FVMusicBlog

Congratulations! Setting up your mailing list is the first step in creating a deep and meaningful connection with fans. 

The people who have opted into receiving email communications from you are among your top fans and should be the first to know about new music news!

Today, we are going to set up your mailing list, but first, I want to run through some terminology so you are up to speed with email marketing terms.

• Lead Magnet – The free gift you give to someone when they enter their email address. (Free exclusive song, live version, acoustic version, remix, behind the scenes video, lyric sheet, stories behind the songs video).
• Landing Page – An attractive page that asks people to enter their email address in return for your leadmagent.
• Autoresponder – When someone signs up to your mailing list, they are automatically get sent your lead magnet and a series of pre-written automated messages designed to build your fanbase while you’re busy doing other things.

You need an autoresponder that will make you money before you start paying for one!

The most important thing to remember when choosing which autoresponder to use is that your main aim is to make money from your mailing list before you have to start paying for autoresponder services. 

Otherwise, you’ll be in the red before you even begin. 

We recommend using Aweber. 

Aweber is a company that has been around for over 20 years. They are a trusted leader in online marketing, so you’re in safe hands.

They host over 100,000 small business subscriber lists and uphold email marketing best practices.

Aweber offer…

• Free landing pages
• Free autoresponder
• Free 24/7 support
• Free 3000 emails per month
• Free up to 500 subscribers – no credit card required

With Aweber, you can access all the elements we need to get your mailing list up and running for free. 

So, it won’t cost you a penny to start building the community around your music.

 In fact, Aweber gives you access to their entire suite of tools for free.

Their competitors, Mailchimp, Convertkit, etc., offer some services for free but don’t offer EVERYTHING you need, forcing you into paying for a monthly plan. 

For example, Convertkit – You cannot create an autoresponder (automated follow-up sequence) on their free level, and what if you need clarification and support? On the free plan, you’re on your own.

I have always found Aweber’s 24/7 support excellent. They can quickly help with any question, big or small.

To get your mailing list up and running, we need two pieces of technology to work seamlessly together while you’re busy doing other music tasks…

• A landing page to capture new email addresses from fans
• And an autoresponder to automatically email your new sign-ups

Luckily, you can do both within Aweber for free, so let’s get started.

Step One: Open Your Free Aweber account

Click to go to Aweber here.

The page will look like this…

IMPORTANT: Don’t click on ‘Sign Up Today’ as this will take you to a paid plan!

Instead, scroll down until you see this

Fill in your information and then click ‘Start growing today’.

After that, Aweber will then ask you to check your inbox in order to verify your email and complete your account creation.

In your inbox, you’ll have an email that looks like this

Click on the blue ‘Get started’ button and it’ll take you to a page to create your account.

Enter your email and choose a secure password and click save password

Great!

Now you’ll see the ‘plan’ page. Either select the free plan or upgrade to a pro plan.

This page also gives you the full features of what you’re getting so select the right plan for you.

By default, the ‘Plus’ plan will be selected but if you’d like the free plan, click on ‘Continue with free’.

The next page will look like this

Fill out your details and click ‘continue’.

Follow the next few pages through with your details, answering the questions asked honestly.

On these pages, you need to enter some information that is important when complying with SPAM laws such as

• Your company name
• Your website
• Your contact address
• Your industry
• If you already have a mailing list

Once those details are filled out…

Your Aweber account will have been successfully created, brilliant!

Step Two: Building Your First Landing Page

On the left hand menu click ‘Pages & Forms’

… and then Landing Pages.

You’ll be greeted by a page that looks like this…

Click on ‘My Sign Up Page’.

And you should be on a page that looks like this…

Now we need to design your landing page.

You can do this yourself with the colours of your brand, or below I’ll help you build one that looks attractive.

First, change your background from white to black.

On the right hand side, scroll down to ‘Background’…

Then scroll down again to ‘color’.

Click on colour… and select black.

Next on the Right hand menu scroll up and select ‘Body Font’

Then, select ‘color’ and select white.

Next hoover over the envelope in the blue circle and press delete.

If you want to add in an image of your lead magnet, you can drag in the ‘image’ button from the left hand icon and upload one from there.

Ok, next we need to change the text in the heading and the body.

Here is your chance to tell people why your lead magnet is special/unique/unmissable!

Mine looks like this…

Ok, we’re nearly there!

At the moment we are only asking for someone’s email address but it’s a good idea to ask for their name too.

