TRANSCRIPT

Transcript: How To Build Your Email List from the Ground Up

June 25, 2020

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AMY PORTERFIELD: “I recently spoke on stage at an event, and I was speaking about growing your email list, and it was to an audience that a lot of people didn't have an email list yet or didn't really understand the value of one. And what I shared with them—so, if you're multitasking, come back to me because this is an important lesson I wish someone taught me so, so many years ago—what I wish I would have known is that when you have an email list, you can make money in your business at any time. You can make money in your business at any time. Now, of course, you have to have an offer, something of value to give to those on your email list to offer to them, but stay with me here.”

“I did an experiment. I have a list of hundreds of thousands of people. I better; I teach this stuff, right? But I wanted to show you that just a list of 1,000 people can go a very, very long way.”

“So what I did is I put together an email, and I only emailed 1,000 people on my list. So I segmented, just took 1,000 people. And I put together an offer, and I said, ‘Okay, I'm going to do a live workshop in the next week. I haven't created it yet, but I'm going to do a live workshop.’ And at the time, it was How to Plan Your 2020 Promo Calendar. So I said, ‘I'm going to do this live workshop. It's $197,’ and I only emailed the invite to 1,000 people on my email list. And within forty-eight hours, we had made $6,000, just like that. Only 1,000 people on my email list. It was an offer of  a $197 live workshop that I hadn't even created yet. I said, ‘I'm going to do it in one week. Here's what's included. Here's what you'll get,’ and within forty-eight hours, we had $6,000.”

“Can you imagine the peace of mind that that would bring to you, knowing at any time, if I have a viable offer—and the way you have a viable offer is you understand what your audience needs—and you can make money. Social media will never be as powerful. The return on investment on an email is so much bigger than social media—122 percent, to be exact—when you do it right.”

“So I really want you to understand that if you build that foundation—you set up your email-service provider, you create a lead magnet, you start to share it—you have just created the foundation of list building. Are there other things you can do? Are there bells and whistles you can add? Heck, yeah, there are. And am I going to teach those to you? Heck, yeah, I will. But let's just set the foundation.”

INTRO: I’m Amy Porterfield, ex-corporate girl turned CEO of a multi-million-dollar business. But it wasn't all that long ago that I lacked the confidence, money, and time to focus on growing my small-but-mighty business. Fast forward past many failed attempts and lessons learned, and you'll see the business I have today, one that changes lives and gives me more freedom than I ever thought possible, one that used to only exist as a daydream. I created the Online Marketing Made Easy podcast to give you simple, actionable, step-by-step strategies to help you do the same. If you're an ambitious entrepreneur, or one in the making, who's looking to create a business that makes an impact and helps you create a life you love, you're in the right place. Let's get started.

AMY: Okay, before we get going, a quick word from our sponsor.

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Okay, on to the episode.

Tell me this. If you have not been growing an email list, but you know you need to, what's holding you back? Is it (a) you're not sure where to start or what to do, or (b) you think you need to wait until you have more followers, or (c) you're intimidated by how much tech comes along with setting up an email list? Is it a, b, or c? because these are three of the most common objections I hear when it comes to entrepreneurs not building an email list.

Let me be very clear and straightforward about something. Despite what is holding you back, you must grow an email list. Building and growing an email list is just part of how you do business online as an entrepreneur. It's part of your business.

Now, in this episode, I'm going to debunk some of these objections, tell you exactly what you need in terms of getting started, and—hint—it's a simple three-piece recipe that begins even before your lead magnet. And lastly, I'm going to give you your very next steps to start creating your email list. And my hope for this episode is that you'll have your list up and running within one week of listening to this, or even less.

Okay, so, as a side note, this episode you're about to listen to was first a Facebook Live that I did on my Facebook page and now I'm turning into a podcast episode because I think you really need to hear it. If you happened to catch the Facebook Live but haven’t taken action yet, then, here’s your refresher.

All right, guys. Enjoy.

Well, hey, there, everyone. Amy Porterfield here. I am so excited to be here with you today, and I'm equally excited to talk about list building. Let's get your list building going. And I'm going to give you the kick starter you need to do so.

Your business, building your online business, becomes so much easier when you actually have a viable email list. Now, notice I didn't say a big email list. You do not need a big email list to be successful, but you do need an email list.

So the first question I have for you—are you ready?— the first question I have for you is let's just start—first of all, this is a no-judgment zone, meaning any question I ask, you will never be shamed, I will never call you out negatively. This is all about learning. And so when I ask you a question, I want you to be honest, and we're just using it to grow. So the first question is, how many people do you have on your email list? I know, I know. Sometimes this question makes—when I was new to my business eleven years ago, this is the question that made me just be like, “Can we not talk about it? I don't want to talk about my list right now.” I struggled to grow my email list. And so with that, I know what it feels like not to have a lot of people. But don't worry. Today I’m going to help you get started. I've got what you need. So just stay with me here. We're going to get there. But how many people do you have on your email list?

Let's see here, because Lita has 1,180. Wow. A lot of zeros. Monica says 550. I never thought I'd get there. I know. Sometimes it feels like it takes a long time. Kim is 16. Lots of zeros. Some as big as 2,000. I see you, Jenny. Okay, so I wanted to get kind of a good sense of where we're at.

