12 Effective Ways to Grow Your Email Subscriber List

Why Grow Your Email Marketing List?

Trying to grow your business? Look no further than email marketing. Of all marketing channels, email marketing provides the highest return on investment (ROI) with $40 for every $1 spent. And, by growing your email list, even the smallest business has a fair shot at competing against larger competitors and growing their client base.

To grow your marketing efforts, you must prioritize email sign-ups to connect with your audience through direct messaging.  Growing your email list gives you a method to send targeted emails to users at  different points in the customer journey. With an email list sign-up, you can attract prospects who will hopefully use your products and services at a later stage in time.

But, there’s a right way and a wrong way to grow your email list. Sure, it may be easy to buy an email contact list, and grow your subscriber count fast. But this will get you on the wrong side of the law, damage your professional credibility, and annoy potential customers.

So, what are the twelve best, legal and effective ways to grow an email subscriber list?  Read on to find out how.

12 Ways to Grow Your Email List

There are authentic ways on how to gain subscribers fast without cutting corners or getting on the wrong side of the law. They include:

1. Create a Clearly Designed Lead Form

A clear and straightforward lead form should stand out on your website so your visitors can easily identify it, and quickly fill it out with their personal details. Adopting a minimalist philosophy while creating your form can help you increase engagement and even sales.

Ensure that the design of your lead form is visually appealing and clearly portrays your brand identity. Start with simple, solid background colors that closely align with your brand colors and identity. The text format (font and style) also matters. Don’t use too many text formats, or you’ll risk visual inconsistency. It’s best to use one font style (i.e. Helvetica) across your lead form. 

2. Add Opt-in Forms to Multiple Pages

If you’re intentional about gaining email subscribers, you must include your lead forms (opt-in forms) on multiple, relevant pages so your visitors will find them at every step You can include the opt-in forms on individual blog posts, blog homepage feature box, blog sidebar, your about page, and website pop-ups encouraging users to sign up.

An example is Hustle Panda’s sign-up form that pops up every time you scroll to the end of a page. It’s the perfect timing because people are more likely to sign up for an email list after they’ve viewed the entire page and gotten value from your website.

When you include opt-in forms on multiple site pages, you need to track the conversion rate of every online form, so you can determine efficacy. According to CampaignMonitor, some opt-in forms have a conversion rate of up to 10%. By tracking this metric, you’ll know where to double up your efforts.

3. Ensure Your Copy Is Compelling

According to Forbes, the average person checks their email 15 times a day.  But, just because people are more inclined to check their emails is not an excuse to send your audience low-quality content. If you want to do email marketing correctly, you’ll have to take writing email copy seriously.

To truly engage with your readers, create copy that connects with them emotionally and helps them fulfill their greatest desires. It could be a sense of belonging, status, earning more money, or getting better at a particular craft. Ensure your copy offers real value to readers so they will anticipate your email offering.

“Quality over quantity—Emails may be cost-efficient, but it’s no excuse to not produce quality content to give to a targeted audience.”

– Benjamin Murray

The ideal copy for your target audience is copy that resonates with them in their everyday language. Make sure every point you make is clear and easy to understand. Since readers skim emails, keeping your copy under 150 words using actionable language can provide the desired effect.

Wool and Gang, a fashion company, creates a feeling of belonging in their emails by making readers feel like they’re part of a community. Their emails often make recipients feel like they belong to a larger movement, regardless of their level of expertise. This approach has a compelling effect.

4. Ensure Your Email CTA is Enticing

Calls to action (CTAs)  in emails are like keys determining whether your prospect will open the door and make a purchase. However, most businesses ignore the power of enticing email CTAs because they’ve put a lot of effort into writing the copy and designing the form. Experiment with generic  CTAs like “Click Here” or “Buy Now,” and specific CTAs like “Show Me How” and “Choose The Perfect Look,” to see what works best for your audience.

Although email marketing CTAs increase clicks by 371% and sales by 1617%, you still have to be creative so your customers can be excited to sign up. You can use email call-to-action best practices to ensure the language is engaging, conversational, and straightforward. Including a call to action in emails will increase your mailing list sign-up and boost revenue.

Budgenista, a brand committed to financial education, uses an unconventional CTA tagged “I Want My Goodies.” The language is catchy and suits her target audience.

5. Offer Something In Exchange

The eyes of an average person light up at the sight of freebies. The way to get someone’s personal information, (especially since they’re already bombarded with daily emails,) is to offer something in return. You can create a lead magnet like a free guide,e-book, or an upgrade to gain email sign-ups. However, ensure that your lead magnet is related to the product or service your business offers so you can convert loyal customers.

