I like list building with viral list builders. While some marketers hate them, I think they have their place, especially if you're a beginning marketer. Don't tell anyone, but I still use them. I believe that many who don't like them simply either don't use them well, or they've used the wrong ones.
So what does a viral list builder do? It gives you a way to leverage your existing subscribers and website visitors so that you create more traffic, and more subscribers. Several years ago, I heard them described as set and forget advertising techniques, and it's mostly true.
If you want to make every visitor count, these tools can help you acheive that at no cost. Some viral list builders work on page, some work as popups, and some replace a page entirely, such as a thank you page. Before I continue, I want to be sure that you understand that zero cost is referring to money only.
Nothing in life is free, or so it has been said. There are often other not so obvious costs associated with using viral tools. These include time, some level of control, and the fact that you're often building someone else's list as well as your own. If used correctly, these tools can make those trade offs worth it.
I'm going to use List Inferno as an example here, since I like that one. It's easy to sign up as there are only three steps in the sign up process, and the code works on page so you don't have to bother your visitors with popups if you don't want to. It also has a number of categories that you can choose from, so unlike some list builders, you can promote ezines on topics other than Internet Marketing.
The basic premise is that you enter your ezine details in the List Inferno list builder and place some code on your web pages. Each time you show a web page with the viral code on it, it will display a selection of ezines to which your visitor can subscribe. In return, your ezine subscription information will appear on another web page on someone else's site.
The end result is that for every visitor to your web page, you get the opportunity to gain another subscriber. In my experience, the sign up rate with viral list builders is rather high. When I use these viral tools, my list building efforts often go on autopilot without much additional effort. If they slow down at all, I do a few things to get them going again and I'm good for a while.
I offer an ecourse on beginning list building in which I cover the basic elements that you need to properly build a list. One element that most list building courses tend to gloss over, is a way to reach potential subscribers.
One challenge, however, is that many people find it hard to drive traffic to their websites, or they don't want to spend the money on a website at all. While I highly recommend that you build a website and develop a number of ways to drive traffic, viral list builders like List Inferno can be used with free websites, and once you get a few visitors, the viral effect begins to build your list for you.
There are a number of things you can do to increase the power of a viral list builder. One simple technique is to create a number of relevant keyword rich pages on your site, and place the list building code on each of those pages.
In order to generate the viral effect of the list builder, drive traffic to those pages using whatever means you normally would. Then, within your emails to your subscribers, give them a reason to visit to those pages.
In this way, not only will you have natural traffic working for you, but each subscriber as well. In fact, if you do this right, each subscriber can be responsible for producing several opportunities for you to gain new subscribers. Using this type of system, you'll be a champion of viral list building in no time.
