Building a list simply means getting permissions to contact people when you want. There are quite a few types of lists out there.
RSS Subscribers
This is a list. It’s people who have given you permission to notify them each time you post something new to your blog. They have given permission by subscribing to your RSS feed. There’s nothing to do with this list, as your RSS feed will notify them for you.
While this is a list of sorts ~ it has its limitations. You can not just reach out to them whenever you want. (They only get notified when new blog posts are published) You also can’t send them emails. You can’t talk to them really in any other way than letting them know you’ve posted again.
Another limitation of RSS is depending on your niche they may have no idea how to use RSS or why they would want to. I think having RSS subscribers is great, but it’s NOT the very best list you could build.
RSS Email Subscribers
This list is exactly the same as your RSS feed list, however, they have chosen to be notified of new posts via their email instead of via a feed reader or (in my case) the Google Ipage.
Even though you are sending updates to their email address you don’t have access to use their email for any other purpose.
Twitter/Facebook
Now some may not consider this a list ~ but I beg to differ. In fact, I think this is one of the most important lists you can build.
Every twitter follower you have has given you permission to contact (tweet) them. The super cool thing is they expect you to contact them ~ not once a week, but probably multiple times a day. You have the ability to quickly build rapport as well as relationship with your twitter followers.
You can tweet new posts, new product ideas, do a survey and have your followers help you, as well as just plain old good stuff you find along the way. Twitter is one of the best ways to grow your list ~ your mailing list that is!
Email Opt in List
This is the big daddy of the lists. If you’re going to build a list I suggest you start building your opt in list. This is the best kind of list you can have. You have permission to send emails right to the person’s in box. You can send emails about new posts, about new products, great things you find online. It’s very similar to a twitter list ~ but you get to send it directly to them and not get lost in a twitter stream.
Why do I want to build a list at all?
It’s been shown time and time again that you rarely if ever make a sale on the first interaction. In fact, it can take someone seeing your name and your message at least 7 times before they trust you enough to make a purchase from you.
If someone comes to your website and then leaves ~ you have no way to get those other 6 or 7 interactions in before they buy.
However, if you capture their information you now have the ability to put yourself, your name, your product in front of them as many times as it takes. You also have the opportunity to not only sell the original product they may have come looking for, but many other products and services as well.
They say the money is in the list… and I’ have to agree.
I still remember the day I realized how important a list is. I was at the point where I had about 500 people on my list. I was talking to my husband (our desks are right next to each other) and sending out an email to my list. I remember that amazing feeling when as we were talking sales came in. Sales, from sending an email. I jumped up and did a happy dance. My husband looked at me like I was nuts.
But in that moment ~ I KNEW I was an internet marketer, and it felt really good.
There’s is no other asset that can assist you in making money online better than your email list. So let’s start building one. 
What’s your going to need:
1. An autoresponder
This is the service that takes and stores all the email addresses and names of your list subscribers. You will log in to this service to send out your emails to your subscribers.
There are two main autoresponder companies. Aweber and Get Response. I personally use Get Response. I like it, it does have some glitches once in a while, but the price is the most reasonable. I chose not to use Aweber because I don’t like their pricing structure. They are a great company and have many amazing features, but I can’t settle within myself the payment structure. But that’s just me. Take a look at both and see which one will serve your purposes and business best.
2. A free gift for subscribing (an ethical bribe)
This is a free report or a little something you give to your subscribers for them giving you their name and email address. What you give them will completely depend on your niche. There are tons of options and we’ll be touching on them in the next post so stay tuned.
3. An opt in box
This is the space where people put their email address and name. When they click subscribe your autoresponder will automatically add them to your mailing list and send out a confirmation email to them. They will have to click the confirmation email to get any further emails from you.
An opt in box is a great thing to have on your website or blog ~ and if it still works there’s a way to get them on your Squidoo lenses as well. This gives people the place to sign up to hear more from you.
4. Squeeze page
A squeeze page is a whole page devoted to getting people to subscribe to your list. Unlike the opt in box, which is in a sidebar and surrounded by many other things they COULD do, the squeeze page has two options.
Subscribe
or
Back button
5. A series of emails to send out
This is called an autoresponder series. It’s one of the easiest ways to make your business “set and forget”. As you create your series you upload it to your autoresponder. You can set the frequency of the messages and now each time someone subscribes to your list they will get those messages delivered automatically without you lifting a finger.
