Alyson Lex 0:00
On today's episode, we're answering the question, How do I engage my new leads once they opt into my email list? The big question is this as entrepreneurs, coaches and business owners, how do we consistently sell our products, programs and services without making our customers feel like we're only in it for the almighty dollar? How do we serve the way we know we're meant to serve and still run a profitable business? How do we put good into the world while we put dollars into our pockets? How do we change the lives of our community while also bettering the life

Jennie Wright 0:34
we lead? It's not a zero sum game. It's not an either or scenario, it is possible to thrive while serving your clients to the best of your ability. This podcast will show you how. I'm Jennie Wright.

Alyson Lex 0:47
I'm Alyson Lex,

Jennie Wright 0:49
and welcome to the System to THRIVE. Congrats, you've either just finished a list build event, or you've just seen an influx of new subscribers into your email list. or potentially you're planning your next list build event. And right now you're thinking about how am I going to get to know these people? How am I going to engage with them? And what do I do with them once they're on my list.

Alyson Lex 1:13
So the goal here is to be front of mind and stay front of mind. After you finish a list build event or you build your email list, there's a really big opportunity to just kind of forget about your people, right, and not engage them in the right way. So that they're kind of follow there with you. We want them with you. We do that with connecting with them consistently and in the right way. We don't want to come on too hard. We don't want to be that crazy stalker girl. We want to connect with them in the way that they need to build that. And I really do kind of hate this phrase the know like and trust factor, mainly because it's so overused. But I can't think of a better way to

Jennie Wright 1:58
deeper connection relationship building a relationship,

Alyson Lex 2:01
we want to build that relationship with them, the first thing that you have to do is understand the state of mind that your brand new lead is in a little bit unsure, maybe they're not really sure what you're all about what they can expect from you, they may have been signed up for other people who promise to not take them for granted. And they do you're competing with for attention with all the other emails in their inbox, always remember that. And they're not 100% sold on you yet. They they opted in for whatever you're giving them. We'll talk about that in a minute. But they're not really sure that they want to follow you. They're not raving fans yet. But what they have done is they've just raised their hand, they've said, I have the problem that you say you solve, hopefully they've gotten value, or they've gotten value from what you promised you would deliver to them, that will actually go a really long way in building that relationship. Because if you deliver the value that you promise, you're known now for keeping your promises, you've broken through one of those first barriers, and which is getting them to kind of buy in to the fact that you're the real deal.

Jennie Wright 3:25
How you connect with your leads, depends on how they came into your list. There's no point in sending the same generic information to every single person. Because we've all come in in different ways. You don't send the same email to the person who came in from a webinar as the person who came in from the summit, the communication style has to be a little bit different depending on what they came in through. So we're gonna talk about that for a little bit. Because I think that's really interesting. And there's different styles, a list building events that you may have done, or you might do in the future, like summits and challenges, webinars and panels, giveaways, workshops, one day events, those are cool. And they've just gotten a ton of information from you by participating in one of those lists and styles. And as a result of receiving all of that information, you can't revert back, you can't like step it back and go into like the mini informational email. If you do that, they're going to feel a little bit of whiplash, don't you think? And you have to keep that level of delivering higher quality content and information to them, so that you maintain being front of mind as soon as you feel in their minds that you've lost some relevancy. They're off to find the person that fills the gap. So you have to remember that they've gotten to know you a little bit they may not know you, you know Allison was talking about this earlier. They may not know you a time that might be a little bit cautious. We're still waiting for that transfer of credibility on to you where you become their person their go to, for all things for what you talk about in your niche. And you got to remember, if you're like Alison and I, you're probably following 20, or even 30 different people in your niche, and you're getting emails from them and content from you're getting bombarded. So you need to be able to stand out to that person, and you want them to be in their head, like, I don't really need to follow those 20 or 30 people. And also, and I have done that, where we've been following all these people were like, yeah, you know what their message really isn't that like, worth it for me anymore. It doesn't feel great. I'm not hearing from them consistently. And when I do, it's just a sales pitch. So I'm out, unsubscribe, right. So you have to absolutely have to remember, these people are just still getting to know you. And they're a little further along than someone who's maybe downloaded a PDF or responded in some way to an ad on Facebook or wherever you have your ads up, there is a way that you can invite them to join you perhaps with like a scheduled Facebook live, to watch an in depth in depth training that you might do. Something that relates to the list build they just participated in is key. So when the summit the challenge, that webinar, when those all end, going back to just a weekly, brief emails, not the way to go, look at creating something with a little bit more higher value, have something which like, you know, here, watch this training, you know, I was just describing it a little bit, or check out this video I did, or Hey, this podcast just came out. This is relevant, because it you know, it talks about what we just went through together. And you have to relate back to that experience, right. So I think that's really important.

