Here’s an example of a simple email collection method used by Publishers Clearning House.
It’s a two step process. Here’s how it works.
1. Run a Contest. You can see in the screen cap below that a Photo Contest has been created offering a $2,500 to the winning photographer. In order to win the prize you have to bring the most amount of ‘votes’ to the table.
In this case a vote is an email address. Note in the fine print (which I’ve highlighted) the text “I agree to receive by email offereing from the Great American Photo Contest and its advertising sponsors.”
The way this promotion works it that photographers enter to win the $2,500 and in order to win the prize they promote their own entry using Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, email and other means to make sure they have the best chance to win.
In so doing, the email list grows in a viral way.
2. Promote using Twitter. Here is the tweet that caught my attention and took me to the ‘vote’ page in the first place.
This is typical of an email promotion which can grow on its own and often doesn’t take a lot of money to run.
Step back from your business and see if you can imagine a type of contest that could create viral buzz and your email list can grow much faster.
