30 Day Email Subscriber Blueprint
In order to sell your products or earn as an affiliate, you need an email list that you can promote to on an ongoing basis. But when you’re new to a niche, you’re starting from scratch.
This is something that acts as an obstacle for many people who are just now starting out. However, you can build a list of dedicated subscribers in as little as 30 days if you’re willing to put some effort into it.
This blueprint will show you how to take action so that you successfully build your list quickly. Instead of a slow growth list building experience, you’ll see your subscriber numbers soar with momentum.
Day 1: Use Automation to Communicate
As people subscribe to your list, you need to have software set up so that they receive timely messages from you. Obviously, you can’t do these one by one. It would take you forever and increase the odds of you either forgetting to email or making mistakes with the message.
You can set up automated email messages through various platforms such as MailChimp, GetResponse and Aweber. All you have to do is create an account, so today you’ll be choosing one that works best for you.
The email autoresponder will show you how to create your automated emails and even give you a guide about how to set everything up and drip feed your emails to new subscribers.
Day 2: Set Up Your List(s)
After you choose your email autoresponder platform, you then need to create your first list today. With most platforms, you can have multiple lists, which allows you to separate people from buyers versus lead sign-ups, or in different niches.
Day 3: Set the Tone for Your List with a Genuine Greeting
On this day, you’ll craft a welcome message for your audience. This message will be somewhat short. Start by thanking them for signing up and instantly give them the download link to whatever they signed up for, such as a free report.
You also might want to set the tone for what they should expect as a subscriber, such as what you’ll be sharing, how often, and so on. You may not have your lead magnet created yet, so you can go back and add the link later.
Right now, you can simply accept new subscribers to receive updates from you, and simply thank them and welcome them in the first email until your freebie offer is completed.
Day 4: Find Out What Answers Your Audience Needs
When you gain new subscribers, you need a way to get and keep them on your list. That means meeting their most pressing needs with a lead magnet that is irresistible, so find their pain points today.
This should be information they need to fix something in their personal life or career that relates to your niche. You can search forums and social media posts that are related to what the audience is searching for.
You can check comments on blogs and you can also look for commonly used search terms that are related to the issue the audience is having. Even product reviews left by consumers can give you a sneak peek into the mind of your target audience.
Day 5: Find the Right Topic to Appeal to Your Audience
You need a hook to draw your audience in that sets you apart from the masses, so today you’ll brainstorm a slant based on the needs you’ve uncovered. There are many freebies that are stale and repetitive.
This not only bores an audience but causes them to overlook it because they might feel they’ve heard it all before. The key is to take the same information, but make it fresh. Instead of creating a report that says, “How to Make Your Budget Work to Save Money,” it would be better to draw in the audience with something like “Stop Using a Budget and Save Money.”
It goes against the grain of most ideas, and then you can explain why most budgets fail (too rigid or shaming) and how to fix that. Because readers will be interested in how to save money and many of them hate budgeting, the title will catch their attention and they’ll want to sign up for your list to have access to the free gift.
Day 6: Outline Your Lead Magnet Idea
Today you’ll want to jot down the main points for your sign up offer to make sure it’s comprehensive enough to tempt people. Then take the main points and break them down into subtopics.
You want to make sure that this sign up has a lot of value. For example, if you’re in the relationship niche, you could write a sign-up report on “50 New Ways to Spice Up Your Relationship” or “50 Little Known But Hot Ways to Surprise Your Spouse.”
The sign-up would give the reader 50 actionable steps they could take and apply and they would be happy to have access to that report – especially if it were free to them in exchange for contact information.
Day 7: Choose How to Deliver the Information
When you’re creating an enticing sign up offer, you don’t have to make it in text-based guide format. It doesn’t have to be a series of tips or even an eBook. It could be a membership course.
You can also use other communication arrangements like a podcast or webinar in audio format or a set of video modules, so make a format decision today. However you choose to do it is just a way that presents your expertise to the audience.
Make sure that your offer looks professional and is one that leaves your audience feeling glad they took you up on the offer. Use tools to help you polish up the product with proper editing to increase value.
