I’ve already talked about how to keep your email list legal regarding the CAN-SPAM Act. In this post I want to talk about two BIG things that CAN-SPAM does not address: permission and double opt-in for your email list.

Some things that aren’t required in the US may be required in other countries where we have subscribers. (See a great infographic here!) But the goal isn’t just to stay legal! It’s to treat our subscribers like VIPs. We want the best user experience for them.

The laws aim to keep spam out of our inbox. We don’t want to do just the bare minimum to avoid being spam! So let’s dive into what you need to know about permission and double opt-in.

Permission and Double Opt-In Explained

PERMISSION

It is NOT a legal requirement to get permission to email people in the US. Shocked? I was. Email service providers DO require this, so I assumed it was in the CAN-SPAM. Nope.

In Canada and Europe, however, there MUST be consent by way of an opt-in. While the definition of spam is an email that is BOTH unsolicited (without permission) and bulk, the CAN-SPAM Act is separate and doesn’t treat email this way. Weird but true.

Why Email Service Providers Care and Why YOU Should Too

Email service providers like ConvertKit and Mailchimp require this for a few reasons. The bottom line is that these companies need to have good deliverability rates. If people receiving emails from these companies mark the emails as spam or report them, it hurts the deliverability rates.

We definitely don’t want to get marked as spam! This can affect our relationship with our email service provider and our personal deliverability. But more than that, we don’t simply want numbers on our email list.

Our lists should be full of engaged people who WANT to be there. Permission is the most basic start to a relationship with people who actually want to open your emails.

Where Permission Gets Murky

Because most email service providers require this, you’d think that permission wouldn’t be an issue. But it still is! Let’s talk about where people get tripped up.

• Sometimes people will start an email list by adding all their contacts from Gmail or Outlook or wherever right into their email service provider. Not okay! It IS okay to email those people individually through your personal email in order to ask if they want to join your list.
• I’ve heard of people going to conferences and then adding emails from the business cards they pick up. Giving someone a business card is NOT giving them permission. Again, you could email them and ask if they WANT to join your list. But don’t add them.
• An extreme example is the conference I went to where a speaker (repping a major email service provider, btw) said from the stage that she required the emails of all attendees as her speaking fee. Sure enough, that next Monday I got an email from her. Ugh! When I speak, I create a standalone page for that event with an opt-in on the page itself.

Permission should be either through that person opting in and signing up through your email service provider OR specifically and clearly telling you they want to be on your list. Pretty simple!

What to Do If Someone Adds YOU Without Permission

I get added to lists all the time without permission. Sometimes when you hit unsubscribe, there will be a reminder of why you opted in or a name of the list you’re on. Several times, I’ve seen things like: Emails scraped from blogs. Or: You’re receiving this email because we thought you’d like our great deals!

Nope. And NOPE.

If this happens to you, I sometimes hit reply and explain my frustration in being added without permission. Every so often this will happen with someone new on the scene who just didn’t know. Rare, but it has happened a few times with friends starting businesses. Telling them helps them learn how to use email properly. (Feel free to send them this post!!!)

I also will report them as spam to their email service provider. Because the CAN-SPAM Act doesn’t put “permission” as a requirement, the FTC will not likely do anything. But Mailchimp and these other companies WILL! When their deliverability is at stake, they will usually act.So next time you get an unsolicited email, try letting the person know and also reporting it to their ESP.

DOUBLE OPT-IN

Double Opt-In refers to a two-step process of permission. The first step is when they enter their email address. Step two is when they get a confirmation email and click a link inside of it.

Unless someone clicks the link in the email sent from your email service provider, they will not be added to your list. I always find it confusing when people don’t confirm. It’s a lot easier to click that link than to enter your email. Still–a lot of people do just that. They sign up and don’t confirm.

To get around this, some people use a single opt-in. This means that once people enter their email on the form, they are ON THE LIST.

In a lot of ways single opt makes sense to me! It takes way longer to enter an email that first time than to click follow on Twitter. Surely they WANT to be on my list if they’ve done that…right?

