How many times have you heard that you “need to grow your email list?” And how often have you looked at the person who said it and nodded and then went on with your life? Usually, when clients say that they want to grow their Instagram and increase site traffic and have higher sales, one of the first things I ask is whether or not they have an email list. Email marketing is a POWERFUL tool. There is a lot of bogus information out there that says no one reads their emails or that it all goes to spam, but the truth is email can be a tool that can skyrocket your business. For a lot of companies email accounts for 20% of revenue. 

Now maybe you are thinking “Well I don’t sell anything, I just create content. Why does this matter to me?” That thinking is the mistake I was making for years! The truth is you may not sell any products right now, but who knows where you will be down the line. I had no idea I would launch a course and thank goodness I had an email list to share it with! Not to mention, there are several ways to monetize your site that may not feel like selling a product. You can make revenue from affiliate sales, from sponsored posts, or banner ads. All of these methods require traffic to your site, which is where email comes in. 

Now that you are considering that you may need a list, I want to walk you through everything I did wrong so that you don’t make the same mistakes I made.

I wish I hadn’t done these things, but I …

1. Picked an email platform because it was $0 without researching. I originally used MailChimp as my email platform and I hated it. Don’t get me wrong, MailChimp works for a lot of people but I wasn’t one of them. It was difficult for me to create beautiful emails and creative opt-ins (ways for people to sign up for my emails). 
2. I didn’t consistently email my community. It can be hard to adopt a consistent schedule but if you can’t commit to a schedule then don’t add this to your list of things to do. I now send weekly emails and occasionally 1-2 extra a month depending on new launches or exciting announcements.
3. Thought “I will never have a big email list.” Mindset is everything. I truly believe that. If you don’t think you will ever have a 10k email list with people who are excited to hear from you then you won’t get there, not to mention 100k. 
4. Dreaded sending emails because it felt like a chore, one that I avoided as much as possible. I don’t know how I expected to grow a list and have a community that I loved and loved me back if I was literally dreading creating another email. 

If you can relate and are thinking, “that’s exactly how I feel,” then let me introduce you to your new best friend, FloDesk. I have been using FloDesk for 6-months now and I LOVE it. FloDesk has made email simple and beautiful. 

Why I Started Using FloDesk

I am going to be real with you. I started using FloDesk because a ton of people were talking about it and saying how easy it was and they were creating beautifully designed emails. I wanted to try it to prove that email was difficult no matter what platform, but boy was I wrong! 

• FloDesk makes it easy to create opt-ins. If you don’t know what an opt-in is, it is a little freebie you give to encourage someone to sign up for your email. My most popular opt-in is a Free Downloadable Content Calendar. FloDesk streamlines the process of creating a form where people can sign up, be added to a segment, and get the freebie in their email. 
• FloDesk has beautiful easy to edit templates. If you are like me then you know what good design looks like, but you just can’t make it yourself. I was always stressed that to have anything beautiful, I would have to pay an arm and a leg. Luckily FloDesk has partnered with amazing designers to create email templates that you can edit. Seriously, I can not get over how much better my emails look.
• For a limited time, while FloDesk is still in Beta, the pricing is unreal. I pay $19 a month to send unlimited emails and have unlimited subscribers. Just for reference, MailChimp is $299/mo for 200k subscribers and ConvertKit is $29/mo for 1k subscribers. Both of these have free options and free trials, but long term they become very expensive. 

How FloDesk Makes it Easy to Grow

For the first two years, I had only 100-115 people on my email list at any time, and 5 of those emails were me and my family. I just couldn’t figure out how to grow. After one week of using FloDesk that number doubled. I know 200 doesn’t seem like a big number, but I am sure you can imagine that after 2 years of sitting at 100 I was blown away! 

The reason I started seeing success was that FloDesk made it simple to create beautiful landing pages and pop-ups for my website where people could sign up to join my newsletter. How can we expect people to join our email list if they don’t know about it? 

How to Get Started

Click this link to join FloDesk and you will get the same pricing I did ($19/month)  which is 50% off! 

Then start watching these videos on setting up your workflows. Michele does such a great job walking you through the process. 

Mindset Shift

I mentioned early on that I HATED sending emails and couldn’t figure out why my list wasn’t growing. These are the two mindset shifts I made that changed the game:

1. I started saying this out loud: “Investing in my email list and my business will give me more money and let me connect with amazing people.” Sometimes it can feel scary to spend money on your business, even just $20 a month (which we all know is 4 coffees), but you need to start believing that by investing in your business, you are in fact attracting more money. 
2. Believing and making tasks more fun! There are parts of every business that just may not be as much fun for you. So I challenge you to figure out a way to bring more fun and ease into the process. When you start to do this it becomes easier to grow your email list and make money, because you are actually excited to do the work. 

I hope this post helps you start to grow your email list as much as FloDesk has helped me! If you have any questions or if you decide to try out FloDesk let me know in the comments, I would love to hear from you. 

P.S. if you sign up for FloDesk with my link I get a little money and you get that 50% off.