Over the past few weeks, there's been lots of talk about co-registration. People come to my blog, searching for that information because they just don't understand what it is. So, let's explain...
Co-registration is when the viewer is offered more than one list to join at a time. No doubt, you've seen the forms, with 5 or 10 or even 20 offers for newsletters, reports, or courses all on one page. Beside each listing, there are little check boxes that allow people to choose which newsletter or offers they want to receive. Co-registration pages can radically boost your list building efforts.
But as with any other business decision you make, there are some things to consider:
- First, how many choices are there per page? Too many will just confuse people and they'll back off.
- Co-registration isn't generally free, so when you're budgeting for list building, this has to be a consideration. Some services are inexpensive, while some are extremely expensive. Find one that fits into your list building budget.
- Not all autoresponder services will accept leads from co-registration. You'll need to check their terms of service to see if they will or not before signing up for co-reg. If you break your autoresponder's terms of service, you risk losing every lead you have because they'll just shut you down.
- How difficult is the service to set up? With some co-reg services, you can simply provide your autoresponder's email address and leads will automatically be added to your autoresponder. Other services require you to enter form fields from your autoresponder. It's not really difficult, but if you're not techno-savvy, then check out their method of sign-up before you join and decide if it's for you.
- How expensive are the leads you'll be getting. If you're paying $57 a month and getting 250 leads, you're paying 23 cents per lead. If you pay more for the same amount, your cost per lead goes up. If you're paying less and still getting 250 leads, then your cost per lead goes down. The value of a lead is how well they respond to you. You'll need to test and track to figure that out. Some leads are much more valuable than others.
- Is the co-registration form targeted to your market? For instance, let's say you sell widgets. Are all the other companies on the page related to the widget business? Say you belong to an affiliate program for an online marketing home study course. Is the co-registration form filled with Internet marketing offers and is it being sent to people interested in Internet Marketing or to soccer moms, who couldn't care less?
- See how high the rate of subscribers who actually confirmed is. It's great to use co-registration for list building, but only if the people actually sign up and click the confirmation message to verify that they want to be on your list. These will be your best leads, and who you should be list building around.
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