I always make sure that when I do trainings on my Facebook page, like today, I always make sure there's something for everybody. So for those of you who have between zero and 1,000, this training is hands down exactly what you need. But for those of you who have 1,000 or more, I want you just to take a few nuggets away from today and ask yourself, am I really doing that? Because once I get past step number one, which I'm going to share with all of you, set number two and three, definitely, you want to pay close attention to just to make sure that you've got those dialed in. Okay? So there’s something for everybody here. I can promise you that. But for those of you who are zero to 1,000, pay close, close, close attention because you're going to want to make sure you take action right away.

We're going to dive into the three-step list-building kick starter. And the three steps are very, very simple. But I'm, first, going to navigate through this training, giving you the three objections that I always hear when it comes to list building, three things that get in the way.

So I want you to tell me now in the comments, give me a one, two, or three—I won't make you be in the comments the whole time, I promise—give me a one, two, or three, which one can you relate to the most if you've been struggling to grow your email list? Are you ready? Number one, so number one is that you just do not know where to start. Let me go through all three, and then you tell me which one resonates with you the most. I just don't know where to start. Number two, you're waiting until you get more followers, a bigger audience, on social to really dive into growing your email list. So you feel like you're just not ready yet. Or number three, the tech stresses you out. So one, two, or three. You don't know where to start is number one. Number two is that you’re going to wait until you get a bigger audience, bigger following, more people on social so you can grow that. Then, you can grow your email list. Or number three, the tech stresses you out. Are you more of a one, two, or three? And if you're a rebel, and it's something else, tell me what else it is. So what is stopping you from growing your email list? What is stopping you?

There's one other one I'm going to share with you that kind of is an umbrella to all of those. But I'll hold that off as a bonus just real fast.

There's, like, a fifteen-second delay, so I've got to have a little buffer to get some questions in. So lots of ones. I don't know where to start. The tech always comes up. So I think ones and threes are kind of beating out the twos. Okay, so this is great. Ones, threes. So we're kind of like a little bit of everything. But Leslie sums it up: #alloftheabove.

Okay, so, we're going to talk about all three of those objections, and then I'm going to give you the three ways just to get started. So there's lots of threes. Threes and threes here. But the one umbrella—let me go back to full screen real fast—the one umbrella that kind of comes over all of them—and I want you to give me an amen or some emoji in the comments if you can relate to this one—that everything else seems to get in the way of list building.

When I was just starting out, I had left my corporate job, and I started my online business. I used to teach—not teach—I used to consult and do social media for small businesses in my early days. I remember everything came before list building: client work, figuring out how to make money, doing my bookkeeping, going to networking events, saying yes to favors, letting people take me to coffee to pick my brain. I hated that one. I said yes to everything because I was so new and had no idea what I was doing. All of that got in the way of list building. Do you ever feel that way? Like, who has time to list build? I've got to do all these other things. So give me a yes in the comments if you can relate to this one, because it tends to come up a lot.

But here's what I want to tell you. If you would just slow down for a moment and just set your list-building foundation, once you get the foundation built, it's like a snowball. It organically starts to happen. Your list starts to grow more easily once you get that list-building foundation set. And that's what I'm going to give you today.

So over the next few weeks, if you meet me here on Tuesdays on my Facebook page, I'm going to give you some more list-building strategies to build off of that. But let's just get the foundation set today. You can literally do what I'm going to teach you today. You can get it done before next Tuesday when we meet again. Good?

Okay, so, with that, we're going to get into—again, let me go here—the three-step list-building kick starter. But I'm going to take you through the objections first before I actually give you the three steps that you're going to leave here with and implement right away.

So the first challenge or objection that I often hear is, “I'm not sure where to start.” Like, “Holy cow, Amy. There's so much that goes into list building. I don't know where to start.” And what I'll tell you is you start with an ESP, an email-service provider. This is exactly where you start. For all of you who had zero people on your email list, this is number one, hands down, the place to start. For those of you who already have an email list and don't love your email-service provider, I'm going to share my top favorite two. I've been doing this for a long time, and they're good. So stay with me here.

But an email-service provider is just this: an email platform that houses your email list and supports your email-marketing efforts, with tools and resources. That's what an email-service provider is. So basically, it's the place where people can give you their email address, and they're going to go into your email-service provider, and then you're going to send emails out from your email-service provider. It is a piece of software.

Now, way back when, when I started, they didn't have really sophisticated email-service providers. Today, they're easier than ever. So when you think about an email-service provider, all you need to think about is one piece of software making it really simple. Like I said, I’m going to share my two favorite in a moment, but I just want you to keep thinking about the fact that this does not need to be complicated. Today, email-service providers are easier than they have ever been, taking away all those tech challenges, for the record.

Okay, so, next step, challenge number two, “I need to wait until I have more followers and a bigger audience.” Some of you said this is the thing that's slowing you down. So I'm not going to get an email list yet because I don't really have that many people on social media following me. I don't really have an audience. So who the heck is going to join my email list? I'm here to tell you that you can have a very, very small email list and make really great money.

I'm going to tell you three quick stories of my students who have done great things with a really small email list. So I'm going to give you some proof. But before I do, let me tell you my own story.

