How to Build Your Email List
You’re all over the fact that building your email list is one of the key things you can do to build your business, yea? If not, you can recap on a few good reasons why you need to jump on this. Email marketing is the most effective way to connect with your audience. You control the experience. You own the channel. You can serve, serve, serve your audience into loyal, raving fans who love what you’re offering and can’t wait to hear from you. Boom 💥
Naturally, the very next question is: how do I do this? There’s a stack of research and battle-tested strategies out there for building email lists. A few quick searches can turn into hours of rabbit holes about how to write the perfect subject line, what designs to use on landing pages, split testing your content, and the list goes on. We'll explore these topics in greater detail in separate posts. For now, let’s focus on setting a solid foundation for you to build an effective email list.
Here’s some tips on how to build an email list for your business:
1 / Pick Your Email Platform
First thing to sort out is where you’ll be sending out these sweet email updates from. You wanna look a bit more professional than shooting a quick email out from your Gmail account (and, you sure want to make sure you’re compliant with email marketing and spam laws…). Dumping a bunch of addresses into the BCC field like your relative did to send those chain email jokes won’t really work either… You need a tool that will help you manage your list, organise it into meaningful segments, as well as make a pretty looking email your audience will appreciate.
There’s numerous options when it comes to email platforms. Which one you pick will depend on several things – the features it offers, the level of support that’s offered, what other systems it connects to, as well as ultimately, its cost. We love Flodesk here at The Story Keeper. Flodesk helps you design beautiful emails that people love to get. You can divide your lists into segments as you’d expect. Create opt-in forms you can drop into your website to get new subscribers (we’ll cover this in point 3 below). You can even use the Workflows feature that helps you automate some of your sending.
Log in and get setup with your chosen email platform. If you haven’t signed up to an email platform, we genuinely think you’ll enjoy using Flodesk. You can sign up for Flodesk, take advantage of their 30-day free trial, and head over to Flodesk University for some helpful content to help you get underway 🙌
2 / Set Up Your Domain Email Address
You need to have an email address set up that runs off your domain, e.g.: hello@storykeeper.co. Like we mentioned above, you wanna look professional, as well as making sure you’re sticking to the rules. Depending on your website platform and hosting situation, your emails will be set up via the Admin panel, your hosting dashboard, or services like Google Workspace or Microsoft 365.
If you don’t have a website at all, you can still go ahead and register a URL for your business (now’s the time!!). You can sign up for a service like Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 to set up your email address and get yourself started in a couple of straight-forward steps.
3 / Create an Opt-in Form
Here’s where the rubber starts to hit the road! You need to have a way that people can sign up to be on your email list. Here’s where an opt-in form comes in. In various locations around your website – your homepage, the website footer, underneath blog posts – you want to place a sign up form that encourages people to subscribe to your email list. Use a title and short description that briefly describes the value your subscriber should expect to receive by being a part of your community. Get a bit playful and be fun and engaging. Subscribe Now belongs back in 1999…
4 / Share Some Good News
Now it’s time to put the proverbial pen to paper and write your first newsletter to your subscribers. But, WAIT!! ✋ Before you go hammering them with this new offer, or that cool thing you need to promote, remember this: you’re here to serve. Your subscribers want a relationship with you. Relationships are built on trust. So, deliver the value you promised when they signed up so they can stay informed, make progress with their projects and goals, or be entertained.
Stuck for some inspo?? A good way to self-educate is to subscribe to some people you admire that are out there doing this well and kicking some goals. They might be from within your industry. They might not. They may be marketers, artisans, subject-matter experts in varying fields, or simply a fellow human with an interesting perspective to share. Whoever you’re sourcing some inspiration from, make sure you reflect on what you think works and what you could do differently. You’ll find this immensely helpful in finding your voice and structuring your content.
5 / Roll Out the Welcome Mat (a Welcome Message)
When someone hands over their precious email address by subscribing to your list, make sure you say thanks! The way to do that in email marketing land is to fire off a welcome message. Let your new subscriber know that you’re grateful they’re along for the ride. Remind them about the value they’ll receive from being a part of the action – weekly updates, exclusive deals, invitations to events and workshops, and any other fun stuff that you’ve got planned!
