We talk a lot about creating an email list here at Great Garden Speakers, and with good reason. It’s vital to growing your business. There are ways you have likely done that with your live presentations (had a physical email sign-up form at your book signing table, for example), but how do you accomplish the same thing with a Zoom talk? It’s easy, and we’ll show you how!
Tell me again why I need an email list?
Simply put, your email list is your #1 tool in what’s called “permission marketing” — these are people who want to hear from you and have given you permission to contact them again. Why is this important? Because you want to avoid being spammy, which is not only annoying but very unprofessional.
Let’s say you have various presentations, a couple books, maybe a course or two, or an online membership. You want to have a way to market all those things to people who like you, trust you, and have said, “FANTASTIC SPEAKER, I want to hear from you again. Please add me to your list!” This is golden. “But I have social media,” you might say. Here’s the thing, though, social media platforms can come and go and you don’t have control over whether they’ll show your content to your audience without paying for advertising. Do not rely solely on social media to communicate with your audience or potential customers or clients. If you do, you risk your entire marketing arm getting cut off when a platform changes or goes under.
What do I need to have in order to start building my list?
Just a few basic things and you’re up and running. And please — let us know if we can help you with this! While it’s relatively easy, it’s detailed work that is not everyone’s ninja skill (but it’s our ninja skill).
- An email marketing service provider (ESP): Choose what email marketing service you want to use — you don’t need all the bells and whistles right off the bat, but you may opt for those further down the road. Check out services like Mailchimp, Klaviyo, Mailerlite, Drip, or AWeber, read about their features and benefits, and compare monthly/yearly costs. Then make your decision and dive in!
- A privacy policy: Privacy policies let people know what you will do with their contact info, and what you will not do with their contact info. It gives your audience confidence in you as a professional — after all, they are trusting you with personal information. And you don’t need to be a lawyer to create one; simply pop over to a site like Rocket Lawyer and make one in minutes. (We do recommend having your lawyer look over the policy that you generate.)
- An email sign-up form: Somebody’s signing up with you? Here’s what needs to be stated somewhere in your signup form:
- How often you email,
- What’s typically in your emails
- That they can unsubscribe at any time
- Your privacy policy(link to it, please!).
Make sure all of that is on or around your signup form. Here’s what ours looks like:
How to Build Your Email List with Zoom Talks
Okay, now that you’re all set up, let’s talk about how to leverage this email list in your Zoom talks. And we promise, this is not difficult — you simply need to organize things ahead of time and remember to share the info you created. Remember, this is not being “pushy” — it’s about helping people to learn how to work with you in the future!
- Remember that sign-up form! Create a tinyurl (makes a long link shorter) for your landing page link , then add that link to the end of your slides and again in the Chat feature. Don’t make them look for it!
- Build mention of your email newsletter into your talk. Don’t just wait til the end of your talk to invite people to sign up — build mentions of your email list into the talk itself, and make sure a program moderator drops the link into the Chat when you do. Talk about all the cool stuff that’s in your newsletter and why people love your newsletter.That way, once you’re finished speaking, attendees will be chomping at the bit to sign up.
- Make sure program managers share your email landing page sign-up link. The program manager can also share a link to your sign-up form in any other communication they do with attendees: social media, emails, videos, etc. “Learn more and stay in touch with our speaker via their email newsletter. Here’s the link XXXXXXXXX.”
- Consider delivering any handouts for the talk via a landing page and email automation. Giving out handouts for your talk? Deliver them to your attendees by giving them a link to a landing page you’ve created specifically for this — then create an email automation that delivers the downloads in an email when the attendee signs up. (An email automation is a triggered email that will send to an individual after they sign up for a list and a particular tag or marker is applied to their record.)
- Add zoom participants to your email list. Is the webinar/talk in your zoom? Are you using the talk as a “lead magnet” to add people to your list, specifically? Set up a zap or other connection between Zoom and your email program to ensure that all participants are automatically added to your email lists. Make sure to a) let registrants know they’ll be added to your list and b) create a little welcome automation in your email service provider to welcome them to your list and add a big unsubscribe link, letting them know they can unsubscribe at any time.
The bottom line is this: ensure that all signs, arrows, and interaction point back to your email list. Your list is your moneymaker. You want everyone who could possibly ever want to purchase a book, schedule a talk, or hire you for services to be on your list, period.
How often should you email?
We get asked this question a LOT. The frequency really depends on what you need/want to accomplish. Monthly is the minimum. Any less than that and you risk people forgetting they signed up for your list.
Every other week keeps you more top of mind, but some people email weekly. It depends on your goals. (Everything depends on your goals, really!)
Ready to get started? You can do it!
If you need help with email marketing, it’s Katie’s (Owner of GGS) favorite thing to talk about. Click here to grab a discovery call slot.