When I was first starting out and left corporate, in the first year of building my business, I got to about 600 people on my email list. I never emailed them. I never engaged with them. We're going to talk about that in the coming weeks, what to do with an email list. But I had this email list. I didn't know what to do with them. So when I launched my first course, it was a huge, fat failure. I made $267, where I thought I'd make hundreds of thousands of dollars. And the problem was I had an email list of 600 people, which would have been perfect if they were engaged, if I was emailing them regularly, if they were loyal to me. They weren't. So it didn't matter if I had twenty people on my email list or 600, they didn't have a relationship with me, so when I launched my first course, they weren't paying attention.

Now, it doesn’t need to be that way. And let me—well, let me back up. One of my peers, he had 600 people on his email list before his first launch, and he made $30,000. So he talks about this story all the time. But he launched to 600 people, made $30,000. I launched to 600 people, made $267. The difference between that, it, one, proved that 600 people is enough to launch to, but you've got to have a relationship with them. So I'm going to teach you how to have a relationship with your list so it doesn't need to be big, but it needs to be mighty.

Okay, I'm going to tell you three quick stories of my students, and I just want to use these to inspire you. So this is Adamaris, and she was working as a licensed psychotherapist, and she dreamed of having a business that allowed her to move to another country, have her own podcast, host a destination retreat for women, and work with Oprah. Those were her dreams. That's what she wanted. So she ended up quitting her job as a psychotherapist, and she started her own online business.

Now, with just 300 people on her email list, she built a six-figure coaching business that gives female entrepreneurs the mindset tools she learned as a psychotherapist. Plus, she launched a new podcast, hosted her first retreat last June, and was featured in Oprah magazine. Talk about a vision board, right? Like, she put it out into the universe, and it happened. But notice the important part on this list: 300 people on her email list, six-figure business.

I want to bust the myth that you need a big audience to grow big email list to have a big promotion or launch. That is not true. Quality over quantity every single day with your email list. Do not let the number pull you down. They just need to be engaged. And that means you're emailing them, you're having conversations with them, you're giving them great value.

Okay, let me give you the next one.

This is HollyAnne Knight. Now, HollyAnne teaches her students how to quilt with confidence. She was recently on my podcast, and she said, “Amy, everybody I teach how to quilt is way older than me, but that's okay because we have a great relationship.”

So she started to grow her email list, and she had twenty-four people on her email list when she sent her very first email. So she engaged with these twenty-four people, they started to tell other people about her, she started to get herself online and out there, and she built her list to 1,000. So she did her first course, and she made $750. So she had 1,000 people on her list, made $750. Now, that's a big deal, considering that everyone in the quilting industry that she knew—like, other people teaching other people how to quilt—were not making any money doing it.

So she's like, “Okay, I need a little money, but I think I can perfect this. I think I can make this better.” So in a short time, she grew her list to 4,000 people, and she did that fairly quickly, and she generated $48,000 on her last launch. So she launched, and then she launched again and made a little bit more, made a little bit more, and then made $48,000 teaching other women, and men if they want, how to quilt. How cool is that?

So I wanted to use this example to say even with 4,000, that's still not hundreds of thousands of people. And HollyAnne can launch and launch and launch. You've got an asset that you can use over and over and over again.

All right. Let me give you one more example. This is Millie Williams—I love this story. So Millie teaches English as a second language, so ESL, to immigrant and refugee students. She realized that there was a gap in resources for ESL teachers. So she created a lead magnet, a freebie, and waited for the emails to come in. And nothing happened. So even if you just create a freebie and you just wait for people to find it, it doesn't work that way, and Millie realized this.

So she found a Facebook group for other ESL educators, and she started to engage in that Facebook group. And she also started investing just a few dollars a day in Facebook ads. So she decided to niche down and really get specific about the type of ESL educator she wanted to approach, and she got clear on her ICA, her ideal-customer avatar. And Millie grew her email list from eight to 870 in five months, with an open rate of 80 percent. Why do I tell you that open rate? Well, the average is around 20 to 25 percent, for the record. With an 80 percent open rate, that means Millie is attracting the perfect audience, people that will eventually buy from her. If you're not ready to sell anything right just yet, be like Millie. Grow your email list now, because Millie is getting ready to launch her first digital course and turn her side gig, which is teaching ESL educators, into a full-time thing. If you quit your job and start your online business and you already have an email list, you're off to the races. This was so smart of Millie.

So, I just wanted to kind of bring it back here and say you do not need a big email list, you do not need a big audience to make good money. But you do need an email list. It is incredibly important, the first step. And I want to remind you that social media is not enough. So growing your audience on social media and thinking that's going to be enough to have a viable business, what happens when Mark Zuckerberg decides to change the algorithm, like he did just a few years ago on Facebook, and boom, everything changed? Never, ever build your business on rented land. And that's exactly what you're doing when you start to make all your efforts happen on social media. It's rented land, meaning when it's rented land, the rules can change at any time. You don't make the rules. You don't own that land. You own your email list. It is yours. And so that's why it's so incredibly important to make sure that you build your business on solid ground that you own—that's your email list.

Okay, let's go back to our slides.

Challenge number three is, “I don’t understand the tech. I don’t understand the tech. There’s too many things going on. I’m not really good with software. It’s really clunky for me, Amy. This isn’t going to work.” That was me, actually. I was very afraid of the technology. I had no idea what I was doing, and quite honestly, still to this day, I'm not a very techie kind of girl. But the greatest thing ever is, with your email-service provider, it is easier than ever to get it up. You can get it up and running in thirty minutes, max. It doesn’t even take that long.