Alyson Lex 6:30
I think it's also really important to note too, and I just thought of this, if you're doing a summit, or five or seven day challenge, or something that has a bit of time to it, these people are used to getting an email from you every single day. And there, there's kind of a fine line here, because we're starting to train them to look for our emails every day. But we're also kind of hitting them up a lot. And what we don't want to do is burn them out. But we don't want to drop all the way back to once a week because now we have them where we want them looking for our stuff on a regular basis. So thinking about not just kind of the state of mind that we talked about a moment ago, but also thinking about the actions that they've been taking to interact with you, I think is going to be really important moving forward.

Jennie Wright 7:25
This is and I just want to interject this one thing, because I just thought of it as well. This is how we roll. This is an amazing opportunity to use your segmentation, tagging and automation to your benefit. And we're going to talk about this more deeply in another episode for sure. But this is where you could say, okay, for the next two weeks, these people are going to be on an I mean, you can call it an advanced email schedule where they're getting two emails per week. And you can preset that up in an automation and Active Campaign, saying everybody with the tag webinar, oh four is going to get this automation for the next two weeks. And when that automation is done, then they get dropped into your regular email automation. And then they're receiving your once a week, informational email until you're you know, perhaps promoting something, what a great opportunity to use those features and Active Campaign or whatever email marketing provider you use, to help keep that connection going. And the fact that you can pre plan it before.

And the other thing and Allison was already thinking this because I see the brain going, you could reuse that automation, with other list build events that you do, just changing up the details.

Alyson Lex 8:38
Of course, I never liked to write copy for just one thing ever. Okay. So you also are going to be doing regular and ongoing promotions. Because we've talked about this, you should always be promoting your business and growing your list. We talked about this in Episode Six, we're probably going to talk about it again in Episode 20. And again, in Episode 31. This is a thing. It's not just building your list is not just a sometimes activity. This is where we put that into action. So you have your list of events, your summits, your challenges, your workshops. The other list build options that you have are things like your podcast guest appearances, where you offer them a PDF download. Maybe you have a quiz or a short video training, something that is a little bit less intensive than your list build event. These guys who have opted in for that they've gotten just a teeny tiny taste of you. They they don't really have the experience but someone who's been through a challenge has. Yeah, they don't, they don't know you as well. They haven't spent that time with you. And so they need to be warmed up a bit more. Now is not the time to ask them to spend four hours with you. Heck, no, no, no, no going from five minutes to read a PDF or three minutes to take a quiz to a $6,000 12. week course. It's not going to work. No,

Jennie Wright 10:13
we always relate this to dating when Allison and I were We were giggling about this last night we were talking about, we're relating this to Tinder, which neither one of us have used because we, you know, we were already in relationships. But

Alyson Lex 10:24
what Tinder was a thing? Yeah. No,

Jennie Wright 10:27
I've never even used it. But I understand the concept of it. And we were talking about this, like we didn't even get, you know, people don't even get to swipe right on this thing. Like when you're when people, if you're trying to go from just getting to know you from a downloadable PDF, and then you're trying to push your 4000 or $6,000 course, you haven't given that person, any time to talk to you to plan that first day and all that kind of stuff. Allison's better

Alyson Lex 10:50
with metaphors. So all they've done is swipe. I don't even know if it's left or right. I'm gonna pendens. Right? Done is swipe right. So they've swiped right. That's their opt in. They're swiping Right. Yeah. And you can't go from swipe right to marriage proposal. Yeah. Right, we've got to go to the coffee shop. First, you might be able to get dinner, but coffee is a more sure bet. And so you're going to give them content that's a little bit deeper than what you gave them in your lead magnet. And then you're going to give them content. After that, that's a little bit deeper, and content after that, that's a little bit deeper. Maybe if you if you've done the summit, you can repurpose an episode an interview, if you have a podcast, send them to an episode that relates to what they downloaded, get them to just engage with you spend a little bit more time with you.

