I’ve been writing email autoresponders professionally for quite some time now.

In fact, my autoresponders have been used by countless end users, and I’ve written autoresponders not only for my business, but several other Internet marketers over the years.

And there are so many things we must talk about.

First off, I see so many slimy, sneaky and unethical emails being sent these days.

Subject lines that are outright lies. I’ve seen subject lines talking about how my PayPal was hacked, or how my password was reset.

Never ever do anything like that. Never lie to your end users, period.

Is it okay to lie to anyone? Ever? My answer is absolutely not. So never lie to your end users, never be a snake in the grass and never cheat your end users.

And I know you are not like that, yet I’m still shocked when I read my catch-all

email these days, some of the egregious subject lines I see are truly over the top, and you know what I’m talking about.

Besides, being sleazy and sneaky never works in the long-run.

That’s not my style, I’d rather build a subscriber list and a tribe that lasts a lifetime. That’s what I advise you to do, make this a marathon and not a sprint.

Instead, build unshakable rapport with your end users by building trust.

Ask them questions. Introduce yourself. Tell stories about how you’ve struggled to build your list, how you’ve struggled to get traffic, and how you overcame that.

Invite your end users to contact you.

Always prompt your end users to REPLY to your best email ads. Ask your end users lots of questions.

Ask them about what troubles they’re having. Ask them what they expect from you. Ask them how you’re doing. Ask them if there was ONE THING you could help them with, what is it?

If you ask them these questions, they’ll recognize you as an authority, and you’ll be shocked when your end users send you a literal novel response, and when somebody does that, several things happen.

First, your email deliverability will skyrocket through the roof, because different email services will recognize your email address.

Second, you’ll develop a relationship with your end users that will last far beyond the typical churn and burn marketer, and they’ll thank you for their time.

This is how you build that tribe that can last a lifetime.

I’ve had end users on my list for many years, and I’ve accomplished it by treating them like gold.

Remember to always treat your subscribers like gold, like your best friends, and never ever lie to them.

I’d say one of the most important aspects of writing the perfect followup sequence is entertaining your end users.

How do you do that? Just be yourself.

Tell stories, and entertain your end users by being real with them.

Talk about how you’ve been frustrated with your own goals, tell them any funny experiences you’ve had on your Internet marketing journey.

Tell them the pitfalls. Tell them anything interesting that you’ve encountered getting where you are. Be real with them.

A lot of people worry about whether their emails should pitch, entertain, build rapport or provide value.

The best answer is that your emails should do everything.

Every single email you send should have a link in it promoting an offer of some type. Even if it’s a very small link in the PS – you should always promote something.

Because never forget this, if you don’t make sales, you’ll go out of business, and then you’ll be failing your end users in the ultimate sense.

That’s the perfect email autoresponder sequence.

The truth is that you can create autoresponder sequences any way that you like as long as you be yourself, as long as you ask your end users questions in order to engage them, as long as you entertain your end users, tell stories, and never forget to sell.

The strategy is always more important than the tactics, your strategy going forward is to write email autoresponder sequences that entertain, provide value, teach, ask your end users to reply, and never forget to sell. That’s the perfect email autoresponder strategy based upon my many years of email marketing experience.

The beauty of all of this, is that my autoresponder sequences will be wildly different than yours. Because my experiences, my stories, and my humor and style of teaching are different than yours. That’s why you’re going to have your 20{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5} of loyal fans, and I shall have mine.

So be yourself.

And when you write emails in this way, with the intention of helping your end users, entertaining them, and asking them questions, you’ll be so far ahead of the competition that your end users will look to you like a savior.

They’ll wonder why you care so much about them, while nobody else does.

If you continue down this path, sooner or later your tribe will be vibrant and stuffed to the brim with like-minded people, and in this way you’ll be able to promote absolutely anything that you want.

That’s the goal of marketing, and solo ads are just a means to an end in this case.

In case you’re worried about how to write an email, don’t be concerned with that, because in a future post I’ll show you a simple copywriting method that works 100{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5}, it’s very effective, it’s the ONLY copywriting method that I use, and it happens to be the easiest and fastest way to write emails, so keep your eyes open for the post.

Before you develop a squeeze page, a thank you page, or a download page, you need some type of opt-in bait so that you can turn even your cheap solo ads traffic into leads.

