Emails are fast. An email can reach it’s intended recipient in a few seconds, depending on the server, to almost anywhere on the planet. That’s pretty amazing if you really think about it!

Emails are used to distribute newsletters, promotional mail and all kinds of other material. How then do you legitimately get enough email addresses to send your marketing materials? This is opt-in list building for email marketing.

The first thing you need to know about creating an opt-in list, is that you need to be targeted. There’s no point collecting mostly male recipients if your site is about brides and weddings. Obviously, that list would be best collecting the emails of women who are engaged to be married.

Here are a couple of helpful tips on how to create a targeted and comprehensive opt-in list for your email marketing efforts.

Create a website or blog site.

There are so many places you can set up a web page, a blog or even a whole website cheaply, that it’s no big deal to do so. Even if you have no knowledge, there are templates and site builders that do almost all the work for you. Once you have your own site, you can add a sign-up form.

Offer a promotion or freebie.

Offering something of percieved value to entice your visitors to subscribe. It might be a free report, software, game or anything else you can offer that will get the visitor to part with their email address and their name.

Write

There are places both online and in regular magazines where readers can submit articles to be published. If you have the opportunity, write an article, ensuring that you place a link to your website and sign-up form in your resource box.

Don’t spam

Once you have your reader’s email address, guard it. Don’t rent or sell it or give it out to others. You will lose trust and subscribers faster than you can imagine.

Check out your competition

Don’t just check them out, partner with them! Find another website owner with a business that is similar (but not the same) as your own. Share the costs of list building and you get to share the list. Make sure your opt-in readers know that they are subscribing to both.

Don’t forget bricks and mortar

Don’t forget offers in the paper, local flyers and other ways to promote your business in your area. Create a form where people can leave their email address. Make sure you let them know you will be sending them promotional material.

Opt-in list building needs some effort on your part, so be prepared for the work. You need to make a plan and plan out a budget too. People on your opt-in mailing lists are potential customers and should be treated as such. The opportunity to capture the details of possible one time visitors to your site is as valuable as gold.

Get to work right now on how you can create your own opt-in mailing list for your own email marketing campaigns. Reach out to your highly targeted, prospective future customers starting today.

Read Opt-In List Building and learn how to build your list fast and you will greatly improve every email marketing campaign. It’s only $7 and comes with a full, iron clad, no questions asked 7 day guarantee.