Listbuilding with paid advertising is a valid way to build a targeted list of email subscribers. There are pros and cons to using paid advertising. It can be one of the fastest ways to build your list, but it can also be one of the most expensive, especially if you aren’t sure what you’re doing.
The Basics of List Building
If you have ever heard the phrase, “The money is in the list,” they are talking about an email marketing list of prospects who might be interested in your product or services. Every smart online business owner should have at least one list that caters to the most pressing questions your target audience has in relation to your niche.
There are a number of ways to build your list, but the two most common ways are to offer either a free ebook or a free ecourse, in order to entice people to subscribe to your list so that you can build a relationship with them over time.
Once they have subscribed, you can send them a series of emails which would help them get to know you better and become enthusiastic about your products and services, and your level of expertise in your niche. Building a relationship with them means they will start to like and trust you, and be willing to try your products. They might even become loyal to your brand and spread the word about all you have to offer.
Growing Your List
There are many ways to drive traffic to your landing page in order for people to subscribe to your list. There are free methods and paid methods. One of the easiest free methods is social media. The social networks are full of people chatting about useful items that can help them in relation to problems in the niche.
Another way to send people to your landing page is using paid advertising, especially on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter. Both platforms allow you to create ads from scratch, as well as offer you the opportunity to turn your social media posts into ads.
On Facebook, this is termed a “boosted” post, and it can enable you to promote an offer that will encourage people to sign up for your email list. Your “boosted” (or sponsored) post will be shown in the newsfeed area of a person’s social media account. They look natural and organic, not as much like ads compared with Google.
Google Adwords is another advertising platform. It can be effective but is harder to master- and more expensive. It is also less targeted than Facebook. The main advantage of AdWords is that it has a large network with millions of sites that show Google’s ads through their AdSense program. The ads are contextual, which means that your niche-related ads will be shown on suitable sites. Keywords will drive the success of your ads.
One of the main disadvantages of Google AdWords is their ranking of quality score. This is their secret formula that determines relevance. Unfortunately, it can be hit and miss and it can be really difficult to create winning ads. If your ad is not considered relevant enough, you will have to pay more. In some cases, the ad might not even show because of Google’s quality score. One change to the AdWords algorithm can change a well-performing ad to one that fails almost overnight.
If you are looking for a fast way to drive traffic to your list building landing page, paid advertising can be the fastest way to do it. The key is to start small, and track your results.
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