Experienced marketers will tell you that email marketing success is based on your subscriber list. However, what they don’t tell you is that the quality of your email list matters more than the quantity. An email list of 10,000 loyal subscribers is more valuable than 100,000 disengaged subscribers. In fact, a small list of engaged subscribers has more potential to bring you more revenue compared to a large list of disengaged subscribers. But how do you attract valuable people who will make your list great? What email lead generation tips and strategies do you need? Keep reading to learn more.

1. Value customer journey above all

If you’ve been doing business for a while, you know that attracting the right customer is not easy. You need to know who your prospective customers are, what they like, what they hate, what their needs are, etc. This will help you create the right marketing strategies for your prospective customers. However, you need to go further than audience research in order to attract the right customers. Enter the customer journey.

What is a customer journey? In a few words, the customer journey (or customer experience) is a result of the interaction between a customer and a company. A customer journey is built on the basis of a long-term relationship and includes a customer’s experience using the company’s products and the company’s ability to fit the needs of a customer.

Image credit: Vendasta

From the infographic above, there are five essential stages of the modern customer journey. If you incorporate the initial four stages wisely, customers will share their positive experiences and become loyal brand followers.

It’s crucial to take the needs of your subscribers into account and anticipate their feedback. According to a Walker study, 86% of buyers want to pay more for a better customer experience. Shift the focus of your marketing emails to a more personalized approach. Your subscribers value a positive experience, and your goal is to make it enjoyable.

2. Make your emails more interactive

Newsflash! A good email is not about how much information you put in it but about originality and creativity.

It’s already hard to impress people, so even more effort is needed to impress potential subscribers. That’s why more and more companies are opting for interactive emails.

Image credit: Brit+Co

Take a look at this email by Brit+Co. This is a perfect example of an interactive email, which not only has a clear offer to the subscribers but is also coordinated with the company’s style.

Create emails in a way that will differentiate you from other companies and help your subscribers recognize your email from tons of other promotions they get every day. Being loyal to your brand and its features will attract more loyal subscribers, which will result in a bigger email list. 

It is important to remember that if a marketing email contains too many animated features and call-to-action buttons, it might hardly open on a smartphone.

It’s very easy to over-indulge in creativity, creating ‘overweight’ marketing emails and smartphones. As a result, it will take longer for an email to download, and it’s unlikely that a potential subscriber will read it.

To avoid that:

• • Make sure your email is not too long.
  • Compress your images.
  • Create a text version of the email.
  • Use brief subjects and a simple email layout.

Further reading: Learn about B2B email lead generation

3. Encourage forwarding and sharing the message

If you have a solid army of loyal subscribers, encourage them to share the message with their friends or relatives and offer them something in return. This is the simplest email lead-generation tip because everyone wins. Your customer gets a gift, and you get a new subscriber. 

Image credit: ModCloth

While encouraging your subscribers to spread the good word about your company is always a good idea, there’s a way to do it even better than everyone else. If you want to be really successful with this method, send this kind of email only to qualified subscribers. i.e., subscribers who’ve already bought your products or used your services. This is a highly-targeted tactic, which works every time.

4. Use Exit Pop-ups to generate leads

Hundreds of people browse your website every day in search of content and information. They might not be your subscribers and might have never used your products or services. But if they do like your content, why not turn them into your loyal subscribers?

Image credit: Gleam

An exit pop-up is a window that appears on your website after a few seconds and invites website visitors who like your content to subscribe to your mailing list. 

According to Sumo, pop-ups often have more than a 9% conversion rate. So this is a good way to attract the attention of a visitor. But there’s a rule to it: let your visitors read your content for at least two minutes before an exit message pops up. It’s useless to offer a subscription when a person hasn’t even seen the content because they haven’t even formed an opinion about your brand.

5. Use QR codes

QR codes are now mainstream, and it’s clear why: they give instant access to the necessary information. The QR (Quick Response) symbols include a URL that links you to the desired web page.

QR codes get used everywhere, so why not include them in your emails? Consider the situation: your subscriber and his/her friend are having dinner together. Your subscriber gets an email that he or she wants to share with a friend. Instead of going through a tiring process of copying the link or re-sending the message, the friend can just scan a QR code and get instant access to your website. It’s easy, effortless, and contributes to the positive customer experience.

Bottom Line – It’s all about quality

Email lead generation comes down to the quality of subscribers rather than quantity. However, that’s only the first step in building a great email list. You need to Build a relationship with new subscribers through lead nurturing, which is a process that takes time and commitment. Be patient and attentive, take an interest in the needs of your subscribers, analyze their feedback, and improve. The more attentive and caring you are, the more loyal subscribers you’ll get.