Maybe. But the double opt-in is a qualifier. It makes sure that those people REALLY REALLY want to be on your list. And those are the kinds of superfans you want on a healthy list!

The other BIG issue is that, like permission, double opt-in laws vary by country. Many other countries REQUIRE double opt-in, which the US does not. Many email service providers don’t even offer you the option to single opt-in or not. But if you DO have the option for single or double opt-in, consider the legality in addition to the quality of subscribers!

Is there a time for single opt-in?

One use for a single opt-in would be for an automated email series that accompanies a course purchase. When people buy my course, Own Your List (or any of my others), they will be automatically added with single opt-in to an email series with information on the course.

This is a good use for single opt-in (and the only time I use it!) because that person has paid for a product and needs the information on how to use it! Things like: the login page, where they can reach you, and a Facebook group or other bonuses they need to access.

That is EXPECTED. You can also let them know on the sales page that they are giving permission to receive those emails, just to be super clear.

I create a custom unsubscribe for these, so if people don’t want to get the email updates about the course, but DO want to stay on my main list, they can.

When it comes to permission and double opt-in, this is the only time I skirt around the double.

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If you’re reading this post, the chances are good that you are already following these best practices for permission and double opt in. Way to go, you!

The ultimate goal is to follow the best practices for permission and double opt-in so that your email list is legal and works FOR you. That looks like great open rates, click rates, and responses to your calls to action. Getting permission and having double opt-ins is just a start!

(Find out more by visiting my Email List Resource page or my Email Questions Answered Facebook group!)

Have YOU ever seen these used poorly?

I’d love to hear your experiences with permission and double opt-in for your email list– or other lists! Especially horror stories. Those are so fun to share. 🙂

A lot of questions I receive about email relate to the CAN-SPAM Act, so I wanted to write a post about how to keep your email list legal. Before we dive into the nitty-gritty, can we first talk about the ridiculous fact that a bill about NOT spamming is call the CAN-SPAM Act? Seriously.

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, if you want to see the full thing, you can read all the details on the FTC’s website. In this post I’m going to share what you really need to know in order to stay legal.

Note: This post deals primarily with how you stay legal with email in the United States. For a full look at these laws around the world (which matters if you have subscribers from other countries!), you can check out this fabulous infographic!

I’ll also suggest a few extra things that are technically legal, but I recommend avoiding anyway. Because if you’re like me, your biggest concern isn’t staying clear of the law. That’s pretty easy, as you’ll see. What I’m most concerned about is growing an engaged list of superfans. I’ll share some email tips or examples that wouldn’t incur a fine, but may hurt your relationships with your email list.

Why Does This Matter? 

I see people talking in Facebook groups about how they don’t abide fully by some of these (especially using a physical address!). While I doubt many of us are going to find the FTC cracking down, if you DO incur fines, they are up to $40,000 PER EMAIL YOU SEND. Chew on that.

The other thing is that these laws have the best interest of your users in mind. We should want to be above board and treat our subscribers like VIPs, so none of these should feel super burdensome.

The BEST Way to Keep Legal

If you are still sending out mass emails through Outlook or Gmail or AOL or Juno (raise your hand if your first email was a Juno address??), then you need to stop. That ISN’T legal.

When you use an email service provider like Mailchimp or Convertkit (read why I prefer Convertkit HERE), they take care of a lot of the legal things for you, or at least remind you of those things. So that is the best first step you can take!

HOW TO KEEP YOUR EMAIL LIST LEGAL

 

Don’t be deceptive. 

This covers parts 1 & 2 of the CAN-SPAM Act, where you are required to avoid deceptive headlines and also sender email addresses. I haven’t really EVER seen this in my inbox and feel like for most people, this is a no-brainer. I would imagine the people and companies using this are not the ones who would be reading this blog.

However, here are some areas where I feel like people toe the line on being deceptive, or just kind of smarmy.

• Using a first-name only.

I can’t stand it when I get an email from Sally and think that it’s my friend Sally, but it’s really salesperson Sally. When you only use a first-name on your email send or IN the email, you run the risk of people reporting you for spam.

