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It's finally happened. We've hit a huge milestone on the Preston's Corner blog, and it's hard to believe that not too long ago, I had zero subscribers. This month, we just hit 500 email subscribers on the blog. It's a huge accomplishment, and I just wanted to take the time to reflect and share a few things with you that I've learned along the way. I'll get into each one of the points individually here in a minute, but here are the five things that I've learned growing my email list to over 500 subscribers.
Lesson #1 Email is Still Relevant
A lot of people think that email isn't relevant anymore, but it's highly relevant. A lot of people get caught up in the latest and greatest marketing tactics, but email is still one of the most powerful tools for any online marketer, if it's used correctly. Most people do horrible email marketing, and you've probably seen this type of crap before, where you sign up for a newsletter, or you download a white paper, and then they just hit you with tons of emails trying to get you to buy, buy, buy. They don't provide any value. They're just trying to get you to buy whatever their latest service or video series is, or whatever. Please don't do anything like that, and most people don't even realize that when it comes to online marketing channels, email is still huge, with the highest return on investment when compared to other channels. It's a return of over $40 per dollar invested, but that's only if it's done correctly, like a true email marketing ninja.
Lesson #2 Don't Procrastinate
Oh, my gosh. This is one of my favorite points here. Go ahead and sign up for an email marketing service right now. If you can believe it or not, people are scared to sign up for an email marketing service. I know I was when I first heard about it. It can be really confusing, it can be expensive, and it can be a bit technical, if I'm 100% honest here. I'd like you to go ahead and take the first step today. You've probably heard of some email marketing services like Awebber, Mail Chimp, Get Response. Go ahead and sign up from one of them, and put a form on your website today. Start collecting those emails. I use and love Get Response, and you can use my code in the description below this video to get one month free of their service. Check it out. Get it going on your blog. I really like Get Response over the other services because they have an easy to use interface, and it's simple to get the forms integrated on my WordPress website. If you're using WordPress, go ahead and go with Get Response. Use the code in the description. Check it out.
Lesson #3 Don't be Afraid to Ask for Emails
Don't be afraid to collect email addresses. A lot of people are actually afraid because they don't know what they're going to send to people who signed up for their email list, and then they let the list go on and on, and they haven't emailed anybody. Six months later, they start emailing people, and people go, “I don't know who this is. Why are they emailing me?” Don't be afraid. Just try to do a weekly email if you can. That's what I'm doing right now, until I can start doing some more email stuff, but don't be afraid to send emails on top of that.
Lesson #4 Have Great Content
If somebody gives you their email address, they're obviously interested in what you have to offer, but have great content. If somebody downloads your report, or takes your video course, which is what you could be using as a lead magnet, and then it stinks, it sucks, it's subpar. Don't be subpar. There's a lot of mediocrity out there. Don't be just subpar. Be excellent. Over delivery. Give them so much value, that they're like, “Oh, my gosh. This course was so great. This white paper was so awesome. If I did buy something from them, I can't even imagine how great it would be, because their free stuff was so awesome.”
Lesson #5 Don't be Generic & Niche Down
That brings me to point number five, which is take a hard stand for something. Don't just be generic, and actually niche down in whatever your niche is, whether it's fitness, online marketing, anything. Whether it's gardening, it doesn't matter. For instance, on fitness, just trying to do something as broad as fitness, you've seen other people branch out and do six pack abs, how to get six pack abs, instead of just, here's how to be healthy, and be fit, and eat healthy, and do all of this. Don't try to do everything, because you won't do everything well. Just try to do that one thing inside of your niche, and be awesome at it, and be the go-to person for that specific thing. Those are the five things I learned getting my email list to 500 subscribers, and if you're a subscriber on my email list, I would just like to say thank you so much for being a subscriber. If you like this video, go ahead and subscribe to me on YouTube. I've been doing these videos a lot lately. I enjoy doing them. I hope you guys enjoy them as well, and hopefully we'll be at over 1,000 email subscribers here pretty soon. I look forward to the journey. If you're on the list, thank you so much for being on it. Go ahead and subscribe, and I'll catch you next week. Thank you so much.