6 / Dish Out a Freebie
You don’t need to fact check us on this, people flippin’ love free stuff!! Offering someone a free gift (even more, an unexpected one) is a quick way to develop a bond with them. If you shoot your new subscriber a beautiful, inspiring, helpful value-add, sparks of email-friendship will fly ✨
Here’s some common examples of opt-in freebies that you’ll find in the wild:
Checklists
PDF Guides (check out The Story Keeper Client Guides 👌)
Video Tutorials
Introductory Courses
Discount Codes
Checklists
Stuck for what to provide? Have a think on what the biggest problem your client is trying to solve. What’s one thing that you could throw their way that will help them out with that? Your freebie will likely not solve the whole problem, but it’ll be a great first step. You’ll want to encourage your subscribers to sign up for your courses or workshops that will further support them. Or, to buy your products that will save them time implementing a complete solution. Find something that strongly resonates with your audience so that they’re more than happy to slide you their email address.
7 / Coming in to Land
And by this we mean create a dedicated landing page for your signup form. Don’t hide your enticing offer on one of your regular pages where some people won’t find it. Have a dedicated page that clearly introduces your freebie offering, and the opportunity to sign up to the email list in order to receive it. Keep it clean and simple – remove any content from the page that’s not relevant, take off any links and the like that might be distracting for visitors landing on the page.
8 / Drive That Traffic
It’s time to get the word out now that you’ve got something to share! Because it’s a stand-alone page, you can take the URL, create a graphic or two and drop a link to your offer wherever it makes sense for your audience. This could be a:
Facebook post
Insta Reel or Stories
Blog post (your own and with other colleagues and brands you collaborate with).
Facebook Groups
Pinterest post
Ad space on your website
Dropping a quick P.S. line in your email signature
Now, grab that link and get sharing 📣📣
9 / Plan Ahead
Consistent. It’s one word you want your subscribers to use when describing you to others. A surefire way to make sure you’re consistent is developing a content plan. Brainstorm topics, take a look at anything seasonal, or any upcoming events that you can tie in with and promote. Get a bit of a list sorted for the next month or two (or three) and get a head start on writing now. That way you’re always feeling relaxed, you're being a great guide for your audience as you take them on a journey, and they’ll love you for it. Way better than firing off that half-baked idea last minute that doesn’t quite land… 😬
10 / Test, Test, then Test Some More
Build a bit of a process you run through after you’re done writing and think you’re ready to hit the big send button. Read, then re-read the content. Does it make sense? Could it be a little sharper or to-the-point in spots? Are there any broken links? Have I run a test-send of the email to my devices? Does the email look the way I’m expecting it to?
Spray and pray is not the marketing strategy you want to employ 🙅. You need to be about what works (and why) so that you can continually improve your content and delivery. Your subscribers will notice and reward you with continued loyalty. Once the above is bedded in and feeling second nature to you, let your curiosity out and get an analytical eye over what’s working and what could be improved. Most email platforms will help you measure certain email metrics that will help you improve – open rates, bounce rates, click through rates, etc. You can also divide your audience in two halves and perform a ‘split test’, sending one version of your email to one half, and another version to the other half. Don’t go crazy and send two different emails! What you can do is make subtle changes and measure their impact on open rates and conversions. Try variations on the subject line, the from address, headlines, key parts of the copy, or the call to action and compare the results. If your email platform doesn’t have specific split or A/B testing features, you can still perform a test like this (albeit a little more manually):
Segment your main list into two halves.
Duplicate the email message (once you’ve got it polished and ready to send).
Schedule the send for each version of the email.
You can log the results for each send in a spreadsheet or Google Sheet and compare them there.
Need some help kicking off your email list ?
There you have it! There’s a bit to getting your email list building foundations in place 😅 But, it’s 💯 worth the investment of your time and effort. Drop us a line and let us know if this post was helpful for you. We’d love to hear your feedback!
If you’re stuck on something or want some help strategising, book a 1:1 mentoring session with Bec from Bec Zacher Photography (Founder of The Story Keeper)! Bec has worked with numerous photography business owners to dial things in and take their business to the next level. Check out her mentoring page and book your session, stat!
Happy emailing!!
