A good number of Internet marketers have not yet realized just how important it is to build a sizable opt-in email list. It is simply not enough to produce sales from a website. Don't misunderstand, it's terrific to be making lots of sales direct from your website, but you will also lose a big percentage of prospective customers if you do not build an opt-in email list. If you have a list you will be able to regularly communicate with folks that visit your site and hopefully build a more lasting relationship with them. When done the proper way you can usually convert a fairly high percentage of prospects that may not have been initially interested in your offer into paying customers. Having said all of this, you are now wondering how exactly does one build a really good opt-in list easily and quickly. Some useful strategies follow.

*** You can offer some sort of incentive to prompt people to give you their email address. I have found this is an excellent way to encourage folks to enroll in your email list. My approach is to offer a free eBook or report that my potential customers find useful and has obvious value. In my opinion it is mandatory to give them something for opting into your list. Experience has shown that this strategy alone should easily double the number of list additions you receive. Those that try to build their list without incentives usually fail. Reports or eBooks that can be used as incentives are both easy to create or purchase so it does not make sense to not offer one. One thing that is ignored many times is doing enough "selling" of your freebie to create the perceived value. If you can convince your prospect of the obvious value of your giveaway, you can easily boost sign ups by more than double.

*** Somewhere on your subscription signup form you must include an understandable written privacy policy. Most people who refuse to give out their email address are afraid of getting spammed. This is not a new problem on the Internet. Who doesn't hate spam? So, if your prospect has any reason to think that you'll give their email address to anyone else, forget it. You have to give them an honest guarantee that you won't share their email address with anyone, period. Hopefully, this will decrease the worries any folks might have about spam. Not having an easily read spam policy will reduce the number of sign ups by at least 50%. This simple tactic can make a big difference in signup percentage.

*** You may want to create a number of narrowly targeted email lists. This can be a very powerful strategy. By having different lists available on one site, the chances dramatically increase that potential customers will find something of interest to sign up for. For instance, one of the email lists could just be for general new product releases and updates, perhaps another about tips your niche would find helpful, while a third could be an all-inclusive monthly news bulletin. So no matter which choice they make, you receive their email address. Do some thinking about what topics those in your market might have interest in. You can then offer various options on your website. For example, a prospect might not have an interest in new product announcements but be very interested in a newsletter. If you provide multiple options you will increase the odds of getting more sign ups. Typically three options are plenty. If your prospect can't find something out of three options they probably are not worth chasing after.

*** My highest recommendation is to choose to have all of your email lists be double opt-in. Double opt-in lists typically ask people to first sign up using a form on your website and then verify their subscription by replying to the confirmation email that is automatically sent to them. Here are several good reasons to use double opt-in. First, it takes away the possibility of being called a spammer. The double opt-in provides proof that the person requested your emails to be sent to them. As well, a double opt-in email list will usually contain higher quality prospects versus those from a singe opt-in list. The explanation is that these subscribers were interested enough to reply to the confirmation email, therefore they must be more serious about what you offer. So it follows that double opt-in subscribers will be much more responsive to your future messages compared to those who did their sign up request on a half hearted basis with minimal interest. It is very critical to successful sales to have a high quality email list.

By using the above strategies you will be on your way to building a substantial high quality responsive email list as quickly as possible. If you have not heard it yet, you will hear often in the future: "The Money Is In The List".