emails about a cool new dating site or a product to make money online. You could send some other weight loss products since if they are interested in losing belly fat they probably wouldn’t mind losing fat in other areas as well. But stay as close to your niche as possible when sending promotional emails and people won’t just see spam showing up in their inbox.

At one point or another in your list building career your going to need to create a squeeze page. It’s a key practice utilized by many marketers, and in this article we’ll take a look at what a squeeze page is and what you should include in one. If you’ve come here from the free report I’m offering, I hope this complements what you read there. Don’t know what I’m talking about? Don’t worry, use the signup form in the sidebar, and you’ll get your free copy too!

What is a Squeeze Page?

At its most basic, a squeeze page is simply a page that houses your optin form and any accompanying videos/text. It is known as a squeeze page since usually there is no exits except for opting-in to the email list (exits refer to the theory that the only way the users can leave the page is by either handing over their email address or clicking back on the browser). You want to squeeze as many visitors as you can into your list. Your page should consist of a simple call to action telling the visitor to enter their email to signup and receive a free weight loss course or whatever your niche is.

Build Your First Squeeze Page:

Before you build your first squeeze page you should take a look at what other people are doing with squeeze pages. Here is a blog post outlining 13 powerful squeeze pages:

http://www.codrutturcanu.com/13-best-squeeze-page-examples/

There are few things that every squeeze page needs to be successful.

Headline – You need a powerful attention grabbing headline that will make your visitors want to read the rest of the page and eventually opt-in to your email list. Using “Free” in the headline always works.

Images/Video – If you are not too shy about being in front of the camera then having a video of yourself talking on the squeeze page will make a huge conversion impact. This will build instant trust in people once they can see you talking and you will definitely see the benefit in your list size.

Opt-in – Of course, you will need your opt-in form on your squeeze page. It has shown that having this high up on the page increases conversions since the visitor can see exactly what they need to do right off the bat.

Call to Action – You want a call to action so the visitor knows exactly what they need to do to get the free weight loss course. Something like “Enter your name and email below to download the free weight loss course now”

Keep it Short – You want your squeeze page short and to hopefully load the entire thing just in one window (no scroll bar). You want your visitors to be able to see everything on the page immediately as well this will reduce loading times so you don’t lose people because your page is filled with graphics.

No Links – Don’t put any other links in your squeeze page leading to other parts of your site. The whole reason for the visitor to be there is so they enter their email address and sign-up to your list. Don’t confuse them with a ton of links going to other pages or your other websites.

When you build your first list you will want a strong and powerful squeeze page, spend a lot of time on this as this is your first impression on the visitors and you want to make a good one. Make sure to use these tips and take a look at a lot of examples and copy what other people are doing. Remember, if you find a squeeze page that interests you it probably will catch a lot of other peoples attention as well.

Now when I was writing this article I was planning to just leave it as it is. But, sometimes people need visual cues to help them along. So, here’s a special screencast I recorded, applying these points to a squeeze page I created for a client of mine.

[vsw id="QS3vIl-i22k" source="youtube" width="600" height="450" autoplay="no"]

When your starting to think about email marketing, or anything related to sending out email to your customers/subscribers, your going to need some kind of email service or autoresponder. In this article we’ll be looking at what an autoresponder is, and some things to keep in mind when choosing one.

What is an Autoresponder?

Before we begin, keep in mind that your autoresonder can be self-hosted, or you can pay a monthly fee to a service such as Aweber, iContact or Mail Chimp.

Whenever a user opts-in to your list an autoresponder will automatically send an email to the user containing whatever you like. This can be information in the email or an attached file. Usually it is some sort of welcome message. The great thing about autoresponders is that you can setup a schedule through your email service. For example, you could setup 7 emails to be sent out each day after a user is opted-in to your email list. This is definitely something you want to setup when you build your first list. This way you can create a mini-course over email that your users will enjoy to look out for every day.

When thinking about going down the self-hosted route, you need to think about such things as:

• Infrastructure: Does your current web hosting account allow you to install the email/autoresponder software to start with? Is your server powerful enough?
• Email Blacklist: Is your server IP/Address blacklisted by major email providers? Get blacklisted and your email messages won’t get delivered.
• Security / Updates: You’ll need to keep your server and software up to date as well as patching up any security holes.

On the other hand, when you sign up to a service such as Aweber, iContact or Mail Chimp as your paying for all of this. The only concession is that as the number of subscribers you have grows, you will end up paying more.
But this is something you must consider when you want to start building your first list or start to take email marketing seriously. It’s my personal recommendation that you start with a paid service such as the ones previously mentioned. In this way you can cancel at any moment and don’t have to worry about things on your end as mentioned above.