Marketers started doing this a few years ago to give the appearance that the email is from a friend. While I think we should develop relationships with our people, we should always give context and not pretend to be their friends by using just a first name. If you use just your first name, you could say something like Kirsten // Create If Writing to show the context of your site or brand.

• Using Re: in subject lines.

This may be a point for contention with people, but I’ve seen marketers use this tactic a lot. Have you seen this in your inbox? I got one this week. I opened, thinking that it was actually a reply to a conversation that I needed to address. AND THAT’S EXACTLY THE POINT.

People use this to get people clicking more, since it looks like a conversation. Again, just another way that marketers sometimes try to be tricksy to up open rates. Not a fan. UNLESS you mean this as “regarding,” not as a way to fake the “reply” notification in email. Sometimes that RE can be appropriate. But I almost never see it used this way (except in actual, personal emails) and typically see this used as a tactic.

• Click-bait subject lines.

Are we still using click-bait in 2017? STILL?? Yes. Despite Facebook’s plan to put these to death on their platform, I still see them popping up everywhere in links and sometimes (but less frequently) in email as well. While the CAN-SPAM Act probably wouldn’t get you for click-bait subject lines, this is a way to break trust with your readers.

This doesn’t mean you can’t write a great subject line that gets people clicking! The difference between CLICKABLE and CLICK BAIT is that a clickable headline has content that matches the headline. You feel like you HAVE to click, but what you read is satisfying. Click bait has a headline you click, but the content doesn’t match up and leaves you disappointed.

Be clear. Give context. Don’t try to trick people. Pretty easy, right?? Let’s move on.

Use Proper Disclosure. 

The third point in the CAN-SPAM Act is that you must identify your email as an ad. For many writers and bloggers, we send out a newsletter or more personal email that doesn’t feel like an AD. It may have ads IN it (or affiliate links or links to our products), but it isn’t the same thing as an email you’d get from Old Navy. So how might this apply to us?

• Use an email service provider. 

As I mentioned in the beginning of the post, one of the first ways that you can make sure you are legal is using something like ConvertKit, Mailchimp, Mad Mimi, or MailerLite to send emails. When people open an email and it’s from one of these providers, it’s clear pretty quickly that it’s not just an email from a buddy.

A lot of people have moved away from pretty, image-heavy emails because text-based emails perform better. I have literally heard people say that this is because they seem like emails from friends. I’ve seen this in my own emails, but as I mentioned with not being deceptive, people shouldn’t REALLY think that you’re a friend.

If they can’t tell that the email isn’t from their buddy, you are doing it wrong. Again, most email service providers cover this for you, even the ones that allow you to have a text-based email.

• Disclose affiliate links.

This is related, but not directly under the CAN-SPAM Act. If you use affiliate links (where you get a commission if someone makes a purchase), you MUST DISCLOSE. It should be a clear disclosure and before the first outbound link. (To be honest? Sometimes mine is right after, in parenthesis like this. For me this is about readability and I’m willing to take the risk that my disclosure is still clear.)

I get tons of emails without proper disclosures and nothing makes me unsubscribe faster. Why? I don’t mind supporting people I like by purchasing through their link. I simply want to KNOW that they are recommending a product because they like it AND because they get paid. That matters. So does the FTC. (Read more on disclosure here!)

Use a physical address. 

Here is where many people get tripped up. Do you have to use a REAL address in your emails? YES. Do you HAVE to include it? YES. Does it need to have a street number and everything? YES.

So…we’re supposed to email potentially thousands of people we don’t really know with our actual address? YES.

If that makes you feel uncomfortable, there are other options! You could get a local P.O. Box or use something like ViaBox, where you can get a forever free forwarding address. Amy Lynn Andrews has a great post if you need more on the address bit. In essence: you need to use an actual, physical address.

Don’t use something like 45 Writer Way Writerland, USA or a Cabin in the Woods Somewhere. I’ve seen people do this! While you mostly likely aren’t going to get noticed by the FTC as a smaller entity, WHAT IF YOU DID? Could you afford those fines?? Not worth it.

