List building is probably the most important part of internet marketing. Whether you have an online business or a brick and mortar one, you need to get a list of leads and a list of customers. Otherwise you’ll have no long term, sustainable business.

It helps a lot to have a blog before you start building an email list. If you missed my last 2 review posts of Blogging With John Chow which are about setting up a blog and blog content respectively, click on the links with the word blog in them in this sentence and read those posts.

Now we are ready to have a look at the fifth module of Blogging With John Chow course.

Module 5 – List Building

This module, as all the other modules so far, starts with a video with John Chow. In it John is talking about list building and the importance of starting to build your list right away. This video is over 4 minutes long.

Then, in text form, John in 5 paragraphs talks more about the importance of building a list. He cautions: “…your list needs to be built around the same principles as your blog -value, value, value.”

He also shares one of his emails sent to a fresh subscriber.

The Three Step Process

Step 1 – Bribe People to Join your List

Step 2 – Provide Valuable Information Regularly

Step 3 – Call them to Action

Note: I’d like to politely disagree with the word “bribe” John uses. I prefer to use the words  “give incentive” or “give the reason why” instead.

The word bribe is short and to the point but it’s not really what transpires. Bribe is given in illegal and under the table activities. In honest and legitimate businesses people give free samples, free information or free estimate incentives. Those are good reasons why people are willing to give their contact information.

The note above is just to clarify the intent behind the word John uses. So, please, keep it in mind. It actually becomes very obvious what he means when you read what he says later.

First, the Bribe

In nine paragraphs of text John expands on this theme. He goes on to say things like: “…when you ask someone to sign up to your email list, they must give you information – usually a name and an email address – and for that, you’d better bring the goods.” …”You over deliver. Just like you do in every blog post you write, video you record or image you share…”

What a Good Freebie Looks Like

John lists and describes 6 different options some of which are:

Video Course

Templates

Free eBook

After that John shows a screenshot of his site where his freebie and opt in box are visible.

Provide Valuable Information Regularly

In 7 paragraphs John discusses this topic and makes statements like the one below:

“…once you have someone on your list, your number one job is to make sure they stay there.”

The Content Magnet

The key here is consistency. It’s covered in 3 paragraphs.

Reprint and Enhance

John covers some strategies about what kind of information you can send to your subscribers. One of them is to reprint your blog post and send it out with some extra content.

Other Great Content

Send them other content that is not on your blog. For example webinars, free reports, videos. The idea here is to create a relationship with your subscribers.

Call them to Action

John gives a lot of information and very useful points and examples in more than two dozen paragraphs under this heading. I cannot quote everything in this review for obvious reasons. I can’t give away the store. But you can get an idea from the excerpts below:

“This is where you start making your move…When you send an email loaded with content, it should contain at least one call to action. Here’s why. You don’t know how many emails one person will read. If someone only reads one out of every five emails you send, it’s very easy for them to miss a pitch. If you include a pitch in every message, they will see it no matter which message they read.”

There is an example of the kind of email that is likely to drive people away – the hard sell and of an email that is likely to be gratefully accepted – the easy going and personalized soft sell.

Strategies to Build Your List

After four short paragraphs John continues on with

The Squeeze Page

After covering in 2 paragraphs what a squeeze page is in general John says that the traditional blog has the following capture methods:

Sidebar Opt in

Popover Opt in

The sidebar opt in is easily ignored and often is. The popover opt in is harder to ignore but people can close it right away.

The third option which John uses and gives a picture example of from his blog is a squeeze page.

He concludes the text under this heading by saying:

“You can then link to this page from any of your posts. This is effective if you are discussing something directly related to the freebie you are giving away. Don’t oversell  it…But don’t undersell it either…”

Email Suppression

Here John talks about the fact that you will not necessarily want all your emails to go to everyone on your list. Under a paragraph of text on this subject there is a near 6 minute video where John Chow is showing some of his AWeber tricks related to this. Since this is a YouTube video I decided to embed it here.

Watch John Chow’s AWeber Tricks in the video below:

How to Create a Squeeze Page in 10 Minutes

John points out that there are a lot of courses about how to create a squeeze page but if you are in a hurry it doesn’t have to be complicated.

The Headline

“Your headline is the most important part of the page…it should do three things.”

Introduce a Problem

Introduce a Solution

Define the Terms

“Remember, the goal is not to tell your readers what your page does, but to describe to them why they should care…They want to know what’s in it for them.”

The Video

To John Chow making a video seems very simple. He recognizes that to other people it may not be so, which is why he devotes 3 paragraphs to making sure that he points out what is most important to keep in mind and to do when making a video to ensure it’s effective. He also tells you what is usually the best length for this type of video.

The Opt In

After one paragraph of text there are screen shots from setting up the opt in in AWeber autoresponder.

Growing and Monetizing 

Ad Swaps and Solo Ads

A squeeze page works if you can drive traffic to that page. However, if you don’t yet have the traffic coming to your blog, consider these two methods to generate subscribers fast, says John Chow.

He explains in 7 more paragraphs what they are and how they work. While Ad Swaps are not costing money the Solo Ads have to be paid for with your hard earned cash.

Instant Monetization

John is describing a way to cover the cost of Solo Ads which has worked for him in the past in 3 steps.

Step 1 – Create Your Squeeze Page

Step 2 – Create a Thank You Page

Step 3 – Sell Something

Freebie Promotions

“…create a sales page (a bigger and badder version of your squeeze page) and send people there with active promotions.”

The Importance of a List

In different words the importance of building and having an email list is touched on again is four short paragraphs.

That concludes Module 5.

What are your thoughts and views about list building and email marketing? Do you think that it’s as important as everybody seems to be saying?

 

Comment on this blog post, like it on Facebook, tweet it, google+ it and bookmark it on your favorite bookmarking sites to enable others to find it and to join the conversation.

Update September 06, 2017: This product on blogging by John Chow reviewed above is no longer available. However, there is a suitable alternative course on blogging by a famous blogger. Check it out by clicking on the banner below.


Authored by Vance Sova

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Related posts:

  1. Blogging With John Chow Review-Part 3
  2. Blogging With John Chow Review-Part 5-Monetizing 101
  3. Blogging With John Chow Review-Part 2
  4. Blogging With John Chow Review-Part 1

Filed under: Internet Marketing Course Reviews