How To Build Your List With Giveaways

It’s Not A Bribe, Really

As a web master trying to drive affiliate sales to your web site, you know the importance of getting people to go through your squeeze page. Every contact you get, coupled with what they actually clicked through on in an affiliated link, is useful data for making targeted marketing decisions, and getting the earning potential you need for your web site.

One of the best ways to get people to go through your squeeze is to cooperate with other internet marketers pitching the same kinds of products you are in a giveaway program. In much the same way that soap companies will give free samples in the mail, or media companies will give sneak previews, a giveaway gives people who hit your site an opportunity “get something” for their web surfing.

How this usually works is that a vendor (the person you’re directing traffic to) or a group of vendors, gives away a small sample, usually with a limited time offer, and all their affiliate marketers broadcast out, trying to drive traffic to the vendor.

Now, this sort of traffic building is good for padding out your list, but you should be aware that the contacts you’re building with this method tend to be, in polite terms, “freebie hunters” or “freeloaders”. A good chunk of them, when you broadcast to them after the giveaway, are going to opt out of your list as fast as they can find the link to do so. Don’t be discouraged by this, it’s all a numbers game.

Do think about ways to market to this list, or generate useful data from them. For example, if they accepted a freebie from one of your vendors, look for other freebie offers, or offer a freebie of your own if they’ll write a testimonial about the product for you. Use them to build up a forum population, or to generate some content.

The key to repeat internet marketing is building a sense of community in your site visitors. You’re establishing yourself as a trusted source of useful information and entertainment. Make sure that you retain that trust, or try to build on it and be prepared to pitch in to giveaway drives to help build up your list.

One interesting variation on the giveaway drive, if you can get your vendors to agree to it, is the online scavenger hunt. This requires a vendor giving away something that’s decently valuable, perhaps in a lottery drawing.

In order to get into the drawing, people have to go through the squeeze pages of several of their affiliate marketers, gaining parts of a serial number or passwords to different parts of the vendor’s web site, which usually has a flash game that they have to play before they enter the access code or discount code.

With the caveat that you’re populating your list with people who are using the internet for entertainment rather than purchasing things they want, this is an effective way to qualify your lead generation.