The Seven Deadly Sinsof List Building

Phil HollowsFounder and CEO

FeedBlitzwww.feedblitz.com

@phollows

About Phil Hollows

• Founder and CEO of FeedBlitz

• Author of “List Building for Bloggers”– ListBuildingForBloggers.com

• Clients include: Seth Godin, Fred Wilson, Jay Baer, Brian Clark, Danny Brown, Krazy Coupon Lady, Cecily Kellogg and over 70,000 others!

• phil@feedblitz.com• @phollows

Why Care About Your List?

“I get ten times more response to my blog from my email subscribers than I do from anyone else.”

Seth Godin

You’re An Accidental Email Marketer!

The Seven Deadly Sins

• Wrath• Greed• Sloth• Pride• Lust• Envy• Gluttony

• Committing these sins will:– Affect your list– Affect your

deliverability– Lose you visitors– Cost you money

Wrath

Wrath

• Unsubscribes• Sending Limits• Deliverability Issues

• Anger make you unavailable, unable to listen

• It taps into core fight / flight system

Virtue: Patience

• Listen to the unsubscribes• Respect limits or change how you send• Manage your deliverability:

– Authentication: SPF, Sender ID, DKIM– IP and domain reputation– Tracking: SenderScore.org

• Action: Dual opt-in, best practices

Greed

Greed

• Take, Take, Take• Send, Send, Send• “20% off, free shipping”

• Recipients feel disrespected

• Do you think of your list as a resource, database or an asset; and not as people or subscribers?

Virtue: Charity

• By all means monetize, but:• Give, give, give! • Educate, entertain, enlighten• Walk the walk on trust and authority• Timely, actionable and relevant• Explore alternative ways to monetize

Sloth

Sloth

Sloth

• No list at all• No testing• No metrics• Taking short cuts

Virtues: Diligence, Attention

• Test / Mix it up! – Time of day– Signup form locations– Popups– Incentives– Layouts / Designs / Subject Lines

• Metrics matter– Pay attention to the trends– Open, bounce, unsubscribe rates

Pride

Pride

• Everything I send is great!

• One size fits all

Virtue: Humility

• You are not your audience!

• Timeliness:– Multiple delivery schedules

• Relevance:– Topic-specific lists, activity-based mailings

• Test:– Subject lines, calls to action, time of day

• Platform:– How does it look on your phone?

Lust

Lust

• Excitement is good!• Capitalize on it, but…• Beware short cuts• Overwhelming the

new subscriber• Too much

“enthusiasm” gets you into trouble!

Virtue: Chastity

• Reward new subscribers• Nurture the relationship• Build trust• Take it easy with your autoresponders• Use activity-based mailings• Send the right message at the right time to

the right person

Envy

Envy

• Size isn’t everything!

Virtue: Kindness

• Quality counts over quantity• Nurture your engaged subscribers• Focus on your trends• Build on your success• Reward continued activity• Prune older lists

Gluttony

Gluttony

• Aggressive popups• Buying names• Not using dual opt-in• Bombarding

subscribers for traffic, income

Virtue: Temperance

• Practice safe popups! Respect the visitor• Experiment with different signup forms• NEVER BUY LISTS• Stay relevant• It’s OK to mail once a week if that’s what

your readers expect

Thank You!

Questions? Comments?

• Talk to me!– phil@feedblitz.com– @phollows– Say hi @ Booth #713

• Resources– Check out:

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