7 Easy List Building Strategies for Coaches and Consultants

Qualified leads are essential if you want to fill your coaching or consulting practice. For online marketing, that means list building - developing a list of highly qualified prospects through the use of web forms.

Sure, you can have a successful business without building a list, but you’ll have to work much harder at reaching your income goals.

The key to having a great list is to make sure that you focus on getting quality subscribers. A highly-qualified list can make the difference between extraordinary success and a failed marketing campaign. I want to help you get extraordinary results.

So here are 7 easy list building strategies to help you get more clients.

Tip #1 - Use These 3 Web Form Basics

Give a compelling reason for someone to fill out the form. Just offering a free newsletter probably won’t be enough. You need to offer something irresistible to your ideal client.
Location, location, location. It’s important in real estate and in web forms. Put your form in a prominent location where it is easily seen and isn’t competing with other graphics or offers.
Keep it short. Only ask for information you absolutely need. Don’t ask them to make choices, fill in extra information, or look up information to fill in a blank. Make it as easy as possible. Often you will only need their first name and email address.

Tip #2 - Ask Them to Confirm Their Email Address

One of the keys to building a quality list is to ensure that you only get valid email addresses. This is often called “double opt-in.” After someone fills out your web form, they immediately get an email that asks them to confirm their request or subscription. Not only will this eliminate almost all spam complaints against you, it will ensure that the prospects on your list are really interested in being there.

Tip #3 - Use a Popup or Hover Web Form

This can sometimes greatly increase your list building efforts, but you’ll have to test it and compare the conversion numbers to determine which web form works best - on page or pop-up.

Some things to test are:

Delaying the appearance of the pop-up by a few seconds
Different images and colors
Different fonts - regular fonts vs. fonts that look like handwriting
How the pop-up enters the page
Size of pop-up

Tip #4 - Give Clear Instructions On How to Activate Subscription or Confirm Email Address

Once someone fills in your web form, have them taken to a web page that explains what they need to do next. Keep the instructions clear and simple. And don’t use words that they may not understand. For example, not everyone understands the term “double opt-in.”

Here are some recommended instructions:

Please check your email inbox.
Open a message I just sent you. If you don’t see it in your inbox, check your spam folder.
Click on the link in that email to confirm your email address. Then I’ll immediately send your free gift.

Tip #5 - Don’t give free downloads to false email subscribers

Many marketers put their free downloads on the thank you page prospects see immediately after they click the submit button. It’s a convenient way to get the information to your prospects.

But if people know they can get your valuable free offer just by giving you any email address, they may type in lkj@jkl.com. That’s not a quality prospect. If someone doesn’t trust you enough to give you their real email address, then they aren’t going to do business with you either.

So what do you do instead? You have two options.

One, you can create a separate page on your website with the free download. Once they confirm their email address, they are immediately taken to that page.

Or two, you could put the download link for the free offer in the first email message that is automatically sent to the list. As soon as they confirm their email address, they’ll get the message and have access to the download.

Tip #6 - Assure Them of Their Privacy

If you’re doing business online, then you need to have a privacy policy on your site. It relieves people’s fear about getting spam, and it satisfies the Federal Trade Commission. I use and recommend AutoWebLaw Pro.

You’ll want to include a brief privacy policy in the footer section of your web form, usually right under the submit button. And you’ll also want a longer and more formal privacy policy in your site’s legal statements.

Here’s another tip: Studies have shown that including the words “hate spam” in your privacy policy actually discourages people from filling out your web form. So avoid statements such as “I hate spam as much as you do.”

Tip #7 - Qualify Prospects Before They Fill In the Form

I’ve saved the best list building strategy for last. Miss this one and all the above tips will be wasted time and effort.

In the first tip, I recommended giving people a compelling reason to fill out your web form. I help my clients create an irresistible offer to do this. But the irresistible offer should also qualify those who decide to opt-in so that only your ideal prospects say, “Yes, I want that!” and fill in the form.

For example, if you’re a business coach who works with medical practices, you could offer a free report titled “10 Secrets to Double Your Medical Practice This Year.” If someone didn’t have a medical practice they wanted to grow, then they wouldn’t want the report.

And that’s good because you only want people who are your ideal prospect to join your list. Remember that a small qualified list beats a big non-qualified list any day of the week.

The Next Step

Review your website and web forms and make a list of any improvements or changes you can make based on the above tips. Some suggestions can be implemented today, while others may take longer.

Remember to focus on building a quality list - a list of qualified prospects who want what you have to offer. When you focus on quality rather than size, you will find that your list will be much more responsive to your packages and services. And as a result, you’ll get more clients and more sales more often.

I’d love to help you maximize your list building efforts with a Mother Lode Website^TM. Just email me for a free consultation, and I’ll be happy to show you what is possible.