What are you giving to your readers in exchange for their email address? Getting your weekly newsletter is not enough of a reason for someone to sign up. Don’t worry! I’ve been there, which is why I’m diving into how to a choose a lead magnet that creates an audience not just a one and done pageview.
IE 68: How to Choose a Lead Magnet
Before we start talking about lead magnets, I want to invite you all to join me on Tuesday mornings at 11:00 EST for my Facebook lives. During the live, you can get your questions answered live and also get a shout out for your blog which ends up on the podcast! If you aren’t currently joining us on Tuesday mornings, please come on over to my Facebook page and participate with the awesome group of women who meet me over there every week.
Do I Really Need a Lead Magnet?
With all of the crazy algorithm changes that are taking place in the online world, it is more important than ever for you to be growing your email list. But growing your email list means that you need an awesome, high-quality lead magnet to draw people in. And if there’s one thing that scares bloggers, it’s coming up with a lead magnet.
Every week I have food bloggers say to me, “But Jenny, I never plan on selling products so why do I need an email list?”
I go back to the algorithms for the answer. You can no longer depend on Facebook or any other online platform to drive traffic to your site. You need to take the people who do end up on your site and you need to convert them to subscribers. Why? Because if you ever plan to monetize in any way, you must have a list to sell to.
Lead Magnet K.I.S.S. – Keep It Simple…Somewhat
When you start to create your amazing lead magnet, I want you to keep it simple…to an extent.
In previous episodes of the podcast, I have talked about options for lead magnets, including things like cheat sheets, checklists, swipe copies of an email series, etc. Your lead magnet shouldn’t be an overwhelming amount of content. If your lead magnet is a 100-page ebook, you might want to rethink that.
People want valuable information when they give you their email address but they don’t want to have hours of reading ahead of them. You want to organize the information you share into manageable, bite-sized chunks. Your lead magnet should be solving a specific problem for the reader. Don’t create a cookbook from every recipe on your site and give that as your lead magnet. It’s too much and it doesn’t solve a problem.
Use Your Data to Create Your Lead Magnet
Remember in the movie, Field of Dreams with Kevin Costner, how he says, “If you build it, they will come.” That only works in movies, guys. Not in blogging.
You have to use the data you have to know what to create. Look at your Google analytics and see which of your posts are already driving traffic. Listen, you have audience members that are already coming to your site for specific content.
What has Google decided that you’re an expert in and so they’re sending people to your site for answers to their questions? What are you ranking in Google for? Once you know what you rank for, create a lead magnet that relates to that topic. Provide tons of value and begin to think about a possible product related to that.
While we’re talking about this, let me give you something to not do. I have a client, Morgan, who does simple crafts and easy recipes for moms and their kids over at Morgan Manages Mommyhood. But when she first started blogging, she wrote this post on hand-lettering. The post went viral but it isn’t something she likes to do. She was getting tons of traffic from this post but she never planned to write anything about it again.
So if you have a post that gets crazy traffic but you don’t plan to focus on that topic for your blog, don’t create a lead magnet having to do with it.
Ask Your Audience to Create Your Lead Magnet
I wish I could tell you how often people say to me, “Jenny, I can’t ask my audience. I don’t even know who my audience is.”
Okay, you guys…you have a Facebook page. You have an Instagram account. You have access to the people who follow you. You can send a welcome email sequence to your subscribers. When you email them, ask them to reply and tell you their biggest struggle. If your lead magnet isn’t exactly where you want it to be in terms of quality or content, hearing from your readers will help you narrow down ideas to make it better.
You have to talk to your audience. If you have a Facebook page for your blog, which you should, use it to engage your followers. Facebook isn’t showing posts that attempt to drive traffic but they are prioritizing posts that encourage engagement. So engage!
Begin with the Product in Mind when Creating your Lead Magnet
Believe it or not, some of us know exactly what we were put on this earth to do. Maybe you were just made to be a health coach. Maybe you were born to be a teacher or a writer.
Let’s go with the health coach example. If that’s what you want to sell, coaching services, you need to create a lead magnet that goes along with that. You want to start getting your audience in line for your services. Whether you want to sell a service or a physical product, create a lead magnet that is the first step of the process so that as your audience works through it, they will naturally want to buy your product at the end.
What Do You Want to Be Known for?
What are you passionate about? When I started my Jenny Melrose business, I knew that sponsored posts were what I wanted to be known for. They are my jam. I am passionate about them and about helping other bloggers learn how to be successful with them.
The reason I can so easily speak to the needs and the pain points of bloggers who are trying to get sponsored posts is that I have been there myself. I don’t have some magic in my head that allows me to get in your head and know what you’re struggling with. It’s just that I am doing what I talk about. I know what it’s like to try to convince my husband that this blogging thing is a real thing that I can make money doing.
It’s easier for you to write about things you know and that you’re in the thick of. Ask yourself that…what are you in the middle of right now? And don’t fret if it takes you a while to figure this out. Try things until something sticks. And when something does stick, figure out why it did and repeat it.
If you feel like you aren’t making progress as a blogger…if you have ever called yourself, “just a blogger”…if you want to level up in your business…be sure to listen to the episode I did on Becoming an Influencer Entrepreneur. This episode tells you how to work your business, how to target your audience, how to grow that audience, and more.
I’m here to help you grow your business so feel free to ask your questions in the comments below or come on over to the Facebook page and get to know other bloggers like you!
Action Steps:
- If you liked this episode of Influencer Entrepreneurs, please subscribe and leave a fabulous review!
- Mark your calendar for the weekly free trainings every Tuesday at 11am EST over on Jenny’s Facebook page.
- Join the conversation on Instagram by using the hashtag #WWJMD and tagging Jenny when you’re listening to the podcast. She’ll send you a personal message whenever you tag her.