So, I promised to give you two resources I love. And when I say setting up an email-service provider is easier than you think, the two resources I'm going to give you are the best of the best. Actually, one’s absolutely my favorite. So here they are. So Mailchimp is free, up to your first 2,000 subscribers. So if you have to go with a free option right now, you can start with Mailchimp. It's not my favorite, but it's, like, my second favorite.

My first favorite, my ultimate favorite, is ConvertKit. So you see it there, ConvertKit. Emmory will put a link. We have special deals with some of my favorite tools, and we have one with ConvertKit. So Emmory will post a link. I think it's amyporterfield.com/convertkit, so you can get a special deal if you want to sign up there.

But it's very inexpensive. And why I love ConvertKit the most is two reasons. Number one, they have tons of great templates for you to use to help you grow your email list. So not only are they a software that you can house all your emails and you can send emails from, but they have templates so you can do opt-in pages for your freebies. So, you know those beautiful pages that say, like, “Put your name and email to get the freebie”? ConvertKit includes those with their service, and they look really, really professional.

The number one reason why I love ConvertKit is their customer support. So they have tons of how-to videos. So if you don't know how to do anything, there's a tech library teaching you how to do it. If you still can't figure it out, email their support, and they will be right on it. Impeccable customer support.

So, Mailchimp if you absolutely need to start for free, but if you can invest a little bit, ConvertKit will grow with your business. Eventually, you're going to want to move off Mailchimp. You can stay—it's just not sophisticated enough as your business grows. But you can stay with ConvertKit and never have to move off. I have peers that use ConvertKit, that have hundreds of thousands of email lists, and million-dollar businesses, and they're using ConvertKit. So I highly recommend ConvertKit. Those are my two favorites right here that you can get going right away.

So with that, this is how you get started. Remember I said there are three steps I want you to take. So all of you that have zero on your email list, here's your marching orders, three steps that you need to take. Number one, you set up your email-service provider. I'd love to give you a challenge that you do that in twenty-four hours. So within the twenty-four hours, set up your email-service provider. Just get it done. You have just built, like, let's say there's three steps to the foundation. You just got step one.

Number two, you're going to create an irresistible lead magnet, a freebie, like a cheat sheet, a checklist, a free video, a free audio, some kind of really great giveaway so that people will want to sign up for your email list and start getting your emails. Now, if you listen to my podcast, Online Marketing Made Easy, I have tons of episodes on how to create a lead magnet, how to get things set up. But I also have a freebie guide for you today, so stay with me. I've got something to help you with your lead magnet.

And number three, you're going to share that lead magnet over and over again. So for those of you who already have an email list of 500, 600, 1,000, or more, I want to ask, do you have a really good lead magnet that you link to in your bios, that you talk about on your Facebook Lives, that you share on Instagram Stories every single week? You only need one lead magnet to be successful here, but you need to share it and talk about it everywhere.

If you've got any questions about that, post them below, because I'm going to go into live Q&A in a moment, and we can talk about different ways to grow your email list, with a lead magnet. But these are your three steps. You're going to set up your email-service provider. You're going to create a lead magnet, and that includes an opt-in page, and that includes the freebie and all of that. Don't worry, I've got resources for you. And number three, you're going to start sharing it and talking about it.

So with that, I've got this great, totally free resource. This is the first time we've ever done this. And we finally just bit the bullet. We said, “We've got to help with the first step.” So this is your email-list starter guide, and in here—so there’s the URL. It’s totally free. Amyporterfield.com/emailkickstart. So go to this URL. You can do it right now. It will take a minute.

When you go there, here’s what you'll get in the guide. Number one, I'm going to help you choose which email-service provider is best for you. Number two, I'm going to help you actually figure out how to get it set up. So if you choose ConvertKit, we've got some step by step in there. And number three, we're also going to help you get started with your first lead magnet. So if you need help coming up with a cheat sheet, a checklist, a free guide, it's in this guide. We made this incredibly comprehensive for anybody. Especially if you're starting from zero, or if you're really struggling and you want to change your email-service provider, you want to change up your lead magnet, go get this freebie. So, again, you're going to learn more about what an email-service provider can do for you and why it's a must, how to choose the right one for you, and how to get your ESP set up so that you can get it up and running. We've got images and step-by-step guide. It's a pretty meaty guide to get you going.

So if you have fewer than 1,000 people on your email list, go grab this right now. If you’re thinking about changing your email-service provider, if you don't like the one you're using, go grab this right now, because this is exactly how to choose your email-service provider and get things up and running.

Okay, I want to tell you a quick story. So here’s the deal. I recently spoke on stage at an event, and I was speaking about growing your email list, and it was to an audience that a lot of people didn't have an email list yet or didn't really understand the value of one. And what I shared with them—so, if you're multitasking, come back to me because this is an important lesson I wish someone taught me so, so many years ago—what I wish I would have known is that when you have an email list, you can make money in your business at any time. You can make money in your business at any time. Now, of course, you have to have an offer, something of value to give to those on your email list to offer to them, but stay with me here.

I did an experiment. I have a list of hundreds of thousands of people. I better; I teach this stuff, right? But I wanted to show you that just a list of 1,000 people can go a very, very long way.

