Issue 8 | How To Get People To Subscribe To You

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You Are The Media?is how you build your brand, create a loyal audience and nurture a community so you can monetise, grow, be happy so you become the person that others trust and turn to.

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OTHERS PRODUCING GREAT WORK TO CHECK OUT (& WHO ARE FREQUENTLY SHOWING UP)...

There are many great people making their stand and producing work that is audience-focused.

Have a look at these?newsletters?that keep giving that I really enjoy...

???Rob Hardy's Ungated is fantastic, it is for people who want to build their true audience, subscribe here.

???I love the work from Evelyn Starr and how we think about the companies we build and look at them through a different lens, subscribe here.

The idea that some things move slow is ok but when it applies to gaining subscribers for the work you create and share, you can’t help but feel a sense of unease.

This section of YATM Extra is not about the actual content you’re producing but that step you take before, when you’re encouraging people to sign up for your newsletter. The slant is towards email newsletter subscribers, not necessarily LinkedIn newsletter subscribers.

Creating a newsletter may end up being the straightforward part, getting subscribers to commit to you, the hard slog.?

You don’t need to become fixated by attracting huge numbers. You don’t need 1,000 fans. All you need is a base from which to build on and for enough people to become engaged so that when you address them, your audience is there for you.

Let me give you a hand with this 15 minute tutorial to get you started, click here.

Why Subscribers Are Important To You

We all have to earn our place in someone else’s inbox.

The reason I put a lot of work into the weekly YATM email (around five to eight hours per week) is that it is so much more powerful than showing up, every now and then, in someone else's LinkedIn feed.

Building an email list provides you with the opportunity to curate a place where you are 100% in control (no one else owns your list), where people have the opportunity to hear from you, come together at a particular time during their week or month and you have a platform from which to deliver. Value is the key, not self-promotion.

For anyone who subscribes, it is your opportunity to keep them entertained, share your world and what you’re learning, and invite them to interact with you. It’s a big thing when someone takes that step and gives you their email address. You have to deliver on the promise that got them to sign up, creating work that is worthy of their time and building a relationship of trust, over time.

It Was A Slow Start For Me / It Was Slow For Me

When I first started the YATM weekly newsletter, the audience was made up of prospects and clients, organic growth was minimal and it took me around a year to acquire my first subscriber – someone I didn’t already know, who was a real person, not a bot (it was someone in Australia).

This “fallow” period may have helped me with my own development in terms of writing and frequency of sharing.

Looking back now, here are reasons why no one was subscribing.

No one knew me.

I had no track record and nothing to build from, it was just me, a person with a business, based in Poole. I wasn’t present and apart from dipping my toe into a few networking events, that was it. I wasn’t doing anything beyond talking about myself and my own interests, and selling the services I had to offer.?

It wasn’t promoted.

All I did was write and send the email. There was no means of attracting subscribers and the sign-up box was there more as an afterthought, hidden away.

It all felt like business.

A website with very few blog posts but heavy on ‘About Us,’ self-absorbed content, was attractive to no one. It was never about what someone else could take from me and if producing it felt like a chore to me, it was probably even more of a chore to read.?

What Stops You Attracting Subscribers??

Attracting barely any subscribers is often nothing to do with your content but more about the way you set up your stall.?

It’s not what you create, but the approach you take to get people to see you and commit to you. You are going to get hardly any interest when:

What you share serves little purpose beyond a vehicle for your sales.?For instance, sharing your whole newsletter on LinkedIn or a link on Twitter as soon as you publish allows everyone to see what you share. Someone else’s interest in you is invariably less than yours. If the majority of a newsletter is new business and selling services, it will attract barely any new subscribers.

People prefer their information/fun from other sources.?There are fantastic industry-related emails that go into topics at such a deep level that they’re the ones leading the way. You can’t compete with them. For a few years, a content marketing-themed approach was the tack I took but with the Content Marketing Institute leading the way and my efforts having very little by way of originality or personality, my work didn’t get a look-in.?

It feels like a chore.?It isn’t a nice feeling when the work and time you give to something attracts nobody. What can start to happen is that the whole process feels laboured and you lose any sense of enjoyment including that enthusiastic commitment to create which you had at the start.?