It makes emails feel more personal and if you move onto using Facebook ads in the future, this can really help to have those details.

So on your form click on ‘Email’, then on the right hand menu click on ‘Add a form field’ and then ‘Name’.

To make it read better we want the name to be above the email. So on the right hand menu click and hold the eight dots next to the name and drag them above the email.

Next, we need to change the colour and the text on the blue button.

To do this, click on the button, highlight the text and ammend it to your offer.

In the button text, it’s always a good idea to remind people what they’re going to get once they press the button.

So your text can read ‘Get’ followed by the lead magnet. In this case, ‘Get ‘Blood’ Live from the Troubadour!’

To change the colour of the button, click on the button, then on the right hand side, scroll down to ‘color’ and select the colour of your chosing.

I’ve picked orange, as studies have shown that orange gets the most clicks!

And make sure you do the same for the ‘hover’ colour too!

Finally, we need to deliver your lead magnet!

So, first click on the white box that says ‘Email’.

Then on the right hand menu click on ‘Submission’.

Here, you can either send the new subscriber to ‘Custom URL’ where they can get the lead magnet or a ‘Simple’ Aweber page. We’re going to select the ‘Simple’ page.

And then, we need to add a tag.

Again, under submissions scroll down to ‘Tags’ and add something that will remind you what the new subscriber opted in for.

In this case, i’m going to use, ‘Leadmagnet – ‘Blood’ Live’ and hit enter.

With all of that complete, it’s time to give your landing page a name (top left) and click ‘Save & Exit’ (bottom right).

Step Three: Publishing your Landing Page

Great, now you’re ready to publish your landing page in a few clicks.

This is simple.

Back on your dashboard, click ‘Pages and Forms’ and then hoover over the 3 dot on the right and click the icon as shown below.

This box will appear…

We now have the URL to your landing page and next we will create your auto responder and deliver your lead magnet.

Step Four: Building your autoresponder and delivering your lead magnet

To build out your auto responder, we’re going to go back to your dashboard and click on ‘Automation’ and then ‘Campaigns’.

Next click on ‘Template: Welcome Campaign’

Next click ‘remove’ on the 3 removes next to the arrows.

Next click ‘Replace trigger’

And this box should appear…

Select ‘Tag Applied’.

On the right hand menu, type in the tag you used in the previous step when setting up the landing page.

In our example it’ll be ‘leadmagnet – ‘blood’ live’.

You should now see this

Now when someone enters their details on the landing page, the tag with automatically be applied and this will kickstart the autoresponder to send the automated emails which we will set up next!

Next we need to click and drag ‘Send Message’ from the left hand menu to under the ‘Tag Applied’.

Then click on ‘Create a Message’.

And then ‘Drag and Drop Email Builder’.

Then you can either take the tour or click ‘Explore on my own’. You’ll be greeted by a page that looks like this…

Hover your curser over the prewritten mesage and click the rubbish bin.

Then repeat the last steps on all of the elements until you have a blank page that looks like this…

The first thing we are going to do is to fill out the ‘Insert Your Subject Line’. This is the title of your email.

So you want it to reflect what the new subscriber has just opted in for. In our example ‘Your free MP3 of ‘Blood’ live at the Troubadour is here!’

Then, on the left hand menu, click and drag the T under ‘Text’ and drop it in the ‘Drop Element’ space.

Next write your email!

Remember to write in the voice of your brand and include the link to your lead magnet.

Delivering your leadmagnet

You can not upload files directly in aweber so you need to upload your leadmagent to dropbox, or google drive, then get the URL to that link and add it in as shown below.

Select a section of text where people can click to download the link, then you need to hyperlink the URL from dropbox or google drive using the button indicated on the screen shot above.

Next click save and exit.

Then, you need to add in a wait time before the next email is sent. I recommend a day.

Simply drag ‘Wait’ from the left hand menu over.

Then repeat the steps above, add another message, then another wait time of a day, then another message until you have 5 emails loaded up and ready to go.

(Note: The messages you send can be encouraging people to follow you on social media, links to your Bandcamp, Youtube or Soundcloud page, or your Spotify pre-save link if you are in the middle of a release. The opportunities to get fresh eyes on your promotions here are endless!)

Once finished, your automation will look something like this…

Finally, you need to publish your automation.

Click ‘Save & Exit’.

Then hover over the 3 dots and click the icon that appears next to them.

Congratulations!!! Your landing page, and automations are now live!!!