Email marketing is an incredibly powerful piece of every great marketing strategy. But in order to take advantage of all that it has to offer, you need to know how to grow your email list!
No matter your business niche, email marketing has the power to connect you directly with your audience. You’ll always own your list—and email has one of the best ROIs of various marketing strategies.
That’s why knowing how to grow your email list is essential! Most of us have no idea where to start in growing our lists…but there are some key tips to help you start fostering that growth now.
What Is An Email List?
Let’s start at the beginning. What even is an email list?
Your email list is a compilation of people who have subscribed to receive emails from you. They’ve provided you with their email addresses and given consent to receive promotions and newsletters from your business.
There are lots of things you can send out to your email list, including discounts, upcoming events or launches, information about your business and offerings, and more.
It’s totally normal for people to join and leave your list. That’s right—it’s okay for people to unsubscribe. Remember that if someone unsubscribes from your list, they weren’t your ideal customer primed to buy…and that’s okay.
But luckily, you can actively facilitate the way you grow your email list. On a basic level, you should be collecting emails at checkout and encouraging sign-ups in other spots, like social media, and across your website.
Why Is It Important To Grow Your Email List?
Email marketing offers perhaps the biggest untapped potential for marketing your business. Unlike social media, which could disappear at any time, you 100% own your email list.
You’re able to build workflows that nurture your audience and prompt way more conversions. And almost everyone has an email address, so you have a chance to reach a way wider demographic of your target audience than on, let’s say, Tiktok.
Beyond that, email has a HUGE clickthrough and conversion rate. You’re able to get super specific and test metrics to improve over time by doing things like A/B testing your subject lines. And of course, you’re able to personalize emails based on where different segments of your audience are in the customer journey.
How To Grow Your Email List With 7 Strategies
Now you know what email marketing entails and why it’s important. Let’s dive in and talk about some specific tips to help you grow your email list!
1. Collect Emails At Any In-Person Events For Your Business
Whenever you host or attend an in-person event for your business, it offers a golden opportunity for you to grow your email list.
You can keep this simple and write down emails with pen-and-paper while at the event. Or, you could even create a scannable QR code for people to sign up for your list by visiting an opt-in landing page, all with a quick scan with their phone’s camera.
At these events (and online, too), prioritize showing the VALUE of joining your list. Aside from hearing from you, what’s in it for the customer? Will they be getting discounts, exclusive information, or other benefits?
2. Use Social Media To Grow Your Email List
Social media is a great place to grow your business. But you should always try to move social media followers over to your email list.
Your social media audience helps you grow your email list by focusing on an audience that’s already interested in your offerings. Make sure to regularly promote your email list and encourage sign-ups.
When you promote your email list on social media, make sure to keep it simple and quick for people to sign up. Add links and instructions to make the process easy.
You can also keep your email list opt-in page as a standing link in your Instagram bio so that it’s always available for people to join. We recommend using UTM links for this so that you’ll know exactly where those subscribers came from.
Related: 5 Email Marketing Metrics You Should Use to Track Campaign Success
3. Create A Lead Magnet
A lead magnet is one of the best ways to grow your email list. It’s basically a freebie that you offer in exchange for someone’s email address!
If you’ve never heard of a lead magnet, trust me—if you’re hanging out online, you’ve probably opted into one before. Lead magnets are everywhere! They’re usually free downloads, checklists, guides, video workshops, or other resources that get people into an email workflow.
4. Incentivize Joining Your List Or Host A Giveaway With Email Subscription As A Step To Entry
Incentivizing people to join your list is a great way to grow, too. You can entice people with things at little to no cost that make joining your list sound more appealing, like early access to shop new launches or insider details on upcoming promotions and events.
But for many business owners, offering a sign-up discount is the best way to grow an email list. You can even run giveaways where being on your email list is a requirement to enter!
5. Consider Using Referral Marketing To Grow Your Email List
Referral marketing offers a unique chance to have current members of your audience help you grow your email list. When someone’s already made a purchase from you, they’re loyal…and with the right incentive, they’ll likely be willing to spread the word about your business.
This is super powerful because people really do trust referrals from friends and other business owners. Try setting up an affiliate program where people earn a small commission when they successfully refer others to join your list and/or make a purchase.
You can also use joint ventures to grow your email list. It’s another way to leverage someone else’s audience to expand your reach! But it’s with a peer, and often, joint ventures happen as part of a campaign or event, like a free webinar or paid summit.
Just be sure that you follow GDPR guidelines when you participate in a joint venture promotion! When used correctly, though, it can be a really positive, effective strategy to help you grow your email list.
6. Add Opt-In Popups To Your Website
A lot of people have email opt-ins pop up as soon as a visitor lands on their site. But really, exit intent pop-ups are a way more effective strategy. With an exit intent pop-up, you’ll monitor the behavior of your website visitors so that you can boost conversions before visitors slip away.
You can also add a standalone opt-in on your home page, about page, contact page, or even in your website’s sidebar. Make sure to add compelling CTAs to your opt-in pop-ups!
7. Use UTM Parameters To Evaluate What’s Working Best To Grow Your List
We’ve mentioned this before, but really, UTM parameters are super helpful when you’re implementing strategies to grow your email list. UTMs help you see exactly which strategies are helping you grow your list.
For example, you could create a trackable link using UTM parameters for the opt-in link included in your Instagram bio. That way, you’d know where every subscriber from that platform actually came from.
Ready to grow your email list? These seven tips will help you get started today!
Don’t forget: a tracked number never grows. You need to monitor your metrics in order to maximize the power of email marketing, and our Traffic Insights Dashboard is the perfect tool to do just that!
Email marketing is super powerful—here are some other resources to help you get started:
- 5 Email Marketing Metrics You Should Use to Track Campaign Success
- How To Increase Engagement On Instagram With 5 Simple Strategies
- 5 Strategic Tips to Create An Effective Email Nurture Sequence
- How To Create A High Converting Landing Page That Works Every Time
