Pin Down Your Purpose
Episode #1 of the course How to rapidly grow your email list by Jessica Festa
Welcome! I’m so excited to help you on your journey to growing your email list.
Why Grow a List
Growing your list gives you access to the inboxes of your most loyal community members. They’ve given you their virtual phone numbers, meaning that they’re asking you to talk to them. Once on your list, you can nurture these readers to grow your authority—and your relationship—and eventually, sell them your products.
And unlike social media, where you don’t own your followers, your email subscribers are all yours.
Start with a Content Strategy
List-building begins with having a clear mission. Before you can get people to subscribe, you have to know who you’re trying to get to subscribe. What you want is a list full of the right people, those who will engage with your content and purchase your products.
Start with a mission. How can you help people? Consider what topics people typically ask you questions about. Make a list of the topics people see you as an expert in that you would also feel confident teaching others about.
If you’re not sure, call up ten friends and ask them what questions they’d come to you for advice on. Additionally, think about what your passions are and what you regularly look forward to doing.
Remember, the topic you come up with should be one you’d enjoy writing about—hopefully for the rest of your life.
Who benefits? Once you know how you can help people, think about who would benefit from this knowledge.
If you’re an expert on making money through Pinterest, who would want to know how to earn an income on this platform?
If you’re an expert in hatha yoga, what type of person could see growth from following you?
If you’re an expert in vegan cooking on a budget, who might be struggling, so you can help them?
The narrower the better. Be as specific as possible, both with your niche and your audience.
Topics like “travel,” “health,” and “science” are very general. The narrower your business niche, the easier it is to fill a gap and stand out. And the more you stand out, the easier it is to meet the needs of a unique group of people.
So, instead of helping “people” to “travel more,” maybe you help “long-term travelers” plan “round-the-world trips.” Having a more defined mission makes it easier to stay on track with your content and help people accomplish a particular problem.
Create a Blog to Attract Your Audience
Whether you’re a traditional business or a blog business, having a blog—aka your website or an area of your website you update regularly—will be essential for implementing the list-building tactics you’ll be learning. If you’re not blogging, you’re missing out on a huge amount of potential traffic.
Think of the blog as the “headquarters” of your email list-growing efforts. Through in-depth blog posts that leave no questions unanswered, you can attract new potential customers—and impress existing readers—and encourage them to sign up for your email list.
For example, let’s say you run an online yoga accessories shop and you write a blog post about hatha yoga poses that help with back pain. Someone who has never heard of your business might be searching for this information, find your awesome article, discover your business, and sign up for your email list.
That’s the power of high-quality content that leaves no questions unanswered and of knowing your audience.
Your Turn
For this week’s homework, fill in the blanks to this statement:
“I help _____ [group of people] do _____ [what do you help them do].”
Recommended book
Growth Hacker Marketing: A Primer on the Future of PR, Marketing, and Advertising by Ryan Holiday
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