Joining in doesn’t feel exciting.?A sign-up box at the bottom of a page that invites people to ‘receive our newsletter’ is not going to encourage anyone. Just because people can fill in an email form, doesn’t mean they will. Even worse, if people can’t find a place to opt-in, how are they going to receive your email???

What Can You Do To Get People To Sign Up?

Here are some suggestions for getting subscriber numbers from zero, to starting to make an impact in people’s inboxes, to having people look forward to receiving your email newsletter:?

Be clear, be open and never be timid about asking people to subscribe.

One of the worst things I did was to think that just because I produced an email newsletter, people would subscribe. When people are not too familiar with you, you have to find a way to encourage them to subscribe. This could be a prompt for every new LinkedIn connection, to a pinned tweet on Twitter.

If you are proud of the work you produce, you can’t be shy in letting people know. For instance, the day before the weekly YATM email I will add a social post in the YATM LinkedIn group and Twitter to say that the email is being sent and if people are not subscribers, to leave their email.?

Have enough proof to convince people.?

When you’re first starting out it’s even more important for you to persuade people to subscribe. So that they have reason to believe that what you’re saying will resonate with them, be clear about the sort of newsletter they’ll be receiving, give them reasons to sign up.?

People need to see your sign-up form.

Win people over by having a dedicated space or spaces to direct people to, be that an email footer or landing page. Remember this whole process is focused on promotion and so sits separately from what it is that you’ll be creating as content.?

Encourage those people who are already in to share and promote your content for you.

I add at the bottom of my newsletter asking people to share the YATM weekly with people who may find it useful (the link goes to the sign-up page). This was something I had never really thought about before but looking at the stats, I can see that people do share material with their contacts. Finding ways of encouraging others to promote and tell others that joining would be of interest and worthwhile, helps your own audience-building efforts.

A new feature in 2021 and into 2022 is putting the YATM audience centre-stage with the YATM Takeover feature which opens the email every week. I ask a community member to send over a photo (that isn’t a profile pic) and information on something that they think would be of use for others to read, watch or listen to.

Alongside this, I’ll add a link to their LinkedIn page and company website. What this has done is encourage others to share in their spaces. Whilst it was never an intention for people to use it as a post for their social feeds, it still feels good when YATM is acknowledged, mentioned and more people become aware of it.

Subscribers goals become part of your overall strategy (and what you do).

When you have a newsletter that’s building an audience, reach and influence, you can eventually use it to introduce new product or service lines.

The very nature of producing work that matters to people, work they care to hear about and hang around for, means that it starts to take priority from a business perspective. Being up close to your audience (and not just in the geographic sense) is going to become the differentiator as many businesses adjust to new ways of navigating the world in the coming months.

Let’s Round-Up

Subscriber growth can be painfully slow when the newsletter you’re creating and publishing isn’t playing to its strengths and receiving the right amount of promotion.?

A newsletter can, over time, become a means of getting people to buy from you but the whole reason of starting it should be to have something you can share that people join you on, enjoy and start feeling a part of.

You shouldn’t be too tough on yourself when new sign-ups are initially slow as it takes time to become aware and recognise the role you serve for others. The longer you keep at it, the more you will find the voice, niche and role you serve for others. Having that better-defined voice will also then make it easier for more people to come on board and join you in what you’re doing.

Respect the audience you build, you don’t need as many people as you may think but you do need to be continually serving up value and reasons for them to keep coming back.

Come and join in with what's happening from You Are The Media. We're back for live shows in March!

Our home is the seaside in the UK, but everything is created for you to join in wherever you sit (and live) around the world.

Here is what's coming up. Be great to see you...

???Thursday 24th March?| YATM Learning | This is our creative dashboard session. It's the tools and apps others find useful. This was our most popular session of 2021,?book here.

???Thursday 21st April?|?YATM Online Offline | Our topic is how there comes a stage when building our brands that adolescence kicks in,?come and book here. It's on Zoom and live in the theatre.

?? WATCH THIS VIDEO TUTORIAL ON HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN NEWSLETTER, NO NEED TO LEAVE YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS,?CLICK HERE.

I'd love to know how you are building your audience and the challenges you have? Any questions, just ask.

Come and join us and be a part of the You Are The Media community.?Leave your email here?and see you every Thursday morning (6.30am GMT) in your in-box.

I'll even send to you a little video just from me to you when you subscribe!

Take care and see you soon.... Mark : )