My clients have heard me talk about the importance of having an email list. Your email list is one of your biggest business assets. You don’t own your social media list, but you do own your email list. However, if your subscriber numbers are low with no sign of growth on the horizon, it might feel hopeless.
The problem is, trying to build an email list is a catch 22. You need traffic to get more subscribers, and it’s difficult to get traffic when you don’t have subscribers. What can you do?
Get More Traffic with Paid Ads
By strategically targeting digital ads to your ideal audience, you can send new traffic to your opt-in/offer page and enjoy increased conversion rates of your page. Even better, with split testing of your ads and landing page, you can refine your ads, copy and offer to make sure you’re attracting the clients you want to attract rather than people who are just looking for freebies.
To run digital ads to your landing pages:
• A offer you’re audience is interested in (Perhaps try doing a free or low cost virtual training series or a webinar.)
• Copy that clearly explains how your offer is going to help your ideal audience
Where to Place Your Ad
Once you know what your offer is going to be, and have your landing page, you’ll need to decide where to run your ads. You have many choices, from Facebook to Google, to YouTube to Pinterest.
The key is first to determine where your audience is most likely to be already hanging out. If they’re on LinkedIn, running ads on Facebook wouldn’t make much sense.
Consider the costs of ads on various platforms, as well. Ads on Facebook can cost less and are often less competitive than Google Adwords.
Start Small, Then Make Adjustments
Once you’ve decided which platform to run your ads on, you’ll need to set your budget and begin running a small set of A/B test ads. I suggest starting with $5 – $10/day at the beginning so you can start to gather data about which ads are more likely to work best.
Watch your ad’s audience reach and impressions, track the click through rates and track your conversions. You can also create split tests of your landing page and your offers. If you don’t know your ideal audience yet, I suggest you A/B test that, as well. For example, if you find that women between the ages of 34 and 50 are clicking on your ad, but are not opting in, you might want to remove them from your audience.
Start by running ads for a free offer first. Remember, these new audiences don’t know who you are yet so conversions for a free offer will convert better—especially if your main offer is expensive.
Your free offer doesn’t need to be an expensive one. If you are asking someone to give you their email address in return for your offer, it needs to be something valued around $10 – $15.
Mistakes to Avoid with Your Ad Copy
Have you ever clicked on someone’s ad because you saw something you wanted, only to land on a webpage that doesn’t offer the thing you clicked on the ad for? It’s frustrating. You feel lied to. It’s that kind of ad to landing page mismatch that will destroy your conversions.
Remember, the copy you use in your ad is essentially making a promise to the audience. If your landing page doesn’t follow through on that promise, your readers will bounce fro myour site, and you’ll have wasted any money you spent getting them to your site. So, before running your ads, be sure your ad heading, creative, and copy all go with the message on your landing page.
In the past, paid digital advertising was only used by big companies or marketers who had a lot of money to spare; however, today they’re more cost-effective than ever. Technology makes them easy to create and track.
If you haven’t yet tried to do this easy traffic generation method, it’s time to start with a few dollars a day and do some experimenting. You might just find your email list—and bottomo line—growing.