9 Steps to Create a Great Newsletter Signup Page - DailyBlogTips

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9 Steps to Create a Great Newsletter Signup Page Posted: 01 Jul 2014 01:32 PM PDT This is a guest post from Karol K. Is your newsletter list growing slowly … or not at all? You might worry that you're sending out the wrong sort of content, or that your incentive isn't good enough. The real reason, though, is probably because you're not giving your readers the best possible opportunity to actually join your newsletter. Basically, there are three main ways to showcase a newsletter signup form on your blog: In the sidebar. Through a popup. On a dedicated landing page – your newsletter signup page. Undoubtedly, sidebars are the most popular solution. But as it turns out, they are not all that effective and the conversion rates are rather poor. Popups, on the other hand, are much better in the conversion department, but the main downside here is that most people hate them! So out of the three, newsletter signup pages seem like an interesting solution. They have way better conversions than a sidebar form, and at the same time they don’t make the majority of your visitors angry. Instead, they make them feel welcome. Having such a page presents a lot of other possibilities too. For instance, you can link to it from your other posts, or share it with people via email or social media. And with some luck, you can also rank it on Google. But how do you actually create it? What are the main principles of building a newsletter signup page that gets results? My plan when compiling this guide was simple: 1. Spy on the A listers. 2. Examine what they have on their pages and why. 3. Steal their ideas! Here’s what I discovered: #1. Understand the Goal of the Page The goal of a newsletter signup page is simple: to get people to click the big “subscribe” button. That's the only thing that matters, and other than that, you shouldn’t care about anything else. I can’t remember who said it first, but a good way to think about your newsletter signup page is to make people either subscribe or leave your site altogether. There really shouldn’t be any other possibilities. The reason I’m mentioning this is because all the other steps on this list really reinforce this goal, so keeping it in mind will give you an instant answer as to why we’re doing something the way we’re doing it. #2. Use Simple Layouts Let’s start with the visual aspects of your page because these are what your visitors see first ? even before they read your headline. The best newsletter signup pages are simple. They have one- or two-column structures with no separate headers or footers. This is effective because it creates a distraction-free environment. People don’t get confused by all the stuff around your newsletter offer, so they can focus just on making the decision (subscribe or not). Now, whether you should use one column or two depends on the length of the copy you’re planning to write. Slightly longer copy works well with a one-column layouts. Ultra-short copy is optimized for two-column layouts. For example, this is how Ramit Sethi does it. Here are two of his signup pages (he has a handful of those), side by side: You don’t want to use a two-column layout with longer copy because by the time someone finishes reading it, they can’t see the form anymore. With short copy, the form remains visible at all times. Also, having longer copy on a two-column layout reduces the readability flow, as the eye starts jumping from one column to the other back and forth. #3. Make your headline large Large headlines are one of the most common things on almost all newsletter signup pages I’ve ever come across. And by large I mean the font size, as well as the number of words and the overall space that the headline block takes. In the examples above, you can see that Ramit is very serious about his headline game. In fact, his headline block takes roughly half of the visible screen area. However, the whole trick is to make the headline fit your design. It can’t be huge just for the sake of it and look like a sore thumb. Note. Don’t forget about tuning your copy to get the most out of your headline as a whole. I’m not going to discuss this here. You’re way better off learning those things from Daniel or Jon. #4. Erase Your Navigation Or at least reduce it. The whole problem with site navigation is that if you have a menu somewhere on your signup page, some people will click it. And you don’t want them to click anything else other than the subscribe button. Now, if you