Let people opt out.

This deals with #5 & #6 in the CAN-SPAM Act and is mostly handled by your email service provider. YAY! One less thing to worry about, right? Right.

If you want to do this better, you can utilize a CUSTOM unsubscribe. You can’t do this with every email service provider. With one like ConvertKit, you can create options where people don’t have to get off your whole list.

An example would be if you are running some kind of sales launch. A great idea is let people opt out of the 7-10 emails you’ll send in the launch. You can create a link in ConvertKit that you could use in the bottom of an email to say something like:

Not interested in my course? Click here to stay subscribed, but stop getting course emails!

This takes the CAN-SPAM a few steps further and allows you to better target your subscribers. Check with your email service provider to see if you can use a form of tagging to handle custom unsubscribes.

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Still with me? Clearly, there are a LOT of things you need to be aware of to stay legal with the FTC! (Don’t forget to check out the link that shares what’s legal around the world!)

To sum up, if you want to know how to keep your email list legal, use a reputable email service provider! That takes care so much. If you don’t have one that you love, I would highly recommend ConvertKit!

You can check out WHY in my post, or get a free month to try them with my affiliate link.Still have questions? Leave them in the comments! You can also join my Facebook group and ask me there.

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What to read next: Permission and Double Opt-In

This post is one of many posts about growing your email list and making email a priority. If you want to see them ALL, you can bookmark this page as a resource. 

For years as a blogger, everything was all about traffic. I am not an obsessive stats-checker, but whenever I did head into my blog dashboard or Google Analytics, I LOVED seeing those numbers jump. I still do.

But along the way, I realized some hard lessons: TRAFFIC IS FLEETING.

It only takes one algorithm shift to tank your pageviews. And, if you are relying on your pageviews for revenue, to tank your INCOME.

My Biggest Traffic Month Didn’t Matter

In June 2015 I had a post go viral that helped push me to over 100k pageviews on my Kirsten Oliphant lifestyle blog.

I have arrived! I thought.

I loved seeing the numbers climb up, even though the big jumps leveled off after a few days. About half my 100k pageviews were from the viral post on Facebook and the other half from the typical traffic I had been having to that time from Pinterest.

The next month, I had no viral posts. And Pinterest changed an algorithm. I went from celebrating to worrying as my traffic continued to dip the next month. And the next.

Soon, I was at a quarter of my viral-post-month’s pageviews, even though I had changed nothing as far as my own actions.

When I got my check from the company running ads on my site (Mediavine, whom I HIGHLY recommend), it was more than usual for that big month, but not crazy big.

When I checked my stats to see how many subscribers I gained for that jump in pageviews, it was more than a typical month, but not crazy more.

That viral month made almost NO impact on anything that mattered. Except, of course, I could now SAY that I had over 100k pageviews. One time. Yay?

Blog Traffic vs Email Subscribers: A Comparison

Even though I didn’t gain a ton of subscribers that month (which was mostly due to me not optimizing my site or having a great freebie), checking the graphs of my traffic and my email side by side looked like this:

The first thing to note is that I really SHOULD have had a bigger jump in subscribers than I did that month with all the traffic. If you see a jump in traffic and not a relative jump in subscribers, you need to take a hard look at your site and your email offers. You likely need to work on your forms or the freebie(s) you offer.

The second thing to note is the consistency of email. In some ways this graph compares apples to oranges. I’m showing you how many pageviews I had per month in blue and how many subscribers TOTAL I had in yellow. If I were to put a comparison of growth percentage per month, that would look different.

But I chose to compare traffic vs total subscribers on purpose. Each month, your blog resets. The traffic count begins again.

With your email list, you DO NOT START AT ZERO each month. You keep growing. So while your traffic fluctuates, your email subscribers should be going up. And up. (The only exception is when I do a cleaning of cold subscribers.)

When Pinterest changes its algorithm (or Facebook does or Google updates), your traffic changes. You don’t get to ride the coattails of a 100k pageviews month.

