Easy Ways to Grow Your Contact List
Editors Note: We’re excited to welcome Amanda Salem, the Director of Content Marketing at Constant Contact to the Dear Handmade Life blog for a series of blog posts to help you market your creative business.
When I first started my small business over 20 years ago, Constant Contact was my first email service provider! And after testing other providers, I’ve recently switched back to Constant Contact. From gorgeous drag and drop templates to easy ways to segment your email list, I love Constant Contact, and their customer service is awesome. Want to talk to an actual human? Yeah, they’ve got you!
Lucky you, Constant Contact is offering our readers 30% off their first three months. Just click here to get this awesome deal.
P.S. – You can catch the replay of our free workshop with Constant Contact, How to Make the Most of Your Next Market: How to Integrate Your Email Marketing with Your In-person Craft Fairs to Build Your Audience & Make More Sales right here!
Now, here's Amanda to share easy ways to grow your contact list....
What came first, the content or the contact list? Many entrepreneurs struggle with what to say, but who to say it might actually be the more critical part of the equation. After all, you already have a product that people will love–keeping them informed about it is the easy part. So how do you attract people who want to stay informed about exclusive offers, new product launches and upcoming events?
As Dave Charest, Director of Small Business Success at Constant Contact, shared in his recent free workshop, How to Make the Most of Your Next Market: How to Integrate Your Email Marketing with Your In-person Craft Fairs to Build Your Audience & Make More Sales with Dear Handmade Life, there are three primary ways to build your contact list: online, in person and in print. He shared some great ways to grow your email list in-person, so we’ll be focusing on a few ways to grow your list online and in print.
Online: Use social media and landing pages together. As we discussed in our previous blog, social media and landing pages can go hand-in-hand to help build your online presence– but they can build your contact list, as well. Consider giving your social followers a product sneak peek along with a link to sign up for more information on when your product goes live. You can also host social media sweepstakes and collect entries via a signup form– just be clear about exactly what they’re signing up for and how you’ll contact them in the future.
Online: Piggyback on existing interactions. When your customers visit your website to shop or register for an event, they are already indicating interest in your business and what you have to offer. Consider adding an opt-in to your checkout process that allows users to populate their contact information at checkout into your contact list. The same approach works well when customers register for a digital event or class, or add themselves to a waiting list for a product.
In print: Go digital with a QR code. This approach works well in product packaging or at the point-of-sale at a store or event. Printing out a QR code that leads people to your opt-in is a quick, easy, and extremely versatile way to give people all the information they need to stay in touch with your business at the click of a button.
In print: Go analog with a signup sheet. Some things never go out of style, and that includes displaying a sign-up sheet at your storefront, marketplace booth or anywhere else potential customers might be perusing what you have to offer. The only downsides to this method are entering the contacts into your database or digital marketing tool… and keeping fresh pens on hand.
An extra tip: Go beyond email addresses. No matter what methods you use to grow your contact list, one thing is certain: digital marketing has taken us well beyond simply gathering an email address for our outreach efforts. Information like cell phone numbers (for SMS text marketing), birthdays and anniversaries (for automated outreach), and even product preferences (for list segmentation) can help you move from a basic contact list into next-level marketing.
To learn more about how to promote yourself to your customers using digital marketing, be sure to check out our webinar with Constant Contact’s Director of Small Business, Dave Charest.
About Constant Contact
Constant Contact delivers for small businesses and nonprofits with powerful tools that simplify and amplify digital marketing. Whether it’s driving sales, growing a customer base or engaging an audience, we deliver the performance and guidance to build strong connections and generate powerful results. For more information, visit www.constantcontact.com.