But…

Where to get your give away?

In a perfect world, you should create the giveaway yourself.

You want your giveaway to be unique. Don’t give away a piece of junk, because then any serious subscriber will recognize it for what it is.

Also, I’m all about actionable content, which is why I think infographics make awesome gifts, and I’ll talk more about that in a second.

Also, I’ve personally had great luck giving away statistics.

For example, one time I conducted a solo ad case study, and then gave that away as a free gift and people loved it. It was real data, it was something that you couldn’t get anywhere else, and I knew that my end users would absolutely loved it.

And if you’re not a good writer, and just don’t have the time to make an awesome give away, then hire somebody on Fiverr to create something useful for your end users.

I’m not going to recommend giving away a low quality piece of white label or private label rights content, because you want your give away to be unique, and actually valuable for your end users.

You only get a first impression once, so make sure that your free give away is actually worth the time of your end users.

The cool thing about crafting your gift idea, is that once you go over the previous post, this will be so easy.

I can tell you that one of the most popular gifts I ever gave away was two ebooks on how to drive traffic.

And if you learn one thing from me, learn this; people who receive solo ads LOVE traffic. Traffic is always a hot topic, if you’re in the traffic niche, you’re in a good niche.

Think about it. Every human on the planet who markets anything, or runs any type of website or business needs and loves traffic.

Traffic is addicting, every business on the planet needs more and more traffic, so traffic has historically done very well for me with solo ads.

I had a simple squeeze page that promoted two free traffic books and the opt-in rates were absolutely killer, I was averaging about 70{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5} opt-in rate for a good stretch of time.

But, once you figure out who your end users are, and what they want, this should be easy.

Another thing you could do, is design an infographic, or have someone on Fiverr design an infographic.

You might be thinking that an infographic is a lousy gift, but here’s the thing. Most people never even read or consume the books that you give away as a gift. That’s the sad fact.

How many books do you have on your computer that you’ve never read. I know I have several Terabytes of data that I’ve never even looked at.

So if you give them a cool looking infographic, at least they’ll consume it. They’re more likely to get something out of it in my opinion.

And by the way, if you’re offering an infographic as a free gift, never say it’s an infographic on the squeeze page.

Instead, say something like this:

“100{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5} free download, find out my proven system to XYZ”.

And maybe it’s a proven system to get unstoppable amounts of traffic, a proven system to master affiliate marketing fast, a proven method to publish your content 20x quicker, or whatever.

The point is, always promote the result of your infographic and not the infographic itself, in my experience it will convert better.

And if you do give away a PDF report or something like that, make sure that the report is at least small.

Because, again, if it’s a 10,000 word report, your end users are almost guaranteed not to read it.

It’s human nature.

People love getting free stuff, people are addicted to it like some type of drug, it’s an addiction to get free stuff.

The issue is that most people won’t read the report, so make the report small, or give them an infographic.

One other option you have is to give them software, plugins, maybe a WordPress theme or something like that, because as you know WordPress and plugins have a high perceived value, and maybe your end users will actually put them to use.

In the following posts I’m going to show you some really cool tricks on how to monetize your download page, how to route your entire funnel, and of course how to put everything together so that it’s a well-oiled machine.

For now, start brainstorming give away ideas, and if you have any questions at all don’t hesitate to give me a buzz.

I’ll see you in the next post, where I’m going to dive right into building some funnel material, so let’s roll up our sleeves and get to work.

This is my idea of a perfect squeeze page funnel.

You might look at this and panic, but I think if you take a few minutes to go over the dataflow diagram with me, and also I’m going to be going over this content in future modules.

To start, focus your attention on the squeeze page. Also known as the lead capture page.

The lead capture if the first page that your end users see, and in my opinion, it’s the most important page, since it will always get the most traffic.

When your end users go on the squeeze page, there’s two possible outcomes.

They’re either going to subscribe, and land on the thank you page, or they’re going to exit.

I’m going to talk later about how exit pops are very important later on, but for now just remember that you should have an exit popup on your squeeze page.

So if your end users do not subscribe, you don’t lose them forever, and you can promote an affiliate offer. I think it’s a good idea to promote an affiliate offer for your exit pop, but we’ll talk about that strategy later.

For now, let’s pretend that your end user, goes on your squeeze page, and then they opt-in to your squeeze page.