Day 8: Create or Outsource the Artwork
On day 8, you’ll need to design the artwork for your offer. There are a lot of free tools like Canva that you can use to do this. There are even tutorials that will show you step by step how to make them.
However, there’s always a learning curve, so what you make might end up looking like it was done by a newbie. That could backfire because then your offer could look like it was second rate and you don’t want that because the first impression on the audience won’t be a good one.
So today, either make sure you have the skills to create the necessary artwork or leave it to someone who does know. You can outsource an eCover or product image for next to nothing on sites like Fiverr and they look professional, as long as you work with someone who has a nice portfolio.
Day 9: Create the Freebie
This is what you’ve promised your readers in exchange for signing up for your list. You want to make sure that what you’re giving them is top quality. You want to give them something they feel they got a good deal on by giving you their contact information in exchange.
If you give them something that’s poorly done or hastily thrown together, they’ll get upset and end up unsubscribing. Today, do your best to create a lead magnet that you can be proud of and that subscribers will appreciate.
Day 10: Make the Sign-Up Gift Immediately Accessible
In order to make sure there’s no lag time, once you’ve put your sign-up gift together and checked it for quality, you want to put a link in the welcome email that the audience can access.
Make sure you check the link before you send it out. You want to make sure the download works properly. A short file name is often better than a long one because it can cause a download to not work, depending on where they save the file to on their computer.
Day 11: Create a Free Gift Landing Page
When it comes to your free item for your subscribers, you’re going to need a landing page for it. This is also known as a “lead magnet page.” This isn’t content that should be long and drawn out, but it does need to be powerful and informative.
You want the information at the top of the page and you want to focus on using attention grabbing text and visuals. So concentrate on creating a few bullet points, but don’t overdo the visuals and have everything geared toward getting those sign-ups – which is your call to action.
You don’t want to make a complicated page. The simpler, the better. Get right to the point. You can use words like “get started” or simply “subscribe.” This is the page where you’ll be sending people to get on your list, so spend today crafting your words carefully.
Day 12: Install the Form on Your Sign-Up Page
When in you’re in your email autoresponder dashboard, you can follow the steps to create a form that you will later embed on the sign-up page as a way for people to get on your list.
You’ll be able to select a specific call to action message, the size of the form, what they have to enter (first name and email address is good), and the colors of the form so that they match your lead magnet page design.
Day 13: Put the Free Gift Page Together with the Subscribe Box
It’s time now to put it all together. The content that you created for the gift page and the embeddable form you got from your autoresponder system is now ready to be put in place on your site.
Once you do put it together, it’s important that you check the page out to make sure it functions properly. You’ll want to examine your content and the visuals you’ve selected along with the box that asks people for their information.
You’ll want to check this to see that it displays the right way on laptops, desktops and cell phones because you don’t want people attempting to sign up only to discover that they’re not able to.
Day 14: Use Your Blog to Gain Subscribers
You don’t want to miss a chance to get people to sign up. A lot of advice out there will tell you that you should make sure you create a sign up box on your lead magnet page and that’s correct.
But you also want to make sure other places where you connect with your audience offers them the same chance. If you have a blog, make sure that you design a sign up form for that as well – so that it can be positioned on the sidebar where visitors to every page or post will see it.
Day 15: Embed the Sidebar Code Using a Widget
Go into the dashboard of your blog and look for the widgets option under the appearances section. You can add a text widget and past the HTML code from your email autoresponder form into the widget before saving it to activate it.
Once you do it and the box or form appears on the side of your blog, you want to check to see that all the parameters of your box look right. If something went wrong, the content you created for the box will extend beyond the columns on whichever side of your blog it’s on.
Day 16: Split Test Your Lead Magnet Page
After you’ve made your first gift sign-up page, you’re going to make a second one. That’s because you need to do what’s called AB (split) testing. The purpose is to see which page is going to perform better for you.
You can make the page using just text again, but you might want to try using other forms of communicating with the audience such as making a video for the page, which helps the audience get to know you better, even if you’re not on screen but they hear your voice.