Jennie Wright 11:42
And that, and I like that, because it's not super intense, right. And it allows for the relationship to develop with Shaklee. You know, you can invite them to a short Facebook Live that you do, maybe you have a weekly Facebook Live show that you do invite them to Yeah, really good like that. Because they're, they're seeing you live on a regular basis, it trains them to show up, it shows them that you're, you know, you show up, which is another big thing. And it allows them to get to know you and that aspect, I like that. If you have a Facebook group that you're trying to grow like a Facebook community that you're trying to grow, you can invite them to join that and talk about the benefits of why that would make sense to them. After they've downloaded their PDF, or whatever they've just participated in with you, it has to be in alignment. So if they've just downloaded a PDF about how to measure their macros, so that they can, you know, lose weight, the Facebook group should not be you know, like high fat baking cupcakes,

Alyson Lex 12:40
Facebook or like,

Jennie Wright 12:42
make it work, you know, it's gonna work. The other really good way to create that connection is to ask them to fill out a short survey. I love surveys. I know I'll say this, too.

Alyson Lex 12:52
I love them. There's so much fun.

Jennie Wright 12:54
And Allison taught me that a really great way to get people to fill out a survey is to bribe them with something ethical bribe, obviously, you could bribe them with something, you could give them something really short and sweet. Awesome. What

Alyson Lex 13:05
would you recommend? So let's say they downloaded a PDF. Yeah. And we want them to fill out a survey, I might offer them a video training that complements that PDF, if they fill out the survey. I like that simple.

Jennie Wright 13:20
Yeah, easy peasy. You know, the other thing is getting them to reply to a question in the email. Now, you're gonna find that that is not as successful as some of the other methods that we're talking about. Because it's a bit more like it's passive to click a link and watch a live, it's possible to go join a Facebook group, like it's just click a link. And, you know, filling out a survey takes a little bit more time. But hitting reply to an email and providing an answer seems intimate. Oh, yeah, that's very true. Yeah. And so you're gonna find that if your expectation is, is that you've just added, you know, during the course of whatever list building event or through your regular activities, you know, if you're asking your 25 new people to hit reply, and let you know how they feel about something, you might get one or two. But if you ask them to watch a Facebook Live, you might get seven or 10. And to join a Facebook group, you might get half. Right? So that's just the, you know, at the same with the survey, you might get

Alyson Lex 14:13
five,

Jennie Wright 14:14
right? It just depends on the level of participation you're asking them to do. That's the result you're going to get. The other thing that you can do, which I like to do in my my list really likes and Alison's learned this about my list is my list likes to get to know me. And they like stories about me. And they want people to they want to understand who I am as a person. And they want me to say things like, hey, I've experienced x Have you? Is this you? Do you get it? Does it hit home for you? Does it resonate? Are you on board with this? Like they love when I asked questions like that? Because then they're like, yeah, that's me to

Alyson Lex 14:52
God, that sucks.

Jennie Wright 14:53
Let's fix together like they just that you know what I mean? Like that's kind of like not feeling alone. Let's go band arms up and go fix the problem. And that really works for a lot of people. And it might work in your niche as well.

Alyson Lex 15:07
I'm going to interrupt you and just kind of break in with a little coffee lesson. You're not alone. That phrase is so powerful, because people inherently want to be part of something bigger than themselves. And if you can show them, hey, you're not alone. In fact, my community is full of people just like you. Yeah, I've helped people through this. I've got you.

Jennie Wright 15:32
Oh, yeah. And you don't have to say those exact words. But if you can create that feeling, yeah, totally, if you can create the feeling in your copy in your email. And if you can't write a video, let's just be honest, you have, you know, please, please do video. The other thing is sharing your life. Honestly, I did a post not too long ago, where I posted a picture that I had my experience, my

Alyson Lex 15:57
parents my witness collection.