When Pinterest changes its algorithm (or Facebook does or Google updates), your email subscribers don’t change. You may get LESS subscribers since your site has less traffic. But you may NOT, since list growth isn’t just about your blog traffic.

Why Your Email List Matters More Than Pageviews

Are you starting to get the picture? I hope so, though I’ll admit it took me a bit to convert over to having a list-growth vs pageviews mindset.

After seeing the huge downturn in traffic after my best month ever, I decided to stop putting so much weight into pageviews. Instead, I started focusing on my list. Big time.

I had just started the Create If Writing podcast and put my full efforts not into growing my traffic on this site (though I DID work on that), but into email subscribers.

As a result, I have almost 5,000 email subscribers on the Create If Writing list. And my traffic on this site last month? UNDER 5,000 pageviews.

Surprised?

This totally flips the way I used to look at traffic and how my other site functioned. I had lots of traffic and few subscribers.

To grow my Create If Writing email list that way, I had to be creative in my list-growth techniques. (I’ll share more about that in a later post!) But these numbers show that you do NOT have to chase pageviews to grow subscribers. In fact, you don’t have to have tons of traffic on your blog to grow your list.

THIS IS A GAME CHANGER. And may help you breathe a sigh of relief.

Why You Should Focus on Your Email List

Here are a few more reasons why list growth trumps traffic for me every time.

• Other platforms are not YOURS.

I interviewed Paul Jarvis on the Create If Writing podcast and he compared social media platforms to a playground. Whenever Facebook wants, it can take the ball and go home. You don’t make the rules. You don’t control the games or how other people behave or whether or not you have to pay to play.

Increasingly, you DO have to pay to play. Our search engines and our social media platforms are ALL in the hands of someone else. But email ALONE is something you can deliver directly to someone’s personal space.

YOUR INBOX HAS NO ALGORITHM.

(Yes, if you are on gmail, there are tabs now. But that isn’t every inbox, plus even if your email lands in the promotional tab, it doesn’t disappear. More on this in the next point.)

You have been invited into a more personal space. If you can learn to love and utilize your list well, you will be ahead of all those people trying to game the system with other platforms. Because just when you figure out what works on Facebook, the algorithm changes again and you’re sitting on the sidelines of the game.

• Email is PERSONAL.

When people see your post on Facebook (which these days is like a flying unicorn with two heads), it’s because they have gone to Facebook and Facebook has allowed it. If they see your content on Pinterest, they have gone to Pinterest and the algorithm has decided to share your pin that day.

When you send an email, it goes right to someone’s inbox. It is right next to that email from Susan’s mom.

Clicking like on Facebook is no biggie because anyone knows you might not ever see content from that page. Following on Twitter is not a big deal because Tweets are only relevant for 18 seconds. Subscribing to an email list is DIFFERENT.

Giving away an email address is another stage of a relationship. It’s like the equivalent of having that DTR talk (that’s Define The Relationship) with someone you’re interested in and saying, “Let’s stop just flirting and be IN a relationship.”

Signing up for an email list is much more of a commitment. It takes your relationship to a different level and gives you a level of access that is simply not available on Twitter or Facebook.

• In a crowded space, not as many people are taking advantage of email.

I’ve been blogging since 2007 and have seen blogging evolve completely. When I first started, no one used social media to share posts. You simply wrote a blog post and knew that your people would come find it. Your readers would type in the name of your blog to see what was new on the home page.

Totally different world, right?

We are now in the age of over totally saturated social media and blogs as businesses. I see a lot of entrepreneurs using email well. But I do NOT see a lot of bloggers or writers utilizing email. I see a LOT of missed opportunities and a huge wide-open space. It’s growing, but still under-utilized.

While other people are chasing pageviews from Facebook’s algorithm and spending time deleting pins or scheduling shares at just the right time, you can be doing something far more effective: directly emailing your posts to the people who have already said they want to be in a relationship with you.

But What about Your Blog Itself?

For most people, the main thing is the blog or website. It IS a great central hub where people can find you and see where else they can connect. But I want to argue that email trumps even your blog.

