How to use Aweber as a Blogger

We all know that the email list is a vital component of our blogger’s toolkit. Having investigated and used my own “in house” email system, and one from another provider, I’m left in no doubt that Aweber provides the best email system for us. So how do we get the best out of it?

List Segmentation

With Aweber, you can have as many lists as you want. Each list has it’s own emails and follow ups. This is a huge advantage, because it means you can really “drill down” into your niche. If your blog is about cookery, for example, you can have a separate list for vegetarians, so it’s easy to target them when you have a specific article or product to offer them. But if you want to send a general newsletter to all your subscribers, in every segment, it’s still easy to do so.

Automation and Follow Up

Each list can have it’s own welcome email, and then as many follow up emails as you want, each sent when you want them and each with the ability to send files. So, for example, you can set up for your clients to receive an E book as a welcome, and then ask them 7 days later what they thought of it, and perhaps 3 months later ask them if they are using any of the techniques you have suggested. All Aweber emails are simply “click to reply” so you can get some really good dialogue going with your readers.

Broadcast Email

A broadcast email is a one off email you can send to some or all of your lists. Typically this is used to send a newsletter, or some content you are not publishing on your site. Every time you send one of these you will see an increase in site traffic. Aweber includes various templates you can use to make the broadcast emails more interesting.

Blog Broadcast

This is a brilliant feature! You can set up a blog broadcast, which will take the teaser from each blog post, compile it into an email, and send it to your mailing list – you will be amazed at how much traffic this can generate! You can tell the system to send when you have a certain number of new posts, or at a specific time interval, for example once a week.

Tracking

The back room of your Aweber account logs all the statistics relating to your emails. You can see in real time, how many people have opened the mails, how many have clicked links, and which ones they clicked. By using this data you can refine the content of the emails to give maximum value to your readers, and to drive the most traffic to your site.

Customer Service

This is the best part for me. Aweber has real people, who actually answer the phones and reply to emails! Seriously, whenever I’ve needed help, they’ve solved my problem very, very quickly.

Deliverability

The best service, with the best features in the world would be a complete waste of space without the emails actually getting to the destination. Aweber has spent years building a solid anti spam reputation, which means more of their mail gets through.

Pricing

Aweber costs $19 a month for up to 500 subscribers. There are other systems that are free, or that have free trial periods. Don’t waste your time! The more time you spend building your list on other systems, the more readers you are likely to lose when you switch to Aweber – because Aweber, quite rightly, insists that new subscribers “opt-in” again.

If you’re serious about creating a long term sustainable income from blogging, then investing in Aweber should be one of your first expenses. I made the mistake of not doing it from the beginning, and it set me back a couple of months in terms of numbers.

If you’re new to, or learning as a blogger, invest in an Aweber account today by visiting this link:

Aweber Email Marketing

(Disclosure: Yes I will earn a small commission if you choose to open an Aweber account through this link. That isn’t why I’ve written this post – I made the mistake of not using Aweber initially and that set me back. The good news is that you can also become an affiliate and pass on a great tool to your readers in the knowledge that the product is excellent.)

Note: If you do open an Aweber account, you’ll find their help system is excellent. However, I’m very happy to help you directly with any questions you might want to ask about the best way to use it. Just email me and we can talk via Skype or chat.

If you enjoyed this, you might also like:

1/ The dreaded “list”

2/ Controlling comment spam on your blog

3/ Communicate your way to success as a blogger