So what I did is I put together an email, and I only emailed 1,000 people on my list. So I segmented, just took 1,000 people. And I put together an offer, and I said, “Okay, I'm going to do a live workshop in the next week. I haven't created it yet, but I'm going to do a live workshop.” And at the time, it was How to Plan Your 2020 Promo Calendar. So I said, “I'm going to do this live workshop. It's $197,” and I only emailed the invite to 1,000 people on my email list. And within forty-eight hours, we had made $6,000, just like that. Only 1,000 people on my email list. It was an offer of  a $197 live workshop that I hadn't even created yet. I said, “I'm going to do it in one week. Here's what's included. Here's what you'll get.”

We sent the email out, and actually, twenty-four hours later, we sent the email again to all of the people, the 1,000 people who hadn’t yet opened the email. So we did what was called a resend, which is a great idea, for the record. And within forty-eight hours, we had $6,000.

Can you imagine the peace of mind that that would bring to you, knowing at any time, if I have a viable offer—and the way you have a viable offer is you understand what your audience needs—and you can make money. Social media will never be as powerful. The return on investment on an email is so much bigger than social media—122 percent, to be exact—when you do it right.

So I really want you to understand that if you build that foundation—you set up your email-service provider, you create a lead magnet, you start to share it—you have just created the foundation of list building. Are there other things you can do? Are there bells and whistles you can add? Heck, yeah, there are. And am I going to teach those to you? Heck, yeah, I will. But let's just set the foundation so when I come back next week, next Tuesday, to teach you more list-building strategies, you will be ready to add to that. You'll be ready to supercharge your email list. Also, next week, I have an extra-special video training that I'll release, where I'm actually going to show you how to set up your opt-in page, and I’m going to get into the specifics and dig a little bit deeper around all of this.

My goal is in the next thirty days, you are set for growing your email list. It is happening organically. Every day you're growing your email list. That's what I want for you. Everything in your business becomes easier when you have an email list.

The biggest mistake I ever made was waiting almost two years to focus on growing my email list. Not only did I leave money on the table in the first two years of my business, I struggled to make money. I really struggled. If I had an email list, I wouldn’t.

So when is the best time to start an email list? Yesterday. When’s the second-best time? Today. So let this happen now. Get it in motion now, and get the freebie, one more time, amyporterfield.com/emailkickstart.

Real quick before we continue, I want to tell you about today's sponsor.

This episode is sponsored by Gravy. If you have a subscription-model business, like a membership site, or offer payment plans, like I do with my digital courses, you've got to listen up. One of my biggest frustrations in the past was lost money due to failed payment plans. In fact, it used to keep me up at night. I would worry about all the people that were on a payment plan, because if they stopped their payments, I'd be screwed.

That's when I started working with Gravy. Gravy sets up a system inside your business, where they contact your customers within hours of their failed payments, and they capture updated billing information and save the customer.

Now, as you know, failed payments can be a sensitive topic to navigate with your customers, and that's why Gravy acts as an extension of your team. So when they reach out to people, they communicate on your behalf, and they do it with compassion. On average, before Gravy, our failed-payment recovery rate was just 33 percent when we were trying to do it on our own. Now it's over 80 percent collection on failed payments. That's a whole lot of saved payments.

If your revenue is currently at $250,000 or more and you know you're losing money due to failed payment plans each month, I want to encourage you to check out Gravy. Here's the great news. Gravy is offering my listeners their first month free. So if you want to book a discovery call to find out if your business is a good fit for everything Gravy has to offer, go to amyporterfield.com/gravy.

Okay, now back to the episode.

I have a question for you. The question for all of you is, if you were to create a lead magnet, what are you thinking you want to create? Or if you already have one, tell me what it is. Because the lead magnet, which we're going to talk about next week and beyond, it's important. I want to give you a lot of examples, and we included some examples in a lot of the resources that we're going to be giving away for free over the next few weeks, so stay with me. If you need an email list, I am your girl.

So tell me in the comments, what kind of lead magnet, freebie, might you create? What kind of content do you want to create? So let me give you an example. If you help sleep train babies, like help new moms and dads get their babies to sleep through the night or take naps, so then you start thinking—okay, let me help you. This is the best advice I can give you. What's one of the first questions that often come up when you tell people what you do? If they're genuinely interested in what you do, what kind of questions do they ask? “Well, how do you do this,” or “How do you teach that?” or “I struggle with this.” That could be your first lead magnet. Just answer the question that you always get asked about what you do, whether it be a cheat sheet, checklist, guide of some sort. Keep it easy to digest. We're not looking for fifty-page ebooks. Not necessary. Something that people can get in and out and say what else you got? That's the best question someone can ask you. What else you got? A good lead magnet will lead to that question.

Okay, here we go. Makayla, you’re a winner. Top Five Tips to Avoid Tech Overwhelm E-guide. Yes, yes, and yes. That one's a great one. Angelic says, Mini Book for Expats, and What to Expect—this is so good—After Relocation: Dealing with Emotional Challenges. I love the specificity of that one. So good. So when—don't worry. Next week we're going to talk about lead magnets even more. But when you think about a lead magnet, think of a challenge people have and solve it with that lead magnet. Remember, you just need one.

So, these are great, guys. Oh, I love this. “I teach wig making, so they always want to know what supplies I need to make wigs.” This is perfect. Sylvia hit on something really important. When you teach something to other people, like Sylvia does with wig making, oftentimes the first question is, what equipment do you use? What tools do you use? What do I need to have on hand to make this work?