want to get extreme here, you can erase all navigation altogether. Just like Derek Halpern does here: Derek has a simple menu on most pages on his blog, but on this newsletter page, you can literally only subscribe to his newsletter or leave the site altogether. #5. Use disclosure and privacy policy links Yes, I did mention that menus are bad for newsletter signup pages in general, but there are still some things you’re required to do by law. The specifics depend on where you’re from and where you’re doing most of your business, but in most cases, some disclaimer links are required. That being said, the rules are that they need to be there, but at the same time, they don’t necessarily need to be very prominent. If you look again at Derek’s page, you’ll see two small links in the footer line: This is all you need. #6. Include trust elements So why would anyone trust you? Well, because you’re awesome and your content is great, obviously! But there’s no way for people to know this right away, so they need just one final nudge to get them through your subscription process without having second thoughts. This is when trust elements come into play. Here are the two most popular types. “As seen on” logos: Testimonials and quotes: #7. Consider Using a Video Videos can work well on a signup page, but only if they are professionally produced and preferably personal in tone. Try talking to your visitors directly just like Chris Brogan does here: The main power of videos is that they really help build a connection. Seeing a video of someone where they’re talking to you seems almost as if they were standing next to you. It’s a lot more personal than reading copy on a page. Now, about the technical side of videos. You can embed your video from YouTube, but you’re better off using a tool like Wistia. It gives you more control over your videos and works flawlessly on every device. #8. Hook Up Your Newsletter Service I'm sure you know that sending emails by bcc-ing lots of people through your email client is a no-no these days. If you want to run a newsletter, you need to do so with a specialized email delivery service. This service will take care of your list, keep people’s email addresses safe, give you access to a cool newsletter design environment and then finally handle the process of sending your newsletters out. There are a lot of email services available out there, but two of them stand out the most, in my opinion. The first one is MailChimp. As part of their free plan, you get to send 12,000 emails per month, which should be more than enough for starters. The other one is Sendinblue. This is a new player, similar to MailChimp, but the thing that’s interesting about it is that the free plan also allows you to send autoresponders, which is huge (not available in MailChimp for free). For instance, you can set automated emails that go out to new subscribers, say, two days after they joined. It’s a great way to re-engage them and get them back to your site. Anyway, once you register with either of these services, you’ll get an embeddable form, which you’ll be able to use on your page to get people’s emails. #9. Give it Some Personality It’s always nice to give your page one or two final touches to make it look special. And there are probably a thousand things you could do, but let’s focus on two really simple ones: Include your picture at the beginning. Seeing your face makes it way easier for readers to identify with what you’re saying (especially if you don’t have a video on the page). Use one cool-looking graphic that draws people’s attention to your form. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy, but it should be in-tune with your main message and headline. You can get those made onFiverr for $5 a piece, by the way. Here’s how Ramit Sethi does both of these things on one of his pages: What Are You Up To Right Now? I hope this guide will help you build a better newsletter page for your blog. But in the meantime, what’s your main way of getting subscribers right now? Is it through a block in the sidebar, a popup, or maybe you already have a newsletter signup page and you’re just looking for ways to make it better? Drop a comment below to tell us.   About the Author: Karol K. (@carlosinho) is a blogger and writer for hire (link). He has his work published all over the web, on sites like: NewInternetOrder.com, Six Revisions, Web Design Ledger, Lifehack.org, Quick Sprout, ProBlogger, Writers in Charge, and others.   Wanna learn how to make more money with your website? Check the Online Profits training program!

