How to Turn New Subscribers into Burning Hot Leads
Here’s a fact: There’s no better time to pitch to someone on your email list than when they first join. Your subscribers are the warmest they’ll likely ever be in the first few days after they sign up for your list.
Let’s back up a few steps, though. Before you can do that, you first need to have an incentive for them to sign up for your list, a way to market that freebie, and an awesome email sequence that will convert.
In this blog post, we’ll be breaking each of these steps down, so you can be well on your way to turning new subscribers into burning hot leads!
First, Create Your Freebie
Sure, people could choose to join simply for the value you’ll be providing through your email content, but the fact of the matter is that most people need an incentive to give up their sacred email address. Those incentives have many names– freebie, opt-in, lead magnet, etc.– but they all serve the same purpose, which is to help solve a problem.
This isn’t to say you need to build a super elaborate freebie that will teach them how to do for free what you actually charge for. It can totally solve a small problem (or seemingly small to you, but a great relief to the person you’re helping). We recommend designing your freebie based on your client journey in terms of where they’re starting and where they’re going to end.
For example, a brand and web designer may develop a brand style guide. That way, those who download the freebie will already have an idea of their brand style. In turn, they’re more likely to want to continue the next steps of the process by working with you, plus they’ll already have an idea of their brand style.
Pro-tip: If you haven’t already, go grab this PDF Opt-in Template that you can customize in Canva, so you can start getting warm subscribers to your email list pronto.
Then, Build Your Welcome Sequence
Once your freebie is created, you need to have an automated email sequence set up to accomplish 3 things:
Deliver the freebie to their inbox
Introduce yourself, what you’re all about, your services, etc.
Direct to a call-to-action (in this case, to work with you)
THE FREEBIE DELIVERY EMAIL
This email will be sent as soon as the person opts in for your freebie. It should be short and sweet, the directions to download should be clear and at the forefront of the email, and you can also let them know when they’ll hear from you next. You can use imagery in this email to really catch their eye and make a solid impression. After all, this is their very first email from you!
THE INTRODUCTION EMAIL
Now it’s time to introduce yourself, your business, who you help and how you help them, your mission and values, etc. Include a photo of yourself so that your readers can start to match up the words with a living, breathing human being on the other side of their screen! This is your opportunity to showcase your personality and add touches of your professional and personal pizazz.
We recommend sending this email 1-2 days after your opt-in delivery email because you’re still fresh on their mind. Plus, if they haven’t dove into your freebie yet, this will also serve as a nudge for them to get started.
THE CALL-TO-ACTION EMAIL
This is the email (again, 1-2 days later) where you encourage them to take the next step toward working with you. What does that look like in your process? Perhaps you just want them to go read more about your services on your website to eventually book a call, maybe you go ahead and link to your call scheduler in this email, or you might even direct them to your contact form so that you can learn more about their business first. Feel free to throw one or two testimonials in this email as well.
Psst… Did you see this Flodesk Opt-in Sequence? We give you copy guidelines, graphic templates, mockup guides, and video tutorials to help you build your opt-in sequence inside Flodesk.
Next, Market Your Freebie
Now that you have your freebie created and email sequence set up, you can start marketing it to get sign ups! We recommend putting it on rotation on Pinterest, showcasing it on your website at the top or in the sidebar, and in each blog post. You also want to make sure you’re talking about it in your social content, too.
Pro-tip #2: Grab our Opt-in Marketing Bundle that includes Canva templates for Pinterest graphics, site banners and side-bar graphics, and blog banners to market your freebie!
Finally, Convert Warm Subscribers into Hot Leads
To take it up a notch, we recommend making sure that your contact form is consistent with the style and branding of your freebie, emails, and other marketing materials. Having an eye-catching and fun lead capture form makes it more enticing for new leads to complete. It will also help you collect important details from a new prospective client about who they are, how they want to work together, and how much they are looking to spend before you even hop on a call with them.
Of course, we have a template for that, too. Our Dubsado Lead Capture Form is a one-click add to your Dubsado account with Canva-customizable graphics as well. It already includes form blocks that you can customize to match the type of information you like to collect from leads.
All that’s left to do is continue telling people about your freebie, and let it, your email sequence, and your lead capture form do the work! Be sure you’re staying on top of email replies and, if you direct readers to message you on another platform like Instagram, always reply back within a timely manner. This is all a part of your client experience, so you want to make sure they’re able to see what it will be like when they become a paying client.
As you can see, we carry templates for every step of this process. Instead of purchasing them all separately, we recommend going ahead and becoming a member of The Co-op so you can download all of our templates for just $47, plus get access to a private Co-op community and podcast feed that breaks down the strategy behind every new template release!
