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Subscription lists are undeniably very powerful promotional and marketing tools. Vital, really. But you knew that.

What you may not have known, though, is that the top 3 techniques for generating and building those lists are very, well, basic. Simple really. And yet oh so effective.

Here they are:

1. Ask for the subscription. Yup, get in your visitors’ faces and ask them to subscribe. This could be direct (”Hey, you, yeah you with the monobrow, subscribe to my RSS feed!”… OK, so maybe not quite that direct) or more passive through the constant use of headlines and icons and subscription forms on all your pages, etc. etc. etc.

If you can do only one thing on this list, “ask for it” is it.

2. There are benefits to subscribing; describe them. Particularly if your site/blog caters more to newbies or less Net experienced folk. Thing is, there’s just so much space available to you on a page; a decent technique for dealing with this is a “Click Here for More Info”-type link that goes to a separate page with fuller details.

3. Use incentives. Give them something if they subscribe. Free downloads (like ebooks) work well. Or a discount when purchasing whatever you’re selling.

Whatever it is, make sure it’s got a good perceived value.

And you may want to try to limit it to items you can auto-fulfill (e.g., ebook download link or discount coupon code in the “Thank You” email sent or confirmation page displayed to new subs) to make life even easier for you. Who the heck needs more complications, right?

Here’s one way to make #3 even more powerful for email mailing lists (not RSS lists): Promise exclusive “subscriber-only” freebies or discounts that you’ll be giving out periodically. This not only gets them to subscribe… it keeps them subscribed!

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