Depending on your niche, getting subscriber's to participate in a survey, poll, or leave comments on your blog or social media pages can be frustrating and exhausting. To encourage people to participate, you must do more than send a link or ask people to post comments about goods and services. You have to convince them that it's in their best interest to do so.
Subscriber participation not only helps build stronger business relationships, it also helps you understand those on your list so you can provide the best products and services possible.
Offer a Small Gift or Prize
Get people interested in filling out a survey by holding a contest instead of just pleading with people to answer your questions. Prizes may include special reports, ebooks, product samples, or coupons. Offer prizes to the first 100 hundred people who answer your survey to get subscribers motivated.
If you want to offer a small gift to everyone that answers the survey, set up an autoresponder message that includes a link to a special report or ebook to be sent to those who reply to your survey message. This is an easy way to ensure those who fill out the survey receive their gift immediately.
What do You Think of This?
Use mass email to promote social media pages. Send a message inviting subscribers to visit your new page and post comments. Include your vision of what you want the page to be and include a link to the page. Ask subscribers to add your business to their contacts list. To increase the number of comments, post questions, short polls, or interesting facts pertaining to the niche you market to and start the conversation! Respond as often as possible to comments so people know you're part of the conversation as well.
Best (Image, Quote) of the Week
Hold a best image or quote of the week contest and ask subscribers to send an image or quote based on a topic you choose. Send bulk emails with the topic and post it on your social media page. Choose the best image or quote and offer a small prize. Or let subscribers choose by voting.
You don't have to stick with images or quotes; you can choose best short story, best joke, best animation, or best video clip – whatever you want as long as you get people involved, it doesn’t really matter. Post a winner each week on your website or social media page and send an email with a link so everyone on your list can see the results.