Are you getting some traffic but not really seeing an increase in subscribers?
Have you been building links and promoting your posts but your subscription rate hasn’t improved by much?
Chances are that your website could be working against your efforts.
Here are seven areas of your website that often get overlooked but if left unattended to will continue to cause a constant leak of subscribers.
Let’s plug the leaks. Here’s how.
1. Checkbox For Offers
Do you offer free downloads, ebooks, videos or audio recordings? If you do, you have a real opportunity to increase subscribers to your email list.
How?
Just by adding a simple check box that allows people to opt-in to your blog or email newsletter updates. Hubspot has implemented this on all its landing pages and claims that it has had a 128% increase in subscribers in just 3 months.
2. Email Optin in Footer
According to research conducted by Marketingexperiments the conversion rate of calls to action or optin boxes below the fold did far better than with them above the fold. I have heard many people say that it is important to have relevant calls to action above the fold, but the research conducted dispels such myths.
So why did those pages do well, because the potential subscribers or customers was motivated to do so by the time they got through the content and reached the opt-in form.
Take for example Michael Aagaard of Content Verve who found that moving the CTA on this page far below the fold contributed to a 304% increase in subscriptions.
Source: Content Verve
So don’t just place an email sign up form at the end of your post, place one in the footer as well. Some readers will peruse through comments on your posts and are likely to reach the very end of your webpage. Such readers are most definitely quite engaged with your content so give them a chance to sign up while they are in that state.
3. About Page
According to Derek Halpern, the about page is another place where you could potentially gain a lot of subscribers. The about page is probably one of the most frequently visited pages on a site, your analytics program should give you insights into this.
People generally go to the about page in order to find out more about the person or business. So giving them the credibility and reasons to subscribe can only further encourage people to subscribe to your email list and come back to re-visit your content.
4. Leverage Video
Video is probably one the best ways to communicate to people and has been shown to help with conversions as well. However video is also a great place to encourage people to sign up to your email list.
Technology and companies like LeadPlayer now make it possible to have an email sign up form appear from within the video player to get people to subscribe to their email lists. If they have read through your content and tutorials then chances are that they would be keen to receive more. Matthew Woodward‘s video tutorials is an example of a blog that includes the video email sign up form.
5. The Start Here Page
One of the best ways to get people to understand what you or your business is all about is through a Start Here page. In fact if you have one, it probably would one of the most frequented pages on your site. The Start Here page from 100daysofrealfood.com is a great example.
The purpose of such pages is to give potential subscribers the chance to decide if they like you or not and generally includes some of your best posts, who the site is for not for and summary of the objectives of the site. It’s also therefore a great place to give readers a gentle nudge to join your email list.
6. Resource Page
Resource pages are pages that provide a collection of resources, tools and or posts that relate to a certain topic. If you know your readers are obviously interested in such resources and content, providing them on page that is easily accessible to them allows new readers to get acquainted with your content and for you a chance to increase subscribers by providing an email sign up form to get updates and or any bribes you may have for them.
7. Email Apps
There is a lot of talk about leveraging social media and I notice that a lot of websites ask their audience to share or connect with them on various social media platforms. While a like or a share is great, building your email list tends to provide a better response rate.
So why not create an email sign up page on Facebook to build your list. Most email marketing systems like Aweber or GetResponse have apps available for you to integrate your sign up form with Facebook.
Source: Aweber app
What’s Biggest Leak To Plug and Increase Subscribers
The volume of a leak on any one website will differ from other websites. So as I said before, plug any one or more of these leaks and you will increase subscribers to your list. Just keep an eye on your website analytics to measure progress. If you already are receiving traffic why wouldn’t you convert more of that traffic right now.
Tell us below in the comments area, what holes have you plugged on your site to increase subscribers to your email list. If you found this article useful, you should take a moment and tweet it to your friends.
Thanks.
Mike says
May 3, 2015 at 6:31 pmWell, I can say that I did most of these steps, and I also used the Aweber application to get subscribers.
For now, I want to increase the content of my blog in order to attract even more visitors and subscribers as well.