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ProBlogger: Partnering With Brands Theme Week: Ways to Collaborate and Earn an Income on Your Blog

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Partnering With Brands Theme Week: Ways to Collaborate and Earn an Income on Your Blog Posted: 01 Jul 2014 08:23 AM PDT Today we welcome Nikki Parkinson, from Styling You, to chat about brand work on blogs. Nikki switched a 20-year journalism career for forging a path online with her fashion, beauty and lifestyle blog. One of Australia’s best, she’s won numerous awards, travelled the world, and created a business she loves, right from her kitchen table. She’s actively worked with brands right from the start, and has enormous knowledge to share. So you’ve been blogging for a while and have built up a solid readership and community because you consistently deliver useful/inspirational/entertaining content? There is a fair chance if you have included a contact email address on your blog that before long an email from a brand, a PR or digital marketing agency, will land in your inbox. You will either be surprised and delighted, or offended, that your little blog has been noticed by said brand. It’s the surprised and delighted among you that I’m keen to talk to, because that first email could be the start of a potential commercial relationship. That first email signifies that as a blogger you need to get very clear on your publishing guidelines. Maybe you already mention brands as a matter of fact in your content. Maybe you haven’t. Either way, that all changes when someone is potentially asking you to mention their brand. Only you can decide how you respond, but having a brand-publishing checklist in place will help you to make the decision that is right for you. Brand publishing checklist 1. Is this a brand you already know, love, and use? 2. Is this a brand that you are confident that your readers either already know, love, and use or would like to know, love, and use? 3. Is this a brand that you could work in to your regular blog content in a way that is seamless? Not in a non-disclosed kind of way, more in a way that would not be out of place to what your readers expect from your style of content. 4. Does aligning yourself with this brand conflict with brands you’ve previously aligned yourself with? 5. Do you feel excited at the prospect of potentially working with this brand or does it give you an icky feeling? I know icky is not a technical term and can’t really be defined, but intuition or gut feeling is a great thing to draw on in this situation. Working with brands The PR pitch Most – but not all – approaches from a brand or its agency will be for “earned” mentions on your blog. This is the traditional way that brands and their PR agencies have worked with mainstream media. The idea here is that the PR is pitching you an idea that has some kind of newsworthy content or relevance to your blog’s audience. They are simply pitching and you do not at all have to publish anything just because they have emailed you. You may, however, find that what they are pitching could work as a part of particular blog post you’re working on, or have planned for now or in the future. This is not something the brand would pay you to do. It is your choice when and if you choose to include the pitch on your blog. The same applies if the brand has sent you a product – unsolicited – to consider using or mentioning on your blog or social media networks. You are in no way obligated to feature the product. Relationships Many of my now paid commercial brand alignments have come from building relationships with brands directly or through their PR agencies. I’ve incorporated their products into my posts and have built up a relationship with that brand. The brand trusts what I do on the blog and they can already see how my readers respond to their brand. I didn’t go into those early earned PR relationships thinking that one day I would be able to get a sponsorship from that brand, but I did start my alignment with those brands based on the five things I listed above on the brand publishing checklist. This ensured that the relationship was one I felt comfortable with from the beginning. More and more PR companies are also including budgets for paid blogger campaigns as part of their contract with the brands they represent, so how you respond from those early approaches is becoming more and more important. Also know that a PR pitch cannot specify to you when and how you publish content about the brand. They can’t tell you to use a certain hashtag, they can’t tell you that you need to publish a certain number of social media posts, and they can’t tell you what day you need to publish. They would NEVER ask a journalist to do the same because the only content in mainstream media that can be guaranteed is paid for – and it’s called advertising. I see this approach happening more and more. And as a former journalist it really disappoints me. It gives the good PRs a bad name and assumes that the blogger will happily do as they are instructed without any remuneration for exposure to that blogger’s audience. Events One of the trends for ways in which brands engage with bloggers is through events. These events are either hosted by the brand and the brand’s PR invites selected bloggers to attend or the events are hosted by third party brand-blogger consultants who are contracted by brands to get bloggers along to the event in the hope of potential exposure. Either way, a blogger’s decision to even accept an invite to an event can be seen as a brand alignment. Even if that blogger doesn’t publish any social media or blog posts, the blogger could be photographed by the brands or event organiser and therefore associated with the event and seen to be endorsing it. Once again it comes back to the brand publishing checklist above. Consider if you are happy to be associated with the host brands