For example, Flywheel offers users access to helpful e-books to improve their knowledge of web design. This way, they make it compelling for users to provide their email without a second thought.

6. Simplify Your Form Fields

You need a form field to capture your subscriber’s name and email address. However, there are some cases where you need more information, so you customize your product or service to suit your customer’s needs. It’s better to make the sign-up process as smooth and simple as possible.

According to WPForms, you can boost conversion rate by 26% by removing as little as one form field. Customers hate filling out long forms and prefer something quick and simple. Make sure your form fields are clear, easy to understand, and your lead magnet provides more value than the information you’re asking for. This way, you gain quality leads with the forms you create.

Here’s an example of Gymshark’s form field that offers a seamless email sign-up process:

7. Improve Email Signups with Dedicated Landing Pages

If you want to increase your email sign-ups, then creating a landing page to grow your email list is one way to achieve this. It ensures that the email sign-up  is hitch-free for prospects without them worrying about any distractions. There are different email marketing software that makes it easy for you to create a landing page with a form with little to no technical knowledge. HubSpot Landing Page Builder is a perfect example.

Airbnb remains a dedicated brand that uses interesting landing pages with compelling copy and design to gain customer data.

8. Promote Your Email List on Social Media

Social media is an effective channel to help you create buzz around your email list. Although some platforms (i.e.  Pinterest and Twitter) make it difficult for prospects to sign up for your email list,, you can still find your way around. Adding links  to your social media bio or post can help you gain new email subscribers and grow your list.

If you’ve invested in creating engaging email content, you can also share snippets on your account so your followers can get an idea of what you share. This allows your social media followers to decide if it’s an excellent fit for them, and opt in to your email list. Another way is to get industry experts and influencers to share a link to your landing page with your email sign-up.

Katelyn Bourgoin shared a link to Wynter’s landing page on LinkedIn so those within the marketing niche could earn a side income by participating in marketing research. This helped the company gain more email sign-ups within its target niche.

9. Use Exit-Intent Pop-Ups

This technique helps you identify when visitors are leaving your website so you can allow them to re-engage with your content using pop-ups. A pop-up email sign-up form helps reduce your bounce rate (or, the number of people who leave your website without taking action, and never return).

Instead of watching visitors abandon your site, you can create a website pop-up so that they can subscribe to a different channel. This way, they’ll still be interacting with your brand. CoSchedule uses this approach to schedule a demo whenever users are about to leave the platform.

10. Split Test Your Forms

Split or A/B testing is a practical approach that allows you to analyze the performance of different versions of your forms to determine which will perform better. Some of your audience will get one version of the form, while others will get another version. Once the test is done, you’ll see the version which converts better so you can keep showing it to your audience.

A/B testing saves you from trial and error. Instead, you can upload your forms and landing pages with the confidence that they’ll convert better.

11. Create a Quiz

Creating a quiz to increase email sign-ups can be tricky, especially since you have to get it right. However, with an engaging quiz, visitors can learn more about themselves and also have fun. With a quiz, you can gain more information about your customers without the intimidation of lengthy forms.

Quizzes are quite common. You’ll find them in most free personality testing platforms. From a more business-inclined perspective, Moz SEO makes the most out of quizzes. In their15-minute quiz, Moz engages users and collects personal information in the process while helping them assess their knowledge of SEO and recommending solutions based on their responses to the quiz.

Quite engaging for the users, and rewarding for the brand.

12. Host a Giveaway

Hosting a giveaway is a double-edged sword. It can either work for you or against you. Since people get excited at winning free stuff, they may want to subscribe because of the giveaway, rather than your company offering.

Avoid promising items like cars, phones, or laptops to gain email sign-ups. It will help you gain subscribers fast, but most of them will never buy your products. Offer your prospects low-prized services to ensure your offering is related to your brand, and to increase the likelihood of their patronage.

Teachable does a great job at hosting giveaways. The education company offers new users30-day free access to its platform. In exchange, the new users have to provide some personal information (including an email address and name).

Also, HubSpot does something similar. HubSpot offers free marketing templates (i.e. this Sales Plan Template). In exchange, the inbound marketing company collects some personal information from its users.

Growing an Email List Isn’t Easy…

Growing your mailing list is no walk in the park. It’s hard work that takes time, and the results will only show with time and effort. However, if you’re committed to using email marketing as a channel to gain leads, and convert visitors into customers, then you should go through these strategies and try to implement them on your own. Think long-term to gain the results you truly desire.