Build your list! Create a lead magnet! It’s the rallying cry of courses and memberships teaching online business.
It’s not bad advice. It is true: the best way to build an engaged email list of subscribers who know, like and trust you is to offer them an amazing piece of free content and then add them to your list where they can continue to get to know you.
What is a lead magnet? And what makes a good lead magnet?
Great lead magnets, also called freebies, are something really valuable that your audience would love to have, but doesn’t cost them anything. In order to get the amazing free “thing” you’re offering, they need to give you their email address.
Here’s an example of one of my lead magnets: All the Things You Need to Grow a List: Your Tech Roadmap
Keys to Creating a Lead Magnet:
Good lead magnets are:
- Fast to create for you
- A quick win for your new subscriber
- Tremendously valuable
- In alignment with your future offers
Effective lead magnets should be two things… a quick win for your new subscriber as well as quick and easy to create for you.
When considering what type of lead magnet to create, remember that people are busy. The last thing you want them to do is to download your digital freebie, take one look at it and think, “Oh, I don’t have time for this now, I’ll just save it for later.” For most people, later never comes and your freebie hangs out in their downloads folder or on their desktop to die a forgotten death. This means things like long video series and entire e-books don’t usually make a good lead magnet. More is NOT better when it comes to your free content.
You want your new subscriber to get a quick win that brings them back looking for more. At the same time, you don’t want to spend a long time creating that freebie. Two days tops to put together the content and get it edited or designed. Choose something you can do easily but that will also be really valuable.
When considering what type of lead magnet you want to offer keep the end in mind. Any freebie you create should be in alignment with whatever you hope to sell to your list down the line. You only want to attract people to your list who will be enticed by what you have to sell. Offering a freebie that is useful to your audience but has nothing to do with what you plan to sell later on will fill your list with people who will not buy from you.
What Makes a Good Freebie
There are many different types of things you can offer, here are some examples of lead magnets that work well:
- Printable freebie: Think lists. Grocery lists, tech checklists, roadmaps, etc. If you’re a creative, maybe you have a pattern, a planner or a shopping guide for materials.
- Freebie planner: A little more in-depth, planners can help people fill in information they’ll need that might lead to working with you. My launch planner is a good example. Even though it’s long, they can start filling it in immediately to realize the value.
- Digital freebies: Meditations, video tutorials, templates for services they may need to use if they work with you or use your services.
How to Create a Lead Magnet
Lead magnets and freebies can be created in a number of ways that are quick, easy and inexpensive. If you’re creating a checklist, a planner or a printable freebie, you could use Canva.com. It’s free and the number of lead magnet templates is amazing.
Audios or videos can be created using free software that is on your computer, or even your phone. Upload the files to YouTube, Dropbox or Amazon S3 to give your subscribers access. Just remember that you still need the quality to be professional or you could give a bad first impression.
Creating an effective freebie or lead magnet is one of the first steps you’ll take with your online business and it’s one of the tasks you’ll come back to over and over again. Most businesses have several freebies available to download on their sites. So don’t worry about getting it perfect the first time. Get it out there, see how it’s received and then tweak it as necessary or try something new. Quick and easy is the name of the game for freebies and lead magnets. Get them done, and get them out there.
You can hear more about lead magnets and some ideas for using them in the video below.
Want to get the freebie I talked about in the video? Click here!