Here’s a story from Pat Flynn to illustrate this. (You can read his full, long story on his site!)

Two years ago, Pat Flynn’s dedicated server crashed. An outside attack on his site shut down Smart Passive Income and his other affiliate sites. TOTALLY. DOWN. For a full week no one could see Smart Passive Income or any of his blogs. He could not log into the back end. Nothing.

It took a week to get everything straightened out. Based on his normal income reports and stats, this glitch cost him a cool $12,000.

(Yeah, I know: this is probably not what you or I would lose if our sites went down for a week.)

But you can’t account for things like people coming to your site for the first time to find nothing. Even dedicated readers are fickle and might just sort of forget to keep checking back after three days of your site showing a “server unavailable” message.

Here is what Pat said about the experience:

“…When I think about this, the blog could have been wiped out and erased from existence, and I still would have been okay thanks to my email list. Worst case scenario, I could easily set up a new site somewhere else and just let my subscribers know, and I’d be back up and running in no time.”

People will still continue to use social media. Even if you have your list all set, you will too.

But when those platforms and even organic Google search aren’t working well, you will have a much more permanent connection to your list.

How permanent? You OWN your email list and can literally print out a CSV file of all those emails and hold them in your hands. Name another platform that can do that!

Final thought: NO ONE EVER SAYS, “I’m so glad I waited to start my email list!”

Start today. Take it seriously. Realize that when Facebook make you pay for ANY reach and your blog server catches on fire (okay, THAT’S unlikely), you will still have the most important thing of all:

YOUR AUDIENCE.

Okay, Email is Awesome! What NOW?

I’m not saying that traffic, your social media, and your blog itself are not important. I simply want to make the point that your email list is MORE important than all of these.

So…what do you do about it?

Here are a few actionable things that you can do RIGHT NOW to start making your list better.

START A LIST. 

If you’ve done that already, I want you to consider what you’re doing with your list. Sit down with a pen and paper or something like Google Docs and Evernote if you like that better and really think about what you want to send, why you want to use email (like: your overarching goals), and what kind of incentives you can use to get people on your list.

If you want more resources and training, I have a free resource for you! It’s called the Free Email Course and it will help you outline some of the most major parts of your email list.

You can also join my private Facebook group, Email Questions Answered, where there is a totally safe space to ask any question. If I don’t have the answer, I’ll track it down.

Questions? Ideas? Thoughts? Post them in the comments! I’d love to hear them!

 

 

In this post I’m talking about how to write emails that people actually WANT to read! Let’s dive in.

How many unread emails are in your inbox?

You know, that little red number on phone’s mail icon. Personally, that red number stresses me out, so I keep mine at zero (but let’s not talk about the 70 voicemails I haven’t listened to). Recently I spoke at Houston Social Media Breakfast about why email is (still) so important and asked who had the most unread emails. The winner? Had 50,000.

GULP.

I understand why so many people want to discount email and chase the next shiny social media object. Is email even effective? Do people even read it?

To answer quickly, YES. Email is still effective. According to Campaign Monitor’s report in 2016, email has a pretty insane ROI– $44 for every $1 invested. We could have a longer conversation about WHY email matters, but for now let’s dive into how to write emails people actually WANT to read.

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How to Write Emails People Actually WANT to Read

Win them Over with Your Signup Sequence

People talk a lot about the importance of a welcome sequence, but often overlook the signup sequence. I see forms on blogs all over the place with the standard “Sign up for our newsletter!” and a button that reads “Subscribe.” Or, when you click confirm, you’re redirected to the standard template page from the email service provider. Each of these is a missed opportunity to connect with your readers!

Think about this: as people move through the signup process for your list, they will have at least 3-5 chances to see your content. First, the signup form itself, then the page they are redirected to after they hit subscribe, the confirmation email, and the link they go to after they click to confirm their subscription.

Be memorable. Customize your language, your branding, your buttons, and your content for every single form and page. By the time they actually GET your emails, they should recognize your name because of your signup sequence.