Setting up an Autoresponder:

Most internet marketers recommend to setup an autoresponder for 7 or 14 days after your user initially opts-in to your list. This way you can advertise that the visitor will receive an email course upon signing up and will be more likely to opt-in to your list. This could be a 7 day weight loss course where each day you give a different exercise targeted to lose belly fat. The great thing about this is that it will build trust in your users, which we will talk about in another article, which will make them want to open up your promotional emails more often (which means more money for you).

Email Services:

To build your first list you want to make sure you choose a good email service with a powerful autoresponder system. Here are my two favorite email services:

• Aweber – This is #1 in my opinion, there are a ton of features for setting up scheduling for autoresponders as well as broadcast emails and split testing different titles or email content. There are a ton of reporting options to track which emails are doing well and which links your users are clicking within the email. It is a paid only service but it is relatively cheap for the lowest package ($19/month) and it definitely gives you enough value for your money. If you are serious about getting into email marketing and building a list then you should choose Aweber.
• iContact – Another great player in the autoresponder field. One great benefit is that they offer a free 500 subscriber account so you can try the service out. There is a 2000 message limit on your account per month, but it’s a great way to get your foot in the email marketing door. They offer pretty much the same features as any other autoresponder service on the web.
• Mail Chimp – The great thing about Mail Chimp is that they have a free account option for people just starting with email marketing. If you are on a tight budget or just getting started and don’t want to commit to paying quite yet, then this is a great alternative to Aweber. There are not as many features as Aweber but there is still a lot and you have a ton of customization over how your emails will look. If you are willing to pay some money I would go with Aweber but if you want to start out for free then choose Mail Chimp.

When you build your first list setting up an autoresponder course for 7 or 14 days will really increase your revenue potential in the long run and should not be overlooked. Make sure you spend time on setting up quality emails because it will really pay off. Email marketing can be highly profitable especially for long term revenue.

Your looking to build your first list otherwise you wouldn’t be here. This article will summarise what list building is,  take a look at the act of building an email list of subscribers that you can send out emails to and hopefully make some money. You will hear many internet marketers say that the money is in the list, which is very true. I’ll start with a quick overview of what exactly is involved in list building and then go on to teach you how to build your first list.

An example popup presenting an user with a free gift in return for subscribing to his list

What is List Building?

Your looking to build your first list, and in order to do this there are several steps which you must follow, but the first, and possibly most important step is to sign-up to an email marketing service (often called auto-responder services), such as Aweber, iContact or Mail Chimp. Once your signed up and have set up your list you’ll need to get your opt-in form.

The opt-in form is a simple sign-up form that you can place on your website which will ask for the users name and email (or other things) to be added to your list. It’s usual for marketers to offer a free report or some other type of incentive to get users to sign-up. Generally there are two ways in which users can be added to your email list.

1. Single opt-in: This means the user enters their details and begin to receive your emails without confirming their email address.
2. Double opt-in: This makes the user confirm their email and verify that they in fact want to be on your list.

After this is done then you then have the ability to send out emails to the entire list at any time you like. In these emails you can promote your own products, promote affiliate campaigns or just send more general information or articles with regards to the service or product you offer.

Build your First List:

Before you build your first list you will need to decide which niche market you would like to enter. It could be anything from weight loss, internet marketing, or specifics within the niche like SEO optimization or losing belly fat. List building in an overcrowded niche is not recommended since there will be a lot of competition and list out there. Someone is much more likely to pay attention to your emails if they are on only one list for losing belly fat specifically then if you are just another weight loss newsletter out of the 5 they are signed up on.

Once you have decided on which niche you will want to make a small ebook or pre-written email to send as soon as the user has opted-in to your list. This could be anything from basic exercises on how to lose belly fat, or simple tips to SEO optimize their website. Advertising that the visitor will receive something immediately after signing up will greatly increase your conversion rate from visitors to opt-ins.

Now it is time to actually start list building and sign-up for an email service. In the next article I will show you my two favorite services to use, but for now let’s assume you use Aweber. Once you are signed up you will need to create your email list and get the web form or opt-in form. Hopefully you already have a website but if not you will need to purchase a domain and hosting as well. Setting up the form is as simple as placing the code onto your website and once that is setup then you can start driving traffic and building opt-ins. In a later article I will give you some best practices for setting up your squeeze page where your opt-in form will be placed, so that you get high conversion rates.

Build Your First List – A Summary:

This is just the beginning  and there’s so much more to learn. The site is full of articles on what to do next and how to take your marketing campaign to the next level – but for now, congratulations, you’ve just started the journey to build your first list.