30 Email Opt-In Incentives To Grow A Mailing List In 2021

AD Affiliate/Own Products | Email marketing is one of the best ways to monetise as a blogger. You’ll often hear the phrase ‘the money is in the list’ because quite frankly it is. One of the hardest things people find with email marketing is actually growing a mailing list. Why I won’t necessarily be covering that in this post, I do have a freebie coming to my Gumroad store titled Email Marketing: How I Grew My Mailing List To 14K Subscribers which will.

In this post I’ll be covering 30 Email Opt-Ins To Grow A Mailing List In 2021. Email opt-ins are a great way to get more sign ups, but they aren’t the only strategy you should be using to grow your mailing list.

Why You Should Be Growing A Mailing List

As a blogger you’ll be thinking of monetising your content in the long run. Mailing lists are a very popular way for bloggers to monetise, as you can grow and start making money from your mailing list almost instantly.

A mailing list gives you a platform to actively speak to and make a relationship with your readers. It’s also a list that you own. For example Instagram, Twitter or any other social platform can be shut down at any point, you don’t own the content. This isn’t something that will happen with a mailing list.

Why You Need To Be Using Opt-In Incentives

I don’t know who needs to hear this but just having a sign-up box that says, “Join my newsletter” won’t get the amount of signups you want, unless you have really high traffic it might not get you any signups at all. At most you’ll probably only get a handful of new subscribers this way. If you’re looking to grow your list you’ll need to do more.

What you need is a lead magnet/ opt-in incentive. This is something that the person signing up receives for signing up to your mailing list. An incentive doesn’t need to be something big, it can be something small like a check list or a page of content ideas.

How To Decide What Opt-In To Create

Your opt-in needs to be tailored to your niche, and your audience. You want top provide a valuable asset to your readers, so you not only need to know WHY your audience come to your blog but your demographic too. The more information you can gather on your readers and why they come to your blog, the better your opt-in will be.

In this section of the post I’ll be telling you sure fire ways to decided what opt-ins to create for your mailing list.

Google Analytics

As a blogger Google Analytics is going to be your best friend. It’s the best and most reliable way to check your blogging statistic. Using your google analytics account you’ll be able to find your most popular post, your most popular searched items and where your traffic comes from. This will tell you exactly the posts you need to create opt-ins for. Then you can brainstorm what you’d like to create.

Example: If your top and most searched for post is a blogging content ideas post, then creating a free check list for content, or a page of 100 content ideas might be a great opt-in ideas.

Pinterest & Pinterest Trends

If you’re not using Pinterest to bring to traffic to your blog, then you need to start. Pinterest can be a bloggers best friend, but it can take a really long time to see constant results. It’s worth mentioning that not all niches perform the same on Pinterest and you may not have content which will hit off on Pinterest.

Pinterest trends is a tool that allows you to see the trending content for the main niches on Pinterest, you can see the trends for the UK, US & Canada. Creating Opt-in content to fit these trends, with relevant or new fitting blog content means that if you have a pin go ‘viral’ you can divert lots of people to your mailing list.

I successfully did this last summer when I had a ‘meal ideas for isolation’ pin go viral one evening when America went back into a form of lockdown. I saw 800 new subscribers from that post why it was viral.

For Pinterest help, head over to 2021 Pinterest Update: Top Tips For Beating The New Pinterest Algorithm and The Ultimate List Of Pinterest Templates For Bloggers

Ask Your Blog Readers What They Want To See

Quite frankly you can literally ask your blog readers what they want to see. This could be a twitter poll, an instagram poll. You could collect information with a Google Docs form. Even a small excert at the end of a blog post asking your readers could bring some helpful feedback.

There’s nothing wrong with doing your research this way, if you find other ways of analysis too technical.

There are so many ways you can do your research, but for most bloggers you’ll find these three examples are ample to get your started with ideas for opt-ins. Also you can do competitor research if you’d like: but remember there is a very thin line between inspiration and ripping off someone else’s hard work.

