251: What You Should Know About Getting Started with Email

Everything You Need to Know About Getting Started with Email Have people been telling you for years that you need to create an email list for your blog? Is it time to finally bite the bullet? Let’s talk about email – how to get started, email providers, types of messages, opt-ins, and sequences or auto-responders. When it comes to choosing an email provider, start simple You don't need all the bells and whistles. Get subscribers used to hearing from you. Send a simple email message once a week or so to keep in touch with readers. The more useful and actionable the message, the better. Readers will look forward to receiving them from you. Once you have an email provider, you can start collecting email addresses of new subscribers. Grow your email list fast by using an opt-in, exit popup, sign-up form or incentive. While opt-ins can be good, some subscribers will sign up just to get whatever freebie you're offering rather than what comes later. To increase engagement, make opt-ins related to what comes next: ongoing emails, increased engagement, long-term opens, and reduced annoyance. Email sequences and auto-responders to set up: exclusive content, best posts, affiliate promotions, product promotions, surveys and asking questions. Being able to segment your audience, and then deliver auto-responders based on their needs or situations, is very powerful. Email serves as a win-win-win for you, your blog, and your subscribers. Links and Resources for What You Should Know about Getting Started with Email: Members Download Area Blog Post Ideas MailChimp ConvertKit Drip Aweber Further Listening: 10 Things You Can Do Today that Will Pay Off On Your Blog Forever   How to Increase Your Email List Subscribers By 100% Or More Today   Create an Opt-In to Increase Your Email Subscriber Numbers How to Drive Traffic and Profit in Your Blogging with Autoresponders Courses: Starting a Blog ProBlogger Pro – 31 Days to Build a Better Blog Join our Facebook group Full Transcript Expand to view full transcript Compress to smaller transcript view Hi there and welcome to episode 251 of The ProBlogger Podcast. My name is Darren Rowse and I’m the blogger behind problogger.com, a blog, podcast, event, job boards, series of ebooks, and courses all designed to help you to grow a profitable blog. You can learn more about what we do at ProBlogger at problogger.com. In today’s episode, I want to talk about email. In particular, I want to answer three questions that I got from some of our Facebook group on the topic of email. The questions are coming from Marco, Lisa, and Lia. Marco asks some questions about getting started, choosing an email provider, and what to send in those initial emails. Lisa asked about tips for opt-ins to get more people to sign up. Lia asked about the sequence of emails that you might want to set up as an autoresponder afterwards. The questions do progress a little bit from the easier, beginner ones through to something a little bit more intermediate. You can find today’s show notes and there’s going to be plenty of extra reading for you. I’ve got some resources for you as well. You can find those show notes at problogger.com/podcast/251 and I will recommend that you get a problogger.com/members and that’s where you can get some downloadable resources, one of which is relevant for today’s show. There are six worksheets and guides that we’ve got there, they’re completely free. You just have to give us your email address and we’ll send them and log in through to you so you can access those and the new ones that we will be adding in there as well. Again, that’s problogger.com/members and that’s just a member’s area that we’ve got set up for you completely free. You will see our courses there as well, some of which are free and some of which are paid but that’s w...