If you do a good job of product placement ~ or leading them to blog posts/articles with product placement you’ll continue to make money as people subscribe without having to do anything else.
It’s really quite nice.
So those are the basic things you’ll need. The last thing you’ll need to make this work is traffic. You’ll need people to subscribe to your list, so they can go through your series and you can keep in touch with them and build a relationship with them. As they get to know you, and trust you they will take your recommendations to heart. This is especially true if you don’t peddle junk ~ and save product mailings for things that are fantastic quality and will really make a difference in your reader/subscriber’s life.
If you send out mailings for every product you see, or every big launch you hear about your subscribers will come to a point where they don’t open your email ~ heck maybe they even create a file and a rule to have your emails bypass their in box all together ~ or worse yet, they will opt out.
It’s every person’s right to opt out of your list. There’s a little unsubscribe link at the bottom of every email that makes it very easy to do so.
You must treat your list as good as, if not better than you treat your family and friends. If you are good to your list they will be very good to you.
This is really important!!
With that said, please don’t think you have to have ALL of those things in place BEFORE you get started. That’s not true. You can get started with only an autoresponder. You can set your service to send out blog updates ~ have people subscribe to stay up to date and build from there.
The key is to get started. It’s such a bummer when sometime down the road you look back and realize what you could have had if only you’d started earlier.
If you have content on your blog ~ get started building your list.
So there’s the basics on list building. I hope you can see why it’s important to build your list from the very beginning. The sooner you can start building this asset the better off you’ll be. We’ll be going over all the pieces I mentioned in this post in future posts so stick around and if you have any questions feel free to ask in the comments section.
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Autoresponder proves to be an indispensable tool. It’s heaven sent to internet marketers. Makes their lives a lot easier.
You mentioned Squidoo have that availible “IF IT STILL WORKS”. Please explain this. and tell how to do it on squidoo. Thanks tony
A while back you were able to use clearspring widget on Squidoo to put the actual opt in box in your lens. That has been disabled. Now the best bet is to take an image of your opt in box (from a squeeze page you’ve got it on ~ using jing or something like it) and then link the image to a squeeze page. So people will see an opt in box and when they click on it to put their name in it will take them to a squeeze page where they can actually input their information. This works quite well. You can see an example of it on my How to create backlinks lens.
Just found your blog today and have read a number of your posts. You have freely given information no one else is sharing. Although I have Aweber and have used it occasionally, I haven’t put forth the effort I need to build the list. And I certainly haven’t added list building to my niche sites – will make note to self re list building and RSS feeds for all sites.
Thank you for being so forthcoming with information for the rest of us.
.-= Edie´s last blog ..Prescription Drugs:To Flush or Not to Flush =-.
Lee ~ That is pretty cool that Tom stopped by. It is important, especially with autoresponders to switch as quickly as possible if you find you’re not happy with the service. Switching list servers is difficult and it’s very difficult to keep your list intact. However, if you’re ready to weed out the “motivated” people on your list ~ switching lists or list servers will do that!
.-= Jackie´s last blog ..Growing Heirloom Tomatoes =-.
I kinda like that fact that Tom from Aweber stopped by to comment
Having said that, it really comes down to researching any service before you shell out your hard earned cash to buy. Ask lots of questions, and if you are not happy for any reason switch sooner rather than later.
This is a great blog! I use aweber for my lists and I really like it. I also use 1shoppingcart.
.-= Martha Giffen´s last blog ..Interview An Expert =-.
I’d been wondering about all this talk of lists. You’ve made it a little more clear. I still don’t really know what I’d do with one, though. I don’t have that much to say about anything that I could be consistent in sending out posts. Eagerly awaiting your next posts…maybe I’ll get it figured out yet. Thanks, Jackie!
.-= Nancy@Cat Supplies´s last blog ..Unique Cat Trees =-.
Excellent write-up Jackie, all the bases covered! A word of caution to beginners; You actually DO have access to the email addresses in your feedburner account, however, pretend you don’t. lol. It is VERY unwise to use them for any other purpose. As Jackie pointed out, for anything and everything else, use Aweber or GetResponse.
