How to Build a Mailing List

Building an email list begins with collecting personal contact information. At a minimum, a list builder needs a contact's email address. Some marketers also prefer to collect names to personalize communications with email list subscribers. Others even go further and ask for the first and last name and other personal information such as telephone numbers. Asking for additional information is a method of pre-qualifying a potential customers to determine their level of interest.

Two common methods of capturing contact information are:

• Opt-in form (such as the previous examples shown)
• Email subscription link – sending an email to an email list address will start the subscription process.

The email list building process for double opt-in email list is comprised of a number of steps.

Step 1: When the customer clicks the opt-in form submit button (link), the email address (and other information) is sent to the email marketing system (EMS) linked to the webpage.

Step 2: The email marketing system adds the email address to the email list (database), sends an email to the customer’s email account requesting verification and confirmation. At the same time, the EMS may show a pop-up message or a new web page to the subscriber acknowledging receipt of the subscription/information request. And asks the subscriber to check their email for the confirmation message.

Step 3: The subscriber opens the email message and clicks the confirmation link within the email. Or decide not to confirm the subscription.

Step 4: The email list database is updated with the confirmation and then sends a welcoming email (1st email) to the new subscriber. The EMS may also show a new web page thanking the customer for confirming their email address and providing either information requested and any associated bonuses, gifts or coupons.

Note: I give away free digital products (ebooks, checklists, etc) by including a link to the freebie (pdf file) I have uploaded to my website via an FTP program or cPanel. The file is stored in one of my sub-directories. The link is either included in the confirmation email, the confirmation webpage, or both.

Step 5: The subscriber then starts receiving periodic emails until they unsubscribe or the email series ends if an autoresponder set up. Otherwise, they will receive periodic broadcast emails.

In a single opt-in process, step 3 is omitted as the email marketing system does not send a confirmation request email to the subscriber.

Next: Building the Email List