Same thing that happens with me and my—so I have this little studio here. What camera do you use? What lighting are you using? What software do you use? I get the question all the time. Don’t worry. I have it in a podcast somewhere. But this happens. Or podcasting. What podcast equipment do you use? What mic do you use? That's a great lead magnet.

So Sylvia totally hit it out of the park with that one. So if somebody is interested in doing what you teach or doing what you do, which is what you teach—which is really meta. I get it—then, tell them the tools. So now they’re taking a first step to say, “Okay, this is doable.” Now they’re going to say, “All right, Sylvia. I got the tools. Now how do I do it?” It’s brilliant. I love it. And that’s what her course does. That’s what she could teach them, or she teaches them in person or however she does it.

So I just want to tell you that it's easier than you think, and everything in our business is typically easier than we think if we allow it to be simple. Keep it simple; get fancy later. And with your email list, keeping it simple, just let's get that foundation going. I'll give you some bells and whistles over the next few weeks. But get your email-service provider set up, get your first lead magnet set up, and start sharing that baby out there.

And the first thing you can do is go to amyporterfield.com/emailkickstart, get that free guide, choose your email-service provider, start thinking about your lead magnet. And even on my podcast, Online Marketing Made Easy, tons of examples of how to get started with a lead magnet. I got you covered, friend.

I'm going to answer some quick questions for those of you who want to stay with me here really fast. I promise to answer questions. I almost forgot.

Okay, so Michelle says:

“I’m so excited about creating a lead magnet. Do I need a lead page or website for them to go to?”

So you need what is called an opt-in page. And if you use ConvertKit, they have opt-in page templates that integrate with their software. So it’s super easy to use and how-to tech videos. That's why I love ConvertKit the most. Mailchimp has some, but I like ConvertKit’s better. You don't need a website to start growing your email list; you need a lead magnet and an opt-in page. ConvertKit will help you with the opt-in page; I’ll help you with the lead magnet through some of my free trainings that I do over the next few weeks.

Rachel says:

“How do you grow the list if your social media is super small, like a 100?”

I’m so glad you asked this. So, the first thing you’re going to do is you’re going to make sure that you stay engaged with your social media so that it continues to grow. One of the best ways to stay engaged on social media is to either blog every week or do a podcast every week or do just a quick video. And if you have a website, put that video on your website every week. One of the ways to grow social—a lot of people don't talk about this—is to create your own original content.

So for me, I podcast every week, and I have since 2013. But truth be told, in 2013 and 2014, I wasn't doing it weekly. And I had a good friend, and I said to him—he's in the industry as well—and I said, “I'm really struggling with this podcast. It's not helping me grow my audience. It's not helping me grow my social audience.” And he said, “Are you doing it weekly?” I’m like, “No. Maybe once a month, if I'm lucky.” He said, “No. Your audience needs the consistency. You need to create a podcast episode every single week, come rain or shine.”

And when you have a podcast episode or a blog or a video, you then talk about it on social so you have something to talk about, something of value to put out there. And by just having this content go out every week, people are going to start to find you, your social’s going to start to grow, and your email list will grow with that.

So I really do believe, adding kind of another layer to this, creating original content every week, I know it's not sexy. I know it's not easy. But every successful entrepreneur that I know started with creating original content every single week. It puts you on the map. So something to think about.

Renee says:

“Is there a type of lead magnet that connects more than others, like a worksheet or a video?”

Not necessarily, Renee. So I've done them all, and I've had success across the board with lead magnets. But let's say you feel really good on video. Do a short video, ten-, fifteen-minute free video, full of value. If you hate to be on video, don't do a video. Or maybe you teach meditation. Do an audio, ten-minute meditation, free audio. Or if you think your audience loves to check things off—like, I love to print it out, have a checklist. Boom, boom, boom. I find so much satisfaction in that—so if your audience loves a good checklist, you make them a checklist. What do you think will resonate with your audience the most? It's really not about the format as much as the really great content. Do they want that content? Is it irresistible to them? Would they even maybe pay for it? That's when you know you found the perfect lead magnet, if people are like, “This is so good, I would pay for it.”

Okay.

“Do you need to have Google G Suite, email provider, or a private provider?”

So you want to go beyond Google G Suite, for sure. So you want something like ConvertKit or Mailchimp. Google G Suite is not enough. Great question. You need to go the extra layer to make it legal for you to collect emails and house emails and send emails. That would be an email-service provider. So I'm glad you asked.

Theresa says:

“How many times do you recommend talking about your lead magnet in a week? I don't want people who have signed up to get sick of me and leave.”

Okay, so, Theresa, once a week would be great,  but let me give you three cool ways to talk about your lead magnet so it doesn't feel like you're always talking about it. Number one, you could easily jump on Instagram Stories, and say, “Hey, guys. I just want to let you know I've got this great freebie all about x, y, z. Here's what's in it for you. Make sure to go grab it.” So you can just flat out just say, “I've got this thing.”

Get on Facebook Live—this is the second way—get on Facebook Live, and maybe teach for ten minutes, fifteen minutes, twenty minutes, whatever you want to do, and say, “Hey, if you like this and you want to dive deeper, I’ve got a great lead magnet for you.”

Look what I did today. I said to you guys, I taught, and then I said, “If you want to know how to do this, how to set up the perfect email-service provider for your business, I've got a freebie for you.” So I taught and then I gave you even more value with a freebie. Did you get sick of me talking about it? No, because you're like, “Oh, I need that. Thanks.” So if it's valuable, if it's irresistible, people will love it. So that's the second way.