An offer to any of your readers that may purchase Aweber through you. I am going to be running a contest or something soon, where I will pick an Aweber user to subscribe under…meaning a lifetime affiliate check for someone! It should be fun.
I hope a link is OK.
http://www.dennisedell.com/5584/aweber-autoresponder-do-you-use-it-for-your-listbuilding-would-you-like-a-lifetime-affiliate-part-1/
.-= Dennis Edell @ Direct Sales Marketing´s last blog ..Will DEDC Comments Remain Do-Follow? It’s Up To YOU! =-.
I used to use Getresponse, but I like AWeber much better!
.-= Heather Burns´s last blog ..More News About Swine Flu and Tamiflu =-.
Very interesting. I pay for 6 months at a time so I’m not sure if that makes a difference or not. If the prices are even I’d say go with Aweber.
.-= Jackie´s last blog ..Painting Easter Eggs =-.
I have Aweber, but only because it was all everyone was recommending. So far OK. I am just learning how to use it. This article is very timely.
I also don’t have a clue how to set up the free download stuff everyone seems to offer. I am hoping as you go along, there might be some help on simple ways to do this or something else other than just an email.
.-= Debbie @flowingmiracles´s last blog ..Radical Forgiveness-Colin Tipping =-.
I will be going over uploading your free report (or anything else you want people to be able to download) that will be on Friday.
I can’t wait for that! I already have the perfect idea for my free report
It will be ready before we reach May. This is the beginning of something special… Thanks to Jackie, Yaro, and Gideon 
.-= Todd´s last blog ..What Foods Cause Acne? Agave Nectar =-.
Hi Jackie! I haven’t started list building because I was afraid that I didn’t have enough time to start putting together free reports and such. I didn’t realize that I should think about sending out blog updates to start. Thanks for clarifying!
.-= Tina@RideOnToys´s last blog ..Childrens Ride on Toys Help Kids Reach Important Developmental Milestones =-.
Sure you can just put an opt in box up and ask them to opt in for updates and latest news etc. Then when you log in to your autoresponder you can add your RSS feed to the autoresponder and they will send out updates automatically for you to your list. (or you can be high maintenance like me and do each update yourself lol). This allows you to email them for other things as well. So it’s a nice easy way to at least get started.
.-= Jackie´s last blog ..Painting Easter Eggs =-.
Jackie… I think the absolute biggest mistake I have ever made in my life is the simple fact that I do not have an e-mail list yet. I started my blog in December 2009. Luckily, I have enough money saved up and I live with my parents that it is not a huge deal as I have not made much money (2 clickbank sales total – both in the last 10 days though
I am in blog mastermind, but have drifted away from it recently. I am going to pick back up tomorrow along with following your advice. I think one of the things I shall do tomorrow is sign up with aweber or autoresponder.
Everyone,
Please start your list now! Do NOT make the same mistake I have made! Please!!!! Now, go!
Jackie,
A quick question… what stats would you say are the most important to look at with google analytics?
Thanks for a motivational post! For me! I better get my butt moving! Lol.
.-= Todd´s last blog ..What Foods Cause Acne? Agave Nectar =-.
well 4 months is not that huge. I didn’t start mine for at least a YEAR after I started blogging. YIKES! It’ll be ok, just start now.
.-= Jackie´s last blog ..Painting Easter Eggs =-.
Oh, man… I can’t wait.
Everybody and their brother recommends AWeber.. you’re the first person I’ve seen who recommends something else. Now I’m thinking everybody else must be wrong.
But I’ll check them both out before I get started.
.-= Kelly @ My Life in Peru´s last blog ..Delicious Banana Dessert =-.
Aweber is awesome, it has some features I really like ~ I just can’t get past the additional fees as your lists grow. It’s 19 a month ~ until you get 500 subscribers then they add on an additional 10 dollar monthly fee and it goes up from there as your list growns. Maybe I’m just too cheap. I don’t know. Getresponse does just about everything aweber does, and they are continually adding new features… so for 17 bucks a month no matter how many subscribers I have across my lists… feels better for me.
.-= Jackie´s last blog ..Painting Easter Eggs =-.
Have you compared pricing lately? I think you may be comparing pricing plans that are not available to new clients anymore. They are very similar pricing structures these days.