7 Ways You Can Start Growing Your Email List Right Now

[Image description: A long-legged individual carries a giant piece of mail to drop it into a computer. An upward trending graph and a bullseye seem to indicate that our mail-dropper is doing a good job.]

I want to give y’all some free up-to-date tips on how to grow your mailing list. Here we go!

Table of contents

1. Host zoom events

2. Create a new freebie

3. Get clear on your "why" and your audiences "why"

4. Set up a giveaway

5. Get interviewed

6. Collaborate with creative people

7. Create really interesting content

1. Host zoom events

It’s really simple, here’s how to do it in 3 steps:

1. Plan your event

First dream up a great event. Your audience likes to gather, guaranteed, so give them something compelling to gather about! It doesn’t have to be a giant event - just make it genuinely interesting and people will show up.

2. Collect emails

When you set the event up on zoom.us, make sure to enable registration. This will collect the emails of your participants, thus granting you the ability to follow up.

3. Invite to your list

Finally after your event follow up with the folks whose emails you’ve collected through registration and invite them to join your list. *Note, just because they registered for your zoom event doesn’t mean they gave you consent to be on your newsletter. Ask!

Pro-tip: Most importantly, enjoy your events! Your enthusiasm is contagious, so make sure you are prepped, relaxed, and ready to have a good time. In this state you're primed to build long term trust and find your most loyal customers.

2. Create a new freebie

This is an evergreen classic step in building your mailing list. You can call it a freebie, a downloadable, a lead magnet or whatever you want (just please don't call it a lead magnet...what are people, metal filings?!).

A freebie is a great way to draw people in to the awesome content you're regularly putting out.What exactly is a freebie though? And what should yours be? A freebie is something of such great value that people really want it, and yet instead of charging for it (which you could) you're offering it for free.

Everything in that sentence is crucial to making a successful freebie. Trust me from past experience doing it wrong, people have to really want the freebie otherwise they'll never jump on your mailing list.

How do you make a compelling freebie? Easy, just take one of your creative offerings and turn it into a lesson, a mini course, or something virtually accessible that solves a problem your people need solved. Honestly the way you should think about it is like this: put your best work into the freebie, better than your paid work. Then make your paid work even better than the freebie (it only works if you do it in that order lol).

What I'm trying to get at is to avoid you playing any weird or sleazy games with your clients to try to trick them into buying something or signing up for something by giving them a partial freebie.

The most happy and successful entrepreneurs I know give TONS away for free. They're so helpful and so trustworthy that people can't wait to sign up for their things. Play the abundance game, not the scarcity game. And if you're worried about whether you have a good freebie idea or not, post it here! I'd love to know and give you feedback right here.

3. Get clear on your "why" and your audience's "why"

So often in business we take actions because we think we’re supposed to, we see other people doing them, or somebody told us to do them. This is the “default approach” where overwhelmed, we just let the wind move us around at will. Because that default approach is so detached and removed from our own executive decision-making, it’s sort of a crapshoot isn’t it?

Sometimes it works, with tried-and-true business practices, but sometimes it falls flat on its face as with any advice we haven’t transmuted into our own decision making process. A better approach is the scientific approach.

1. Do research.

2. Make a hypothesis.

3. Run an experiment.

4. Get the results.

5. Repeat.

Research Part 1/2: It starts with you.

In this case take a look at your newsletter or mailing list activities, close your eyes, and imagine you were a client of your business. Now ask yourself the following questions:

What draws me to this business?

What’s exciting, intriguing, or meaningful about this business to me?

What’s so compelling that I want to be emailed about it every month or week?

Research Part 2/2: Go ask people who are on your list, or existing customers what they’d most love to see on your mailing list. What would be the most helpful to them?

Now make your hypothesis about what’s the easiest thing to add or change based on that info and go do it. You’ll learn a ton this way and continually fail your way to success. You’re gonna love it.

4. Set up a giveaway

Some of your most valuable assets are your most valuable assets. No that’s not an innuendo! I mean the very things that you offer, your services and products, are hugely valuable assets that you can leverage to build your list.

Whether you were giving away an hour of your time, a spot in your course, one of your world-famous kitchen limes zesters, or swag, anything valuable that you offer you can give away for free. But we’re not randomly giving them away for free, we’re creating a sense of excitement, a game, and something remarkable. There are so many ways to do a giveaway, I trust you to find one that works for your business.

5. Get interviewed

When you’re interviewed you get out in front of a new audience. That kind of exposure is priceless. When you’re in front of an entirely new audience you have a chance to demonstrate what you do, and you’ll likely get to share your email list to that new audience. Make sure you have an appealing deal already prepped for that audience before you do the interview. Likely even a special link on your website for them specifically to go.

6. Collaborate with creative people

All of my favorite entrepreneurs are expert collaborators. They’re constantly teaming up on projects that not only deeply serve people, but also allow them to get in front of new audiences to grow. First ask who. Who would it be really fun for you to collaborate with? If you don’t know, we encourage you to join our Facebook group and make an ask.

Next ask what. What could you collaborate on? Save this question for asking with your new collaboration buddy. Together I am sure you can come up with dozens of great ideas, only one of which you need explore at any given time. Because we are social creatures we are always looking for ways to belong. To not collaborate as an entrepreneur is a colossal misunderstanding about how humans work. So go find your collaboration buddies!

7. Create really interesting content

Whether you're making videos or writing, your audience will pay a lot of attention if your content is any of these things:

• Amazing / Incredible / Positively Surprising

• Bizarre / Strange / Curious / Remarkable

• Inventive / New / Novel / Original

• Funny / Silly / Goofy / Witty

• Cute / Eliciting an Awwww

• Inspiring / Powerful / Transformational

I know how unique and creative you are, so don't waste my time trying to convince me you're not. I believe you can write, shoot photos, and shoot videos that highlight these qualities. So take some time right now to scan through the kinds of copy you write. Where could you up-level in the Amazing category? How about Bizarre? Go down the list and find the one or two that you least use in your writing. Now your work is cut out for you to up-level those areas. Then do the same for your photography and videography.

Always stay true to your brand, but do these in authentic way and you'll have your audience hooked.