The third way is that let's say you were to write a blog post or do a podcast, mention it in the podcast. I often mention my freebies in my podcast. Like, “Hey, guys. If you're wondering how to do x, y, z, I've got a freebie, and here's the URL.” So I have a lot of freebies because I've been around for a while. When I tell you you just need one, we all start with just one. Dial that in before you ever think of more. You don't need a bunch of freebies to grow your email list. One really good one is the golden ticket. So find a way to mention it, and link to it in your blog. Find a way to talk about it on your podcast.

I could give you so many different ways. Make sure it's in the bio of all your social media. You can go right to the opt-in page. Another way is put it in your email signature. “Hey, if you’re looking for a way to x, y, z, I’ve got this free guide. Go here.” You can put that in your email signature.

And one of my favorite ways is to get interviewed on somebody else's podcast, and ask them if they would mind if you shared your freebie when you’re interviewed and send their traffic to your opt-in page.

So many different ways to do that. That's just a few different quick ones.

Claire says:

“How can you create a lead magnet when you don’t yet have an offer to model it after?”

Oh, great question. I love intelligent questions like this. Once again, if you missed it:

“How can you create a lead magnet when you don’t yet have an offer to model it after?”

So if you don’t yet know what you’re going to sell, which most of my students do not know what they’re going to sell when they’re starting with zero on their email list. So what you want to do is get clear on who you want to market to. So that's your ideal-customer avatar. Emmory’s going to post a link below this video to a podcast episode I did on how to figure out your ideal-customer avatar, your ICA. So if you get clear on who you want to market to, you, then, start to study that person. You start to—you know what essentially you want to do. Let's say that you want to help women lose weight. You're not exactly sure if it's going to be a digital course or a membership or a coaching program. But you've got a special way, and you want to help women lose weight. You’re not sure how you’re going to sell that, but that’s the topic you want to do. That’s your niche. So then you get clear on who is your ideal-customer avatar, get really specific on who this woman is that you want to help, and then you start to think, “Well, what are some of the struggles she has with weight loss? I'm just going to start there.” Just start with their struggles. Start with their challenges. What do they want to know more about? Where are they confused? Fill in some holes right from the get-go so you can start to attract that woman. The more you learn about her, the more you uncover the product you want to create for her.

So a lot of people start with just figuring out who they want to market to in the niche that they're in, and then, starting to just use some content to uncover some challenges and solve some challenges, they will then tell you where they want you to go with that. Pay close attention.

Okay, Aliya says:

“Do you have tips for improving the health of a list? I have over 1,000, but after four years, open rate is low.”

Yeah. So what I think is important is you could do one of two things. Number one, you can just take everyone on your list—like, send out an email to—let's say you podcast. Send out an email. Say, “Hey”—like every Thursday, I send out a new email, and I say, “Hey, guys. I got a new podcast. Here's what it's about.” Like, my Monday’s podcast was all about Facebook groups and how to engage in Facebook groups. So I said, “I have a new podcast episode. It's about Facebook groups. Here's three things you're going to learn. Go check it out.” So anybody who opened that email, they are going to stay on my list. But if it's been thirty or sixty days, you can decide, that that person has not opened up any of your emails, and if you’re emailing weekly, take them off your list. Just scrub that list. I think this is the best way to do it. Just scrub that list. Let’s make it a little conservative. If they haven't opened up an email from you in sixty days, and you're emailing every single week for, let's say, a month, and they haven't opened up any of those emails for thirty or sixty days, take them off your list.

Let's start anew. Reengaging a dead email list is really a lot of effort and totally not worth it. So I'd rather you just—it's like to get a fresh haircut. You feel good. You feel lighter. You're ready to take on the world. Most girls feel this way. And that's what I want you to do. So you can Google how to reengage an email list. You're going to find some great articles out there. I’ve never seen it work really well. I would just rather clean up the list and start from there.

Okay, so let’s see here. Valerie says:

“I'm a blogger. How can I give value to my audience and grow a business/revenue?”

So the way you give value to your audience is you create original content every single week. Like I said, you answer their questions, their objections, their challenges, whether it be—well, you're a blogger, so you're going to be writing about that. What do they want to know about? What are they asking about? You're creating that.

From there, you're listening to your audience. What do they want more of? Where's your sweet spot? What do they tend to go to you for? There's an offer in there, whether it be—you want to think about, when you are ready to sell, do you want to do a coaching package? Do you want to do consulting one on one? Do you want a digital course? which is what I highly recommend. Do you want to create a membership experience? What do you want to create for them? First, you think about what problem you're going to solve, and then, you think, “Well, how can I package that into an offer?”

So before you know what to sell, before you know how you're going to make money, you've got to figure out who your ideal-customer avatar is—that's why I have a podcast episode on that—and how you're going to offer them value.

Now, listen. I know when you're just starting out this feels like a lot. I'm not saying you need to do all of this overnight. Baby steps, my friend. It goes by faster than you think. You'll start picking things up a whole lot quicker.

But if I could give you any advice, it’s start creating original content every single week. Sign up for an email-service provider; get my freebie to help you do so. Create your lead magnet. Start to share it. Create original content every week. Sign up for your email-service provider. Create a lead magnet. Start to share it. Let's just start there.