Jennie Wright 15:59
So I'm left handed. So as Alison. And when I was learning to bake and cook, I was using whatever utensils my mom had, and she had purchased this wooden spoon at this art festival. And it was made for right handed people. So it had like a curve in the spoon. And I couldn't use it because it was curved for right handed people. And if I tried to use it, the back of the spoon was facing me not going to work. So my mom actually bought me a left handed spoon where it was curved for left handed person and I've been hooked ever since. Now, I took a picture of my spoons, because they regularly have to be oiled and I'm going off on a tangent, but they have to be oil, there's a reason go look at my Facebook post, you'll see it and scroll back if you have to. So you oil them up and everything. Now this post took off. It did, because people were like, wow, this is something private of Jenny, this is something you know, we don't often see if Jenny, Jenny doesn't do that kind of stuff, post a very much, but people want to see it. And it was great to see, you know, it's great to have that connection. And you guys can use something similar as well. You know, maybe it's taking your dog for a walk or going out on a boat, or decorating cupcakes with your child, your niece, your grandchild, you know, things outside of your business that humanize you. People want to see that. So you can include that sparingly, but included in your building of that know like and trust factor that we're talking about. And it's important, you know, this stuff is as important for your entire list as it is for the people who've gone through a list build for you. So make sure you're doing this on a consistent basis. It's important for your list to know you as a person, and not just a solution

Alyson Lex 17:40
provider. It's really important because and I will say this until I'm blue in the face, people buy from people and discussion, I'm more likely to pay more to buy something from someone I like, than to buy from someone that I just can't stand, or I don't know, or I don't know, right? I'm very happy. I mean, very happy to support the people that I know and care about.

Jennie Wright 18:08
You're very honest about the fact that you're like the crazy cat lady. And you get people who are like, Oh, I like you know, they identify with that. And they connect with that because they have a pet or maybe they like cats to whatever it is.

Alyson Lex 18:21
And there's actually two Animal Rescue like I do, or they just think animals are awesome. Or they like watching looking at cat pictures on Instagram, I don't know. But by being myself by showcasing that part of me, the quirky I don't take myself too seriously. I mean, I have a planter on my desk with sunglasses on it. And a succulent that looks like hair. Like I don't take myself that seriously. And that helps people connect to me because they get to know me. Another thing you really want to do is make sure that your people know what to expect from you. And this is really important after your like your call it the mini list building efforts, right when you have your PDF, lead magnet or you're on a podcast or whatever, because they haven't gotten that chance to get to know you. They don't necessarily know what to expect on an ongoing basis. And so letting them know how you're going to fulfill those promises that you've made. showing them how you're going to show up. Let them know how often you're going to email them. Make them feel like they know what's going to happen now that you have their information, because email inboxes can be very private. Personal places.

Jennie Wright 19:37
Oh yeah, for sure.

Alyson Lex 19:39
Now mine. So I have a couple email inboxes I have my email that I created when I was 16. That's kind of become the repository for all the spam in the world. And that one is just kind of whatever. But when it comes to a business email address, that thing is kind of like a guard Don't sign up lightly. Oh, no,

Jennie Wright 20:02
it's sacrosanct. I know it is.

Alyson Lex 20:04
Let them know what to expect from you. Let them know how often they're going to hear from you. The next way that people are going to potentially get onto your email list. And this is a way that I utilize a lot. I'm not sure about you, I think it's more My thing is really, that's more than it is more you're networking. I'm working as a love or hate kind of thing. Like you either love networking, or you think it's the worst thing in the world.

Jennie Wright 20:30
I'm a little too introverted for it at times, I can be convinced it's the right thing. And then once I'm there, and I'm over the initial, there's a lot of people in this room and you know, they're staring at me or whatever, I'm fine. And I mean, I can get my game face on, and I'm good. But getting me to agree to go to a networking event takes a little bit of persuasion, trust, being

Alyson Lex 20:53
fully aware, actually. runners, like come to this event with me, you're like, NAB, good,

Jennie Wright 21:00
I'm good. Now watch the recordings. Thanks.

Alyson Lex 21:03
I'm like the record, I don't even go to the sessions. It's all about the network. Anyway, so when you meet people in person, even online, when you're in a networking situation, you already have that more personal connection with them. You've had a conversation with them.

Jennie Wright 21:20
Yeah. Now, this isn't the time this is pre COVID times

Alyson Lex 21:24
three COVID is pre COVID. So when you first connect with them, it should be personal communication. And if I was writing that it would be an all caps, personal communication, I don't mean through an autoresponder. I don't mean, copied and pasted, hand typed, send a note card, if you have too personal in that personal communication, you can invite them to join your webinar, to check out your PDF download, to opt in for your summit, any of those things. And then they can drop into the sequence that you've already set up based on what we talked about previously. Okay. It's not the same, to go collect cards at an event and throw them into a lead magnet sequence. You have to have a personal connection. First. That's a huge mistake people make huge I cannot Well, the first mistake that people make it events, I could do a whole episode on this, I probably should. I have been to huge events where I've talked to so many people, and I get next to no follow up. People that I have spoken to about potentially purchasing their services have not followed up with me. Crazy. That's crazy. And the ones that do send me some boring, automated message, I have one person in mind. He works for a payment processing company. And I remember the conversation that I had with him it was over three years ago.