or brands in any way before saying yes to attend. And, like a PR pitch, a blogger should not be coerced or expected to post anything in return for attendance at the event. The should be free to do so if they want to, not because they’ve been invited. Just as a journalist would do. Paid brand alignments At some point in your blog’s growth you need to take stock and put a value on the time you put into your blog and the readership you have built. Once you’ve established a set value for your blog, I suggest you review this every six months or every quarter depending on the scale in growth of your readership. Your readership is your currency when it comes to being appealing to brands. Brands mostly want to see the numbers. The number of unique visitors to your blog is the main number they’re looking at. Why? Because it’s the number that most equates to the numbers game of mainstream media. It’s the equivalent to circulation figures in print media and ratings numbers on TV and radio. Clever brands and agencies will also look beyond the numbers to engagement and influence. They will also look at the demographics behind your numbers – particularly if they’re wanting to connect with readers in certain locations or of a particular age or sex. When I talk to bloggers about valuing their time and their blog’s audience, it seems quite an arbitrary thing to suggest – and in many ways it is – but increasingly, bloggers are sharing what they are getting paid for brand alignments and this helps us all to establish that value. I suggest that $150 should be the minimum payment for a sponsored post – and then bloggers should scale up according to their readership and influence. Why $150? If you are working as a consultant then the minimum hourly rate is usually about $100 an hour. Most sponsored posts take longer than an hour and a half this to create and compile. For 5000-10,000 unique visits to your blog a month, you could charge $1550. For a blogger with 30,000-50,000 unique visits a month, $3000. Ways to earn money from brand alignments Sponsored posts: This is the most common form of commercial alignment between bloggers and brands. It works most successfully when the blogger is given creative control to write the post in the same way they would write a non-paid post to their readers. Keeping the authenticity of your voice is key – as is being upfront to your readers and labelling it as a sponsored post at the top. This is not a legal requirement, but it is practice that is very much worth embracing. You want to keep your readers, not dupe them. Being upfront has seen me grow my blog readership since I started writing sponsored posts – not have it disappear. Social media posts: Being paid by a brand to promote their product or message via social media can be part of a sponsored post campaign or separate to it. One blogger talent agency has been reported as charging out up to $750 per brand mention on an Instagram image. With the growth of Instagram, particularly for fashion bloggers, this has become an attractive alignment for brands looking to harness its power. Ambassadorships: Ambassadorships are the strongest way in which a blogger can align with a brand. They usually represent a long-term commitment between the blogger and the brand – six, 12 months or longer. This is a win for the blogger in regards to steady income, but it’s an alignment that needs to be fully considered before making because of the longevity of the association. A word of warning: many brands will try and “buy” bloggers as ambassadors with product only. Be careful with this because once you’ve received the ambassador title, you’ve more than cemented your alliance with that brand and don’t leave the door open for a commercial arrangement. Television commercials: Bloggers are being included as the “talent” in television commercials and infomercials, usually as part of a wider sponsored post and social media campaign. This has come because audiences are proving more responsive to “real” people as opposed to celebrities or actors. Blogging for a brand on their site: All bloggers know that good, solid content builds a blog’s readership. Brands have also realised that they too need good solid, relatable content on their sites to increase readership, brand awareness and sales through their sites. Who do they turn to? Bloggers who can not only create that content but bring an audience with them to the brand’s site. Reader events: a win-win for bloggers and brands is when a blogger can offer something of value to their reader either through valuable/useful content or a giveaway. When that giveaway includes a chance to meet the blogger and attend an event that will add value or entertainment to the winning blog readers, then it’s proving to be a successful way for a blogger to align with a brand. Event appearances: As I mentioned above, a blogger’s attendance at an event is a sign that the blogger is endorsing the brand. So it’s little wonder that bloggers can now obtain an appearance fee to attend an event. Often a certain number of social posts using a specific hashtag may be attached to this commercial arrangement. The bottom line Your blog hasn’t just appeared from out of thin air with a solid, influenced, and engaged audience. It’s taken long hours at the keyboard, dedication to your blog’s topic, and an extreme passion to communicate and connect with your readership. You need to remember that whenever there is an opportunity presented to you to work or align yourself with a brand. Make good choices, disclose those good choices, and create brand content that still represents who you are and what your blog is about. Do all this and your blog will continue to grow, as will your blog-business income. Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger Partnering With Brands Theme Week: Ways to Collaborate and Earn an Income on Your Blog

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