What's a list? A list is a database of people who have come to one or more of your sites and given you their names and email addresses in return for receiving some information, such as a newsletter or special report. Alex Mandossian calls this an ethical bribe. You give them some valuable information in return for their names and email addresses. This is called an "opt-in list."

Building your list is done one of two ways. (1) With a "squeeze page", which is the first page your visitors see when they come to your site. It's called a squeeze page because if they don't give you their name and email address they won't be able to get to your sales page. (2) With a "pop up", "pop over" or standard registration form on your main sales page. The second alternative does not force visitors to give you their information before you give them access to the rest of your site.

There are two reasons you need to build a list:

First, more than 95% of the visitors to your site will not make a purchase on the first visit. (A good site converts 2%-5% of its first-time visitors.) This means if a visitor doesn't make a purchase, you've lost them forever unless you collect their names and email addresses BEFORE you give them your "pitch." That way even if they don't buy, you can send follow-up emails (with your auto-responder), giving you the opportunity to convert a much higher percentage of your visitors. It's a very effective strategy for increasing the conversion of your sites.

The second reason to build a list is so you can make additional offers. Let's say you have a site that offers a health newsletter, and you've built a LIST of 25,000 people who've visited your site.

Now offer your list an eBook on some aspect of health for $40. If 2% of your list buys the eBook, you'll make $20,000. Making a similar offer each month you add $240,000 a year to your income. Do you see how a list lets you make money on demand?

Remember, you only want to send offers to your list that are related to the reason they originally signed up. So if they joined your list requesting your health newsletter, you don't want to send offers for golf clubs.

There are two things you need in order to build your list. You need a site set up with a "squeeze page" to offer free information (newsletter, special report, etc.) in return for visitors giving you their names and email addresses and you need an auto-responder to collect and manage the names and addresses.