List buildingThis time we’re going to discuss the second major way you can benefit from content marketing. Namely, by building your list. (In earlier articles we talked about establishing yourself as an expert as well as providing an introduction to article marketing.)

There are two ways you can use an article to build your list: 1.Include a call to action to subscribe to your list from within your article. 2.Include a call to action to subscribe to your list at the end of your article (within the resource box).

If you’re posting your article on your own blog or some other property where you have a say in what types of links you can post, then you can create multiple calls to action. In other words, you can have a call to action in your article body as well as in the resource box at the end.

However, certain content sites (like some article directories) frown on you including a call to action in your article. In those cases, you’ll want to include a persuasive ad at the end of your article that encourages people to click through to your website. At a minimum, your visitors should arrive at a page with a subscription box. For best results, this page should include a mini sales letter that encourages people to join your newsletter.

You see, a lot of marketers send their visitors to the same landing page… even though these visitors came from different articles. If you want to go beyond being an average marketer, then you need to start creating different landing pages for different articles.

Now, this doesn’t mean you need to create an entirely new landing page for every article. Instead, you should create a different landing page for every main topic. Let me explain…

Let’s suppose you have a site about traveling. All your articles on traveling to Central America would go to one landing page, all your articles about traveling to South America would go to a different landing page, all your articles about traveling to Eastern Europe would go to still another landing page… and so on. You get the idea.

Here’s why:

1. By sending your prospects to different, yet tightly focused landing pages, you can actually segment your mailing lists. This allows you to send more targeted content and offers, which will boost your overall conversion rate.

2. The landing page itself will be more targeted. In the example above, you know exactly what part of the world your prospects are interested in traveling to, so your mini sales letter can talk about that location. What’s more, you can offer a freebie that’s also highly relevant to that location. End result: you turn more prospects into subscribers.

Now before we wrap this up, let me offer you a little trick…

If you want people to join your mailing list, you need to give them a compelling reason to do so. And one way to do that is by offering them “Part 2” of the article they just read. If they liked Part 1, they’ll want to read part 2. And indeed, those who don’t like the feeling of “loose ends” will feel virtually compelled to join your list.