30 Opt-In Ideas For Growing Your Mailing List

• Free access to an exclusive group (for bloggers with facebook groups or private groups for customers of products)
• A tick list for your niche (affiliate marketing, fashion ideas, lifestyle ideas, any list can be tailored to a niche)
• Content planner (a free content planner for bloggers of your niche)
• Yearly Content Calendar ( a great opt-in for the blogging niche)
• Free Quiz (great for those with lifestyle or dating niche blogs)
• Access to a Pinterest Board (great for those looking to grow their Pinterest)
• Private Webinar access (a special webinar just for your audience could be a way to see your stats boom)
• Free Pinterest Templates (almost all fellow bloggers or business owners will be using Pinterest so could be great for growing a blogging related mailing list)
• Free ebooks (perfect for those who sell ebooks as it builds customer trust)
• Passwords (a great way to have a freebie library or hidden content, people who sign up get a password to unlock content)
• Discounts (if your blog doubles up as a business, this is a great way to make more sales by offering x amount off)
• Free challenge (a great way to have subscribers join you on a 30 day content challenge etc)
• Mood Board/ Vision Board templates (perfect for those who are growing a manifestation blog or business)
• Printable (budgeting printable or content printable)
• Mini Online Course (a great way to build customer trust if you sell online courses)
• Free Blog Audit (offering a free blog audit to your readers could be a great way to get subscribers if you sell this service)
• Video Tutorials (a walk through on how to use WordPress or fashion styling tutorial, can be very versatile based on niche)
• Free stock Images (a great way to grow if your blog is also a business)
• Resource Library (only shared via your mailing list)
• Budgeting Resources (a great way to share referral deals and content for money bloggers)
• Cheat sheets (a perfect resource to share for all niches)
• Free podcast episodes (for those with podcasts, having secret or free episodes just for your mailing list is a great incentive to sign up)
• Free coaching session (I’ve seen people grow 100s of subscribers with this one, but it is very time consuming)
• A recipe card (perfect for those growing a food blog)
• A spreadsheet (using a spreadsheet you can create a great resource for your readers to track or monitor whatever you think is suitable)
• Affirmation PDF (really niche specific but one I recently came across that I thought was great)
• Swipe Files (often used for Pitching or other template situations, they can be used to create a valuable resource)
• Contact List (this could be a PR contact list, or for contacts who offer similar freebies)
• Sponsored opportunities (this could be for a PR you actively work with – I often share sponsored work on my emailing list)
• Free Art Prints (I’ve seen this done before and had to sign up to the list, it’s a really great incentive)

Where To Place Your Opt-Ins On Your Blog

On your static home page – you’re going to want your opt-ins to be one of the first things that your readers see when they come to your blog. Some people often put the in the header space of their blog on their main blog pages so they are literally at the top of the page. I personally don’t use this approach right now, but I have before.

Pop ups – You may think of using a pop up to advertise your opt-in so they are the first thing you readers see. Pop ups will increase your bounce rate undeniably, but they can be a good way to gain subscribers if a lot of your traffic is new traffic/uses that comes from Pinterest or another social platform. I wouldn’t recommend using them if you have a lot of ad placements because they can massively slow your site speed. Pop-ups have many positives and negatives so it’s about what is you, and if you want them.

Side bar – This is where I keep my sign up form, and link to my sign up landing page. It’s continuously there so it gains signups daily.

Imbedded in blog posts – If you have a mailing list you’re going to want to have a sign up on EVERY single page you have, sometimes more than once depending on the post or if you’re sharing an opt-in. I personally keep mine to the bottom of my blog posts, and in the middle if I feel the need to share it, but placement is really a choice.

Growing your mailing list is no easy task but it can be made easier with some tips and tricks, for example all of my recent cheatsheet & checklist templates have come from Etsy. Where you can buy and edit them to send to your mailing list (check the terms and condition on products before you do this) as many sellers sell email list templates.

If you enjoyed this post please use the social share buttons below and tweet or share this to Pinterest, it helps my blog out a LOT.

If you enjoyed this post head over to my Finding The Best Blogging Resources On Etsy and The 10 Best Affiliate Marketing Platforms For Beginners