Day 17: Include a Hard-to-Miss Sign-Up Box
When someone checks out your blog, they might do so at a glance at first. If they only see the sign-up box in the left or right column of the page, they’re not going to automatically be drawn to giving you their information.
That’s because they don’t know the value you provide yet. Once they do read it, they’ll realize they do need your guidance. This is why you’ll want to give them the chance to sign up as soon as they finish reading a post.
Just create another form in your email autoresponder and embed it under your posts. If your posts are lengthy, the reader will have scrolled past the sidebar option anyway, so this gives them another chance to subscribe.
Day 18: Check to See What’s Working (and What’s Not)
You can’t set everything up without making sure all is well. Once you’ve finished creating your pages, whatever video format you have and your side columns for signup, you’ll need to make sure that everything is running smoothly altogether.
You can check to see how much traction each version of the forms you’re using is getting by looking at your dashboard in your email autoresponder system. This is helpful information that will show you what signup location on your page is the performing best for you.
Day 19: Guide the Reader to Take Action
What you say in your blog posts is important. But the last thing you do is even more so. Don’t end a blog post without telling the reader what to do next. The choice you want them to make is to sign up for your list.
The way to do that is to show them the sign up box again. State that they should enter their information, and then use a firm statement like: subscribe now, get help now, watch the video now, get started, view, learn more, join, etc.
Readers need to have the direction that tells them what to do. Action words will help remind them to take action, whether it’s getting on your list, buying a product or clicking through on a link.
Day 20: Ensure Subscribers Stay on Your List
To get your audience to sign up, you created something that they wanted enough to give you their name and email address. It was important enough to them that they were willing to risk their contact information without fully knowing or trusting that you aren’t a spammer.
That’s why it’s important that your first communication with them after the welcome email has that “wow” factor. It’s equally as important that you don’t just stay quiet after you gave them the sign up gift.
Now is the time to show them how much you appreciate them following you. It’s also the time that you need to show them what else you can do for them. Your audience will be delighted that not only did they get something they needed when they joined your list, but that you went the extra mile and gave them even more help.
People like to know that their needs and wants matter even when they’re joining a list. By giving them an extra unexpected gift, you’ll be the person who stands out in their mind as someone who’s interested in making a difference in their life or as someone who genuinely wants to solve their problem.
Day 21: Have a Click Out Strategy
When you check your traffic analytics, you may notice that you have a bounce rate that’s higher than you like. When that happens, it could be that something on your blog or site just isn’t grabbing the reader’s attention like it should.
Before they leave, you want to capture their name and email address so that you can send them content that meets their needs better via email. You can use a pop-up for this purpose.
It’s imperative that you set the pop-up to activate at the right time. This can be done in the beginning to grab attention. But it can also be done as the reader is preparing to leave the site without having made a decision.
But make sure you use the right kind of pop up. Don’t try to hide the x or make it difficult for the reader to minimize the pop up. Because if you try to use the pop up to force them to remain, they’ll just get annoyed and leave your site without becoming a subscriber.
Day 22: Create Extra Perks for Those Who Sign Up
People who sign up for mailing list should get preferential treatment. They should get first notification about events, sales and information. But they should also be treated better when it comes to what you share on your blog.
If everything that you write is accessible to any reader who stops by, then the subscribers aren’t really getting anything extra from reading the posts. That’s why you want to write a series specifically for those that have signed up. This blog series can be on any topic that you feel would be beneficial to your subscribers.
When people who aren’t on your list try to read these posts, you can have a “subscribe to continue reading” call to action notification. Setting up your blog this way not only makes your loyal audience members appreciate the extra perks but also can help you to grow your list.
Day 23: Let the Internet Know About Your Gift
It’s not enough just to talk about the free gift you have for subscribers on your website. You also want to share it on other platforms. So talk about it on your Facebook page, on your Instagram.
Mention it on TikTok and everywhere you have a social media account. You want to be careful that you don’t present your freebie as an obvious ploy to get their contact information.
Instead, you want to share with the followers how you realized there was a problem and you found a solution. Then tell them about the gift that you’re giving away to help people.