Don’t Get Stuck in the Newsletter Box

When bloggers and writers think about WHAT to write in an email, what typically comes to mind is the newsletter. The term newsletter is yawn-worthy and I think even creative people who have no problem writing books and blog posts hit a wall when they have to write a newsletter.

So DON’T.

You can write any kind of content you want in your emails with any kind of frequency. Maybe you only write once a week when you publish a new blog post, inviting people to come read. (More tips on that below!) Maybe you curate links related to what you know your readers might like. You might write something more personal or even test out potential blog post ideas by writing them first as an email to gauge the response.

When it comes to the kind of content, don’t feel like you have to fit in a box. Write something you want to write that also serves your readers.

Utilize Headings and White Space

Our attention spans are shorter than EVER. 55% of people read a blog post for seven seconds. Knowing this, we should consider how we can not only create interesting content in our emails, but make them visually appealing. 

I don’t necessarily mean amazing templates and tons of photos. (Plain-text emails tend to actually convert better, though I love reading a pretty email myself.) Whether you are using plain text or a template, you can make use of white space, headings, and words in bold typeface to keep people moving through your email.

I’ve noticed some of the biggest email gurus like André Chaperon sending emails made up of single sentence paragraphs. Why? Because you keep reading. 

Something about single lines rather than a big block of text is powerful.

It keeps us moving down the page–er, screen.

Maybe it’s the white space.

Or maybe we just like bite-sized pieces of content.

See what I did there? If that feels weird to you, don’t do it. But do consider breaking up big blocks of text. Use headlines. If it fits with your writing style, use all caps for emphasis, italics, and bold.

 

Make Your Links Inviting to Click

If you are trying to drive traffic to your blog posts with your email, consider an alternative to RSS. (Read why I really hate RSS!) If you are only posting once a week, writing a short email for each of those posts can be more effective than a truncated RSS feed that simply tells people to click and Read More. 

To get people clicking, utilize the same tips that work for subject lines or blog headlines. Curiosity is a powerful motivator. I use the term Itchy for email subject lines. You give people an itch that they HAVE to scratch (by opening the email). Try using itchy lead-ins for your links in email.

Ex:

• I’m sharing my top ten favorite winter-comfort foods this week. Eight out of ten are pretty standard, but the other two may totally surprise you!
• My dinner party this weekend was a complete disaster with only one tiny redeeming moment. Read the full post to see why I’m taking a break from entertaining. Maybe forever.  

You can also ask people to click the links by making it seem like an exclusive invitation just for them.

Ex:

• I just finished putting together a roundup of uncommon uses for coconut oil. Have you tried any of these? I’d love to know or hear any that I missed! Click over to see all twelve and let me know in the comments if you have any that should have made the list.

Readers feel special when you make reading your post feel like an invitation to participate with you. This is a tactic used by Ramsey Taplin of Blog Tyrant. He writes simple, usually one-paragraph emails inviting readers in this way to read and comment. This recent post of his has 107 comments. (And take note that half of those comments are HIS. If you want more blog comments, you should also be active in your comments section!)

Don’t Skip THE PS

Because people scan, a PS often becomes like the speed bump that really stops them. I can’t say exactly what makes a PS so powerful, but do not miss these!

Pick the MOST important thing from your email and put that in the PS. I often will write mine TO those people: “Hey, skimmers! I see you there. 🙂 Don’t miss my new class this week!” It leaves the big takeaway there for anyone who skimmed to the bottom and also makes them feel SEEN. Just make it fun, not something that makes them feel guilty for scanning.

 

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Don’t overlook email because your inbox is stressing you out.

Email serves up THE best ROI with a permanence that other platforms don’t have. I love using email in conjunction with Facebook groups (I’ve got a main Create If Writing group AND one just for asking email questions!), but email is the real foundation for what I do. And I want to write emails that people want to read so I’m constantly trying to find new ways of getting my engagement up.

Want more tips for killing it with email? Check out my post (and a video!) over at Mediavine on how to write great emails!

Have you tried these tips? Do you have others that you recommend or even things that drive you crazy in emails? Let me know in the comments! I’d love to hear your thoughts!