Wow, memory,

oh my god. It's not because he followed up with a personal email that referenced what we talked about, asked me to keep him posted on how it was going and mentioned if I had anybody to refer to him, that he would always be available for questions. That's cool. I have referred probably 15 people over the last three years to him.

Jennie Wright 23:22
Oh my gosh, so he did it right. And as a result, he got business. Yeah, he got business as a result. So that's the right way to do it. I like

Alyson Lex 23:30
throw me into an automated funnel. It was personal, it was direct. So I just really thought that that was important to bring up. Because people do tend to do that wrong when they're networking and meeting people, and then one on one with conversation.

Jennie Wright 23:46
And you can use that same technique when it comes to online networking, like, and I've noticed this with people who do Facebook Lives events. So if you do, there was a summit that I just did for a client recently, where he did breakout rooms, like networking rooms, where people could connect about the thing that he offered. And each networking room had about 10 people max in it. And the whole point was to get to know people who were, you know, in a similar field, etc. And as an observer, an external observer of what was happening. There was a lot of people like yeah, that's so cool. Oh, you do this? Oh, that's really, really cool. We should connect, we should connect. And then we actually sent out a survey saying Did you kind of connect with the people that you were in the breakout room with? The majority of people said no, they just were saying it and they didn't connect. What a lost opportunity that is, you know, the same thing goes with if you're on a Facebook Live, like you're doing a Facebook Live, and you've got people who were interacting with you, and like oh, that's really cool. I'd love to know more. You should absolutely be going back to those comments and saying, Yeah, absolutely is you know, if you'd like I could send you my such and such or, you know, we can connect through dm and I'll make sure you get a copy of This or, yeah, I'll send you that article, no problem, make sure you do the follow up. Right. And I think that's a big thing. I think it's really important.

Alyson Lex 25:07
I think it's really kind of interesting that we've, we've almost added a definition to list building your email list, your list is not just these automated leads that come in through your lead magnet or list builder events. It's also potential jayvees, potential relationships, potential clients that you've met one on one social followers that have interacted and engaged with you more than others. Sure. So those are all assets in your business and should be taken care of, in the same way that you take care of the people that opt in for your PDFs, or your summits or your challenges. Absolutely. That's

Jennie Wright 25:51
just the first step. Everything you do after that is the big deal. It's It's not hard to get people to join your email list. Let's just be honest, it's not that hard. What's really hard is to keep them centered, keep them focused on you. Get them through the next step, and have them see you as the person of credibility that they need to be following. And that reminds me very well about the fact that we absolutely have a download that's going to help you with this process.

Alyson Lex 26:19
Yes, I totally forgot. I was so into this conversation,

Jennie Wright 26:24
it's actually turned into an amazing conversation. We've actually, if you don't know Allison and I very well yet, we create an outline for every single episode. So we know what our talking points are going to be. As opposed to just having like a you know, riffing off on a conversation. We've gone off a little bit today, because we've really like we've had an opportunity to, to dive into some new topics, which is great. But I'd be remiss if I didn't tell you about this download, which I think is very good and very valuable. And you can get it by going to System to thrive.com, forward slash 10. And that's the numeral 10, one zero, so that you can grab this download, this download is actually going to help you a lot when it comes to connecting with your brand new leads. So we've got a whole slew of things in there of resources that are going to get you to exactly what we were just talking about. Staying in front of mind connecting with them how you're going to do it, lots of information. And we're we're tossing in a couple of bonuses in there, and you'll see them in there that are going to really make some difference. So go check it out. It's your new lead connection workbook System to thrive.com. forward slash 10 to grab it, and it's all yours. All right, thank you so much for being on with us. We've had an incredible conversation. Thanks for being here, and we'll be back with another big question next time. Thanks again for watching or listening to this podcast. We hope we've answered some of your big questions today. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast anywhere you're listening and leave us a review.

Alyson Lex 27:55
Also, make sure you've checked out the thrive collaborative podcast community, our Facebook group for listeners and entrepreneurs find us on Facebook or online at System to thrive.com