Day 24: Create a Product Idea to Gain More Subscribers
You’ll notice that other entrepreneurs may have bigger email lists. You can ethically and politely swipe their subscribers but you also need to be sure that you’re bringing something to the table.
You can do this by creating a funnel of products for them to promote. You can offer the other entrepreneur all of the commission on the first product in the funnel and a percentage on everything else.
Other entrepreneurs will promote your products, too. It’s up to you to make sure the items are worthwhile and gives the audience something that’s valuable that they’ll use or affiliates won’t promote for you – they’ll protect their subscribers from you.
Today, spend some time brainstorming at least two items you could create that would make those with established lists want to promote it to their subscribers, allowing you to get those same people on your list, too.
Day 25: Discover Niche Leaders with a Big Audience
In order to grow your own list, you need to see who has a list with similar items and a similar target audience. You can search to figure out what items are selling by your competitors.
Find out what those products are. Look through their websites, read through their blogs and see what they’re saying. Check out their rankings to see who’s selling the most and you can estimate what their list size may be if they’re converting well.
Their audience is made up of people who would purchase the same kind of products from you. Check out leaderboards of launches with contests to see which affiliates performed best and you can jot down their name as a potential list building affiliate for your launch.
Day 26: Give Affiliates a Details Page and Use a Launch Calendar
When you have your product idea developed, set up a joint venture page where affiliates can gather all of the information they need for your launch. By using a product launch calendar like Muncheye, you can input all the important details – like the day of the launch, when it’s going to start and end, and all of the necessary information and details that will make people who promote the products notice and want to take part.
After you set up your launch on a calendar and announce it, potential affiliates with a big reach (and potential subscribers for you) will be able to see it and you can get them to promote so it’ll grow your audience. By announcing your product, you’ll gain the interest of more affiliates than just those you happen to know.
Day 27: Make the Front End of the Funnel
Spend today creating a fantastic front end product for your launch. If the value is terrible, that customer isn’t going to be happy, won’t stick around and you’ll have wasted your time and effort trying to build a list, so don’t attempt to put together a product that isn’t top quality.
Keep in mind that the launch needs to consist of leaders who have customers who buy the products they’re introduced to. These leaders have created loyal lists because they only share items that are worthwhile.
Once you have these files ready to go, double check that they’re free of errors. Then write your persuasive copy so that the person is convinced to give it a try. This copy needs to grab attention, have your main text, your list and instructions telling the reader what to do next.
Day 28: Offer Something More
The key to establishing a successful list is to always give more than what’s expected. You can do that by focusing on your upgrade offer. This is something that earns more for you and for those who promote the product.
Your affiliates and your customers will both be happy. Remember that even your upgrades are going to need to have attention drawn to them, so work on the sales copy for this, too.
Once uploaded and activated, check the funnel offer so that you can see that it all loads properly and delivers like it should. You don’t want any unpleasant surprises on launch day when real money is on the line for both yourself and affiliates.
Day 29: Get Other Leaders Onboard
By now, thanks to studying the competition in your niche, you have a good idea of who you need to connect with. Contact these leaders and tell them who you are and what you have to offer.
Let them know why you think your offer is right for their subscribers. Since they’ll want to check out the viability of the product, you’ll need to let them see it. You’ll also need to have that JV page ready for them to view as well.
Because you want them onboard, entice them to promote with whatever you are willing to do – like giving them 100% commission on the front end, a spot on the download page, a reciprocal promo or whatever perk it is you have to give. You want this to clearly be a good deal for them.
Day 30: Have a Contest to Get Affiliates Interested
You can create a contest to garner interest from your competitors so that you can expand your list. A contest makes affiliates pay more attention to how the launch unfolds, making them mail repeatedly to maintain a spot or climb the leaderboard.
Because not everyone is above board online, you’ll want to have some boundaries in place for your event. For example, you might want to have minimum numbers of sales or conversions in order to do win a prize in the contest.
Make sure that you always know who’s going to be promoting your launch. While the majority of affiliates are decent people, there will always be some who try to game the system including doing illegal things. Some screening before your launch will help prevent you from becoming the victim of an affiliate scam.