If you try to sell too soon, you're not even going to be sure if what you're selling is going to work. Let’s slow down just a little bit, and then, if you love my stuff, we can start talking about how to create a digital course to make money. But let’s start with growing your email list first.

Okay, Carl says:

“If I know what my audience wants—it's not necessarily my service but would attract the owners I'm after—is that acceptable to offer?”

So, you know what they want, and you're going to put a lead magnet out there. It's not your service, but it would attract the right audience. That's a little bit tough. I think it'd be hard to engage them if you attract them with one thing and then the service is totally different that you offer. I really want you to find some alignment between the two, your lead magnet—if you already know what you're going to offer, what your service is, that lead magnet, there's got to be some alignment there. If it's out of left field but it attracts the right person, they're going to be confused by the content you start sharing to them. So I'd like to see some alignment there.

Karen says:

“This is where I get lost. How do I find the perfect content to grab attention?”

I’m just going to answer, like, three more questions, guys, because I don't want to keep you too long. I know we're up on the hour almost.

So, Karen:

“This is where I get lost. How do I find the perfect content to grab attention? People love the channeling-energy content, yet it's easier to talk about chakra balancing and my intuitive-life coaching.”

So this is a great question: How do I find the perfect content to grab their attention? People love the channeling-energy content, yet it's easier to talk about the other stuff.

So you do want to give them what they want. So one of the greatest things about a lead magnet is that it really is what they want. You can then start talking to them about what they need the most, as you get them on your email list, and offer value and continue to blog or whatever you might be doing. But a really good lead magnet is what people want as well as need. And so if they want the channeling, I'd find a way to teach that in a lead magnet. Now, if it's too complicated to teach and it's easier to teach the chakra balancing and they want it, then go there. But if they don't want it, that's not an irresistible lead magnet. Or if they don't know they want it, that's not an irresistible lead magnet. If you need to help them understand why they want it or need it, that's what you do in your weekly content. The lead magnet is just a sure-fire, “Yep, I want that. Give it to me.”

Brenda:

“How long should a weekly email be, and is it a mix of education plus personal stuff?”

So you can play around with lanes. Sometimes my emails are super long; sometimes they're short. I'd start out with the shorter ones and see how they do.

So, I love an email that is a little bit of value—like, teach us something—while offering a little bit of personal as well. So I might talk about what I did this weekend with Hobie and my son Cade, and then, I'll somehow weave that quick story into what I want to teach them this week. So always adding a little personality to your emails, or a little personal touch, is a great idea.

Christine says:

“How can you apply a weight-loss lead magnet when you have a network-marketing product that is all about weight loss?”

If you are in network marketing, and let's say the product is all about weight loss, what's the number one question people have in your audience, not your network-marketing business, but in the audience, about weight loss? I would start there. You might have a product about weight loss, but what else do they want to know? Where do they need to get started? Where are they struggling? Do they need a cheat sheet of daily habits? Do they need a meal plan to help them get going? Like, what will actually kick start them to get going? That's where you guys want to think. No matter if you're in network marketing or not, you want to think about how to kick start them taking action.

Okay, last question. Here we go.

“I only have a handful of subscribers—seven—and I haven't emailed them for months. How do I break the ice?”

So, Brenda, if you don’t already have a lead magnet, I want you to create one and then offer it to your subscribers, and say, “Hey, I've got something great and valuable and free for you. So go check it out.” And then from then on, Brenda, every week you're emailing them with a link to your weekly content.

So if you guys are curious, I'm going to get into this in the next few weeks, so make sure you follow me on Tuesdays here. But if you're curious, what do I email every single week? because I want you to send an email every single week to your new subscribers, whether you've got seven like Brenda or 5,000 like anybody else. I don't know. I don't know who has 5,000.

But here's what I want you to do. Every week you're sending them an email, and you're saying, “Hey, I've got a new blog post. Here's what it's about.” Or in my case, “Hey, I've got a new podcast. Here's what you're going to learn.” Or maybe you want to do a video every week. “Hey, I've got a new video up. Here's what you're going to learn.” That's why you can stay in touch and build a loyal audience because you're sending them valuable content every single week. So doing a blog every week, or a podcast or a video, that's what you're going to email—a link to that—every week to your subscribers. Now, the content you create attracts a new audience as well as nurtures the audience you already have. That's why it's so important.

I'll leave you with this: most people won't do it. I know. Breaks my heart. When I teach the fact that you want to create original content every single week, it sounds good, but most people won't do it, because it's work. It's consistent work.

You are different. You are going to show up differently. You're going all in. How bad do you want this? How bad do you want your online business to succeed? How bad do you want to build something online so you could leave the nine-to-five cubicle and have your side hustle turn into a full-time thing? How bad do you want it? Because doing the work to build an email list and create content every single week is the work that keeps you on the map. It's why I've been around for eleven years, because I deliver value every single week.

Before you sell, before you try to get more clients, before you go to that next networking event, get your foundation of your business set up—your list, your weekly content, your lead magnet. That's what we want to focus on.

So I want to remind you. Go to amyporterfield.com/emailkickstart. I cannot wait for you to grab this freebie. It's going to be incredibly helpful. Get your email-service provider set up and ready to go. I will see you here next Tuesday, where we are again talking about list building, but I've got some new ideas, new examples. We're going to talk about lead magnets. I'm going to help you get this up and running.

I cannot wait to see you soon. So thank you so much for tuning in. I'll talk to you again soon. Bye, guys.

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