One of the fastest ways to develop, build, and grow your own
list of subscribers is to develop a “mini” course with an
incredibly compelling promise.
I have personally used “mini” courses to build lists of
several thousand subscribers in as little as a week.
A “mini” course is simply a series of e-mail’s where you
teach people a specific skill, set of skills, or reveal
other information they really want to know.
In the process of providing this focused, valuable
information, you prove to your subscribers that you are THE
expert in a particular area – and, you also encourage people
to pay you to get even BETTER information from ebooks and
information products you’ve either written or recommend.
An example of a “mini” course offer I’ve used with great
success is the free mini course at www.7dayebook.com that
appears in the exit pop up window when you leave the site.
The promise of this “mini” course is strong and compelling.
Here’s what it says…
FREE eBook Mini-Course
“How to Write and Profit from your own eBook…
while you’re still young enough to enjoy it!”
All the registration page asks for is first name and email
address… and this mini-course has generated thousands of
subscribers!
So here’s the basic formula in a nutshell:
Strong promise+ low risk+ high perceived reward= Subscribers
Now, if you’d like to build your own list of rabid
subscribers, here are 5 sure-fire tips for creating a mini-
course that truly kicks butt!
Tip #1 – The Promise
If you want to launch a successful mini-course, target an
audience with a specific need and then make them the biggest
possible promise you can deliver on.
People are pressed for time and rarely see as much value in
something they get for free as opposed to something they pay
a lot of money for.
Add to this the fact that the Internet gets more and more
crowded everyday and you can see that the best offers are
the ones that grab people’s attention by making a benefit-
driven promise they can’t resist.
Even though you offer your mini-course for free, you still
must SELL people on WHY they should pay you with their time
and attention.
Example: If you want to do a mini-course on real estate
investing, look for the biggest and best promise you can
make for people.
Let’s look at these various promises for identical mini-
course content:
Good: How to make a fortune in foreclosures.
Better: How to find and buy a profitable foreclosure within
2 weeks.
Best: How to find and buy a profitable foreclosure property
in your area within 2 weeks – using none of your own money!
** The promise you make has everything to do with whether or
not people sign up. IMPORTANT: After they sign up, make sure
you deliver on the promise.
Tip #2 – Don’t reinvent the wheel
Look for existing content – your own or other people’s – you
can adapt directly or indirectly into the mini-course.
Hey, I understand you’re busy… I’m busy too!
Why would you want to spend 2 days coming up with all the
content for your mini-course if you already have past
information you can adapt!?
If you don’t have any existing material, then find someone
else who has written an article and use that for part of
your mini-course – with their permission of course.
You’d be surprised at all the pieces of the puzzle that are
out there independently which you could combine into a great
mini-course without nearly the mountain of effort you might
expect.
Tip #3 – Give yourself lots of chances to make money
One way to build more value into your mini-course and make
sure people hang onto your messages instead of deleting them
is to put lots of quality links into your mini-course.
This allows people to get additional information on specific
aspects of the mini-course.
Some of those links can be to free resources, others to
resources where you earn an affiliate commission, and still
others to your own products and services.
The more links you have that actually contribute to your
students learning the subject of your mini-course and
fulfilling the promise you made to get them to sign up, the
better your chances of them clicking those links.
If you create lessons people save for future reference
because they have great links in them, you’ll make more
money!
For an example look no further than your “in-box”! Almost
everybody has email messages they’ve saved from other people
because they contain links to sites you want to use now or
access in the future.
Tip #4 – Build anticipation for the next message
If you’re going to take the time to put together the mini-
course, wouldn’t it be great of the majority of people who
subscribed actually read your messages!?
If you want to launch a successful mini-course, you’ve got
to rise ABOVE the noise of all the other email messages
people receive every single day.
One way to do this is to always end each lesson with a small
“ad” or excitement builder for the next message. You do this
by really playing up a big benefit they’ll receive as a
result of reading the next message you promise to send them.
Here’s an example:
“The next and final installment in this mini-course will
give you five tips for how to get 10,000 visitors to your
website without spending a dime on pay-per-click traffic! So
stay tuned for the next lesson in 2 days…”
It’s a simple, yet very powerful way to build anticipation
for the next message into EVERY message you send.
This simple step helps make them look forward to the next
message so it gets read… not trashed!
Tip #5 – Tell them what they don’t know!
If you’re using the mini-course to promote a product that
covers a much “bigger picture” of the topic as a whole,
constantly remind people that the mini-course is just a
“tiny piece” of the whole product.
Remind them of what else they need to know and tell them if
they buy the product then they’ll get this benefit, and that
benefit, and even more specific information.
Remember, you didn’t publish this mini-course to practice
your typing skills! You are in this to make money, to get
subscribers, and to make sales!
Once you deliver quality content that gives people a real
taste of what’s in store when they actually purchase, then
it’s time to close the sale… you deserve it!
