You Must Build A List

When I first started working with online marketing over a decade ago, I realized pretty quick the value of a subscriber list. In fact, I've become obsessed with growing my list. I have observed one simple fact: as your list grows, so do your leads and your income. The bigger your list, the more money you will make.

The value of your list is not the list itself; it's the traffic to your site that you get to direct because of your list.

There are three types of online traffic that we'll take a look at:

1. Traffic you control
2. Traffic someone else controls
3. Traffic you earn and OWN

Once you understand how each type of traffic works you will have the opportunity to help direct that traffic down your "breadcrumb trail".

The number one and ONLY goal is for you to OWN all the traffic you can. If you've played the game Monopoly, I'm sure you realize you will lose if you do not invest in acquiring lots of prime assets. The more assets, the merrier. The game is the same in online marketing. The asset you need to acquire in online marketing is an email list. An email list that is earned, not purchased.

Let's look at the three types of online traffic.

#1 - The traffic you earn and own

The traffic you earn and own is the most important. This traffic is your blog subscribers, social media followers, readers, customers, etc. I "own" this traffic because all I need to do is send out an email, post a social media message, or create a compelling blog post, and I will generate traffic.

#2 - The traffic you control

The next type of traffic is the traffic you control. The traffic you control is paid traffic such as banner ads or pay-per-click ads with Google, Facebook, and others. My goal is to direct this type of traffic to a specific landing page with a very simple objective -- to get an email address. When I get an email address I can then convert this traffic into traffic I OWN. When I own the traffic, I have earned the customers permission to continue providing value. When value and trust are high, it creates the perfect recipe for a sale.

#3 - Traffic someone else controls

The last type of traffic just shows up. I don't have any control where it comes from or where it goes. Below is a good example. In May I wrote a blog post called The Real Trick to Marketing. My post was mentioned on June 12th by Lucas Gregory (@LRheaGregory) who found it on Twitter. Because of his mention via Twitter it spread to his network and beyond and was shared by several people who were not even on my network. Now if those people haven't already given me their email on my website I now have the basis to connect personally with them and provide them with more value. I will share how I do this in an upcoming post in the near future.

My ONLY goal just like with traffic I control is it to turn this into traffic I OWN. This is why if you go on any page of my website or blog there is always a prime place for visitors to give me their email address. Whether it's to subscribe to my newsletter or to get a free resource, I position to get the visitors email address. I've learned the more value you can provide the better the result of getting a new subscriber.

My NUMBER ONE GOAL in my marketing is to grow my list and OWN the traffic. 

Once you OWN the traffic what should you do next? Next week we'll take a look at that.