After they opt-in, two things are going to happen. First, they’re going to see your thank you page.

They’re also going to start receiving email followup sequences.

Now, a few very sneaky and ninja things happen when you use a funnel exactly like this.

The first ninja that occurs, is you don’t immediately give your end users the gift that was advertised on the squeeze page.

Instead, the gift is delivered immediately via email autoresponder.

A lot people, what they do wrong in my opinion, is they immediately offer the gift on the thank you page.

Another thing I’ve seen amateurs do, is they use the default confirmation page that the autoresponder gives you.

When you use the default confirmation page, it’s simply a page that says “thank you for subscribing”.

That’s the worst idea on the planet, because you’re wasting that traffic. You’re definitely not using your funnel to its utmost potential.

Here’s why I say that.

Because once your end user subscribes, now’s the best time to get the most out of their attention.

This lead is red hot, and they might never be redder or hotter. So strike when the iron’s hot.

In other words, you want to use this time to bond with them, to introduce yourself, to sell something.

You have their attention, don’t waste it. So, back to the thank you page.

What I like to do, is make my thank you page, a video, with a button under the video.

And the first thing I always say in the video, is “Thanks for subscribing, please check your email in 15 minutes to get your free gift”.

That’s a beautiful script, and it’s a great way to introduce whatever it is you’re about to sell, or promote.

It also reminds your end user that their gift is on the way.

It also mentions 15 minutes specifically, so this psychologically triggers their mind so that they know they have 15 minutes to spend before they check their mail.

So, they have time to watch this video, and they won’t be panicking to check their email immediately.

After I say that, I’ll begin to introduce myself. Nothing long, I’m talking about a 1 and a half minute video.

And I include a video script that you can use as an attachment in post number 8, and I’m also going to go into more detail for how to create thank you pages, so for now just remember that if you make a thank you page in this way it will be tremendously powerful.

Also, if you truly hate doing videos, you could always just write the script in text

instead. However, I honestly think videos have a major advantage these days, especially with the best solo ads because most never ever make videos themselves, and I’ll show you in a future post how to easily create videos even if you’re a tongue tied scaredy-cat.

So you do not have to use a video on your thank you page, but I seriously think you should, because video has more perceived value than text.

Because you’re introducing yourself to your end users. Most people who buy solo ads never ever make a recording of themselves, so you’ll stand out like crazy.

And, even if you don’t have a studio professional voice, then that’s even better. Because your end users will know you’re a real person, which counts for something these days.

And then, below that video, you shall have a button, promoting whatever it is that you’re promoting.

Because in your script, you’ll remind your end users to check their email for the free gift, then you briefly introduce yourself, and briefly introduce your offer, and then you have a call to action, prompting your end users to click the button below the video.

Now you can promote absolutely anything in this video, and the simple script will show you how you can promote anything.

You can promote an affiliate offer. One of your own offers. Maybe a book you wrote. Maybe a network marketing opportunity. Maybe a weight loss plan. Maybe some type of mind hack, or a physical product.

That’s the beauty of this simply squeeze page funnel, it’s so dynamic that you can use it to promote anything in the world.

Now, you’ll also notice, that if your end users exit the thank you page, they get an exit pop.

You don’t need an exit pop on your thank you page, but I would have it, just because if your end users don’t click on the thank you page, then you can still get more clicks out of them by promoting an affiliate offer. I know you might not like to use exit popups, but I’m going to make a stronger case about why exit pops can be used effectively, as long as you don’t abuse them, I’ll talk more about that in another post, for now I just wanted to mention that indeed an exit pop could be places on your thank you page, but it’s not necessary if you don’t want it.

Okay. So to briefly recap. Your end user lands on your squeeze page. They then go on your thank you page. On your thank you page, your video reminds them to check their email for the free gift, and also promotes any offer that you want.

Let’s pretend that your end clicks the call to action on your thank you page. Maybe they buy, maybe they don’t buy.

But, in 15 minutes, let’s pretend that they receive your first email autoresponder email.

I’m going to go into massive detail about how to write killer emails later on, but for now, just remember that your end user will probably be more likely to check their email because you reminded them with the video on the thank you page.

So, pretend that your end users get the email your autoresponder sent, then they click on your download page.

Now, your download is where they can download the free gift that you offered. Your download page is another awesome opportunity to sell something.

Because you can offer them the download, and then under that download, you can promote any other complementary offer that you want.

Maybe there’s a cool affiliate offer you’d like to promote.

Maybe, you could promote another one of your funnels on your download page. Maybe you want to promote an affiliate webinar or something like that.

Maybe you have another book you’d like to plug, or maybe you’re trading clicks with somebody, maybe you’re trading clicks with a trusted partner or something like that.

The point is, do you see how much traffic and how many clicks you’re able to extract from one single end user with this simple little funnel?

There’s no limit to how much you can brand yourself, introduce yourself, make an impact, while promoting anything you want.

That’s why, in my years of developing funnels, this is my favorite style, period.

It takes a little more work to setup than just having some third party affiliate funnel, but remember with this funnel the sky is the limit.

Because you can build rapport, authority and prestige just by introducing yourself and being yourself.

SO your end users already know you, more than they know 95{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5} of other marketers, because most marketers don’t have really cool funnels like this.

In future posts I’m going to go into much more detail on each of these individual components.

But hopefully, this excites you and my goal is to bring a big fat smile to your face when brainstorming all of the cool ways you might run with this.

I’ll see you in the next post.

The single biggest lesson I’ve learned Internet marketing over the years, and buying solo ads in particular, is that you need to know your end users better than anyone else.

It’s more important than your funnel. It’s more important than your squeeze page, and it’s more important than any followup sequence you’ll ever craft.

Because if you don’t know your end users well enough, and if you don’t know about the typical run of the mill solo ad end user, nothing you ever do will sing the right notes.

And, if you know your end users and study them well enough, you’ll connect better than anyone ever will, because 95{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5} of marketers never bother to know their end users to the point of necessity, which is something I advise for you to endeavor.

So, know your end users.

How do your end users talk? What frustrates them? What keeps them up at night? What do they need to believe in order for your solo ad funnel to be successful?

What do they need to believe about you? What do they need to believe about your product? What do they need to believe so that they buy your stuff?

Have you ever played dungeons and dragons? I happen to love dungeons and dragons.

And in dungeons and dragons there’s something called a paper doll. The paper doll represents your character.

It represents what class they are, what they wear, what type of clothing they’re wearing, and it can even represent other things such as their alignment, their race, where they live, and other attributes that tell you everything about them.

What you would be wise to do, is develop a paper doll for your ideal end user, and then cater every single marketing aspect for that paper doll for each solo ad campaign that you ever produce.

This will help target your marketing efforts tremendously.

Suddenly all of your give aways, all of your squeeze pages, all of your email copywriting will be specifically for that one paper doll.

Because remember earlier I talked about the 20/20/60 rule. 20{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5} of people are going to love you.

Well, that 20{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5} of people who are going to love your content, should be represented by your paper doll.

That paper doll is your target market.

It’s important for you to realize that I’ve actually polled thousands of end users, and

I’ve received so much valuable responses from solo ad recipients over the years, and I want to share the general gist with you regarding what I’ve learned.

I’ve learned that the average solo ad recipient, meaning the person who will be joining your list from solo ad traffic, these people are typically hard working, just average people.

They’re not advanced marketers, they’re not looking for advanced marketing tactics.

They are however looking to make money online, they’re looking for self-help stuff, they’re looking for weight loss ideas, and they’re looking for anything that your average human would look for.

I’ve had leads generated from solo ad traffic tell me how they’re frustrated that they don’t have enough money to buy their grandchildren Christmas presents.

I’ve had leads generated from solo ad traffic tell me that they’re struggling authors, and they’re just not selling enough books.

I’ve had leads tell me that they’re not generating enough traffic, and they’re so frustrated that nothing’s working in their business.

And that’s another aspect that’s important for me to tell you; that the average human on the planet, is hurting.

Most businesses are failing, as you know, probably over 95{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5} of businesses are ultimately failing.

So if you can actually help people, and if you care about them, and if you actually empathize and offer your assistance, they’ll be on you like a duck on a June bug, and they’ll thank you for your help.

My advice is to remember that on average, you’re dealing with very broad traffic in the solo ad niche.

So, if you visit a popular solo ad marketplace, odds are you will not have much luck promoting something that’s very niche.

If you’re promoting a solo ad funnel that has to do with making money, health, