Step 1 – Sign Up To Your Own List

Be honest. When was the last time you really took a really good, in-depth look at your own landing pages and opt-in forms?

How about your welcome email? Can you even remember what it says and how you make new subscribers feel?

And, what about your lead magnet? How up to date are both your design and your content?

Now is the ideal time to take stock of your entire lead capture process and the first step you can take as part of an audit of your whole process is to sign up to your own list today!

Signing up with any email will work just fine, but I often tend to use a throw away account that I set up just for this purpose. It allows me to see all my auto-responder emails for various lists in one place.

A Gmail account works well for this because (aside from the fact that it’s free and easy to access anytime, anywhere), it’s very searchable.

This is particularly useful when you’re trying to find a specific email that needs changing or updating. You can easily find it in your Gmail account by searching on a relevant keyword rather than having to trawl through your entire auto-responder series trying to locate it.

Also, keep a notepad open nearby as you audit your own lead capture process and start paying close attention to each stage in the process by looking at it from your subscribers’ point of few.

Consider things like…

• How attractive is your opt-in offer?
• Is your headline catchy?
• Do you help readers solve their problem with your lead magnet and the content you provide in your follow-up emails?
• Does your copy hit upon key pain points the reader may be suffering with?
• How attractive are your graphics?

As you go through your sign-up process, focus on how easy and intuitive it is. Think about and re-evaluate how much information you ask for. Consider…

• Whether your landing pages and welcome emails make sense?
• What might you be able to do to clarify and improve either or both?
• Do your lead capture pages tie in with the overall look and feel of the rest of your site and your branding?
• Are there any elements that standout or pop-up that may distract your ideal prospects from submitting their details?
• Do you tell your subscribers what to expect from you next along with anything that they might need to do next?

Once an opt-in has been confirmed, you should land on an acknowledgement or Thank You page. Make sure you think about this and are set it up to your best advantage. Always make accessing and downloading your lead magnet simple, but remember you don’t neccessarily have to send a new subscriber to the download page straight after the opt-in.

Since you have their attention, now is the time to start to create a relationship with your new subscriber, as the first step in in the process of turning them into a client. We’ll cover what else needs to be done and how you can do it most effectively and congruently in a separate step, further down the line.

It almost goes without saying that you MUST make sure all the links on your download page work. It’s quite amazing how many links that are sent out or displayed on websites actually don’t work. Not only is it very frustrating, it’s unprofessional and creates a poor first impression in your subscribers mind.

And finally, within this first step, head over to your email account and review the welcome email you received.

Going forward, review each message in your auto-responder sequence as it comes in. Make sure all the links within your emails work, any offers you make are still valid and the messages are all congruent with your branding and any services you offer.

Obviously, edit and tweak as needed, although do take into account the fact that any changes to your calls to action should be split-tested before being fully incorporated and rolled out.

That’s it for Step 1. Next we’ll be taking a closer look at your lead magnet itself and you’ll find out what you can do to make it considerably more effective at getting new subscribers to opt-in.

Good bye for now…

Tim Dodd www.3dConsultingServices.com Magnifying Your Mission : Multiplying Your Reach

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