You have your subscriber list growing at a nice rate and you’re mailing to them at least every week. But there’s only one problem – a big problem actually. No one is responding to you. By responding I mean clicking a link you provide, signing up to learn more or buying something.
So there your list sits, and all the rumors you’ve heard about how building a list is so lucrative, well, it looks highly doubtful now.
Increasing Responsiveness Takes Work
But don’t give up just yet. List building takes work and it takes focus. If you want to increase the responsiveness of your list, then you have to focus on that task and see it through.
Here are 7 things-to-do that will increase the responsiveness of your list:
- Where are your subscribers coming from? How did they get on your list? One of the first things I recommend doing in increasing the responsiveness of your list is to do some detective work back to your original funnel. What did they opt-in for? If it’s an eBook or report, what was it about? Are you sending them applicable information or are they getting a little bit of everything from you? Which brings up the next point…
- Segment your list. Your autoresponder offers a beautiful feature – it’s called creating lists. You can have as many lists created as you want. Don’t try to cram all subscribers in to one. Segmenting your subscribers not only narrows down your focus, but it ensures your subscribers get the most targeted information. If you have opt-ins from a squeeze page, you can send them different emails than the opt-ins you get from your blog. Better yet, have an autoresponder sequence set up to take care of this for you.
- Do you have a definite call-to-action? Always, always, always include a link to click. A “hi, how are you” email is the worst – don’t ever send an email just to ask this. Instead, if you really want to know how they are, send them a survey to fill out and then you can see how they are. Surveymonkey is great for this. This is your call-to-action. Send them to your blog, offer them a tool to purchase, recommend a service for them, but always include a call-to-action.
- What is your subject line saying? Most people check their inbox with a quick scan. Maybe they see your name and stop – that takes ½ second. Then they check the subject line. Sounds intriguing? Then they’ll click. Uninteresting? Click delete. Subject lines are your split second opportunity to grab their attention. Because if they don’t open your email, it doesn’t matter what you send. Hint: Every once in a while use [] or () in your subject line. Not every time because they will become immune to it, but brackets and parentheses attract the eye.
- As mentioned before – send out a survey to find out what problems they are facing. Having a list of names and/or email addresses doesn’t mean anything if you don’t know what to do with them. If you’re at a loss at what to send the folks on your list, send out a survey to find out what they want. Give them multiple choice questions. Even if you only get 5 filled out, at least you have an idea of what they want to accomplish.
- Give away something for free. A free gift is a great way to rekindle your subscribers interest. This is different from your original list building freebie. This is a random free gift that you put together and give away. Everyone likes a free gift. Take a few of your blog posts and put them together in a PDF. Give it a catchy name and give it away.
- Keep growing your list. The best way to increase the responsiveness of your list is to keep adding new people to it. Your opt-in number should be increasing every day.
A Final Thought on List Responsiveness
Unfortunately, lists do get stale. Yes, it’s a sad truth, but as time goes on, your list responsiveness will decrease. But fortunately, there is a way to balance out the lull in the list…
Just keep growing it.
Every month, every week, every day focus on building your list – do list building activities for a set time every single day. Visit and comment on some other blogs, send your free opt-in offer out on Twitter, mentioned your freebie on Facebook, each one of these activities will contribute a few subscribers here and there and before you know it, your list is growing on autopilot.
Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Nice work, Christine! You’ve beautifully presented a lot of great strategies for increasing the response rate to a list. I like the suggestion on creating a call-to-action. It’s important to give subscribers some type of instruction so that they will do something in response. Thank you for Surveymonkey.
Anthony Thompson recently posted..Self Manager – How to Successfully Apply Positive Affirmations
Hi Anthony,
Glad you enjoyed it!
Try out surveymonkey – it’s a pretty neat way to communicate with your list!
Thanks for your comments!
~Christine
Love the hint about using [] or (). I’ll be giving that a try.
What about using the recipient name in the subject line? Do you think that has any significant impact either way?
Caimin | Genius Startup recently posted..How to Use Content Curation as a Business Model
Hi Caimin,
Thanks!
I think using the recipient’s name is a great way to draw attention to your message. There are a number of ways to jazz up your subject line. Its similar to using the tactic of numbers in subject lines – they convert really well too.
Glad you stopped by!
~Christine
Wow – that is a LOT of info! I’d like to see each one of these broken down into their own post.
A couple of ways to keep your list from getting stale:
1. Send out an unexpected no opt-in freebie every once in a while.
2. Change your free opt-in every so often. Because some people like to keep a main free offer (they use that link on the back of their business cards), you can just change the offer in your pop-up box or just send out a hidden-page offer. Both work great.
And you need to send out new offers so that people will opt-in again. When people change emails they often keep the old one active for a few months. They will sign up with their NEW email, and that way you won’t lose them when they change over. Unless they want to be lost.
Michelle Mahoney recently posted..5 Lies the Big Gurus Are Telling You
Hi Michelle,
Great points!
The free gift goes over really well. I always get good feedback from it.
Thanks so much – glad you enjoyed it!
~Christine
Building a large, responsive email list can be tough. If you don’t know the little things that make a big difference, it can take forever and seem next to impossible to grow your list to the size of others in your industry!
Good tips overall thanks.
Shamelle recently posted..How To Create a Blogging Workflow That Works With Evernote
Hi Shamelle,
That is very true!
However, it’s not always the size that matters. I’d rather have a small list of responsive people than a big list of lumps on a log
Thanks for your comments and have a great weekend!
~Christine
Thanks, Christine.
Great advice for someone who’s been coasting along, feeling fine. I can always improve my email’s subject, incentive, CTA, and more. Thanks for the reminder!
-Robbie
Robbie Schlosser recently posted..What Alan Jaffe Taught Me About Wedding and Party Music
Hi Robbie,
Thanks!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Have a great rest of the weekend!
~Christine
Hi Christine,
The tip on segmenting your list comes at the right time for me. I have all subscribers in my list bundled up in the same list and as you say, it affects the responsiveness of the list.
How would you suggest I go about segmenting my existing list? For new subscribers, one can outright send them to a new list, but how do I segment those already subscribed?
Yeremi Akpan recently posted..Is Commenting for Traffic a Waste of Your Time?
Hi Yeremi,
To answer your question, for your current subscribers, in Aweber there is a subscriber search function. You can search within a number of different parameters, even a “not opened” list. When you segment the list the way you want, save the segment and do a broadcast email to them. The segment feature is an incredibly helpful feature!
Does that answer your question?
~Christine
Those are great tips Christine and I haven’t even used them all. I have a pretty good open rate though on my emails and my list does continue to grow every single day. I don’t have a lot of opt outs although they still do come. Mostly from people just getting on way too many lists and needing to keep a better handle on that.
The headlines are the key ingredients I will agree with you on that. There are also a few headlines that will almost guarantee that your email will be opened but like you mentioned with the brackets, you can’t abuse it. People will get very wise.
Thanks for sharing this and I’ll be sure to do the same.
~Adrienne
Adrienne recently posted..Are You Making These Social Media Mistakes
Hi Adrienne,
Thanks so much – glad you liked it!
It’s great how you said you still get opt outs but it’s mostly due to people needing to keep a better handle on their lists – that is such a great way to think about opt-outs. I always advise not to worry about about the opt outs as they will happen, focus on the opt-INs.
Glad you stopped by!
~Christine
Thanks for another great list building article, love the tips you give and the advice you offer. Will ceratinly be trying these over our upcoming campaign
Hi Shivie,
Glad you enjoyed it!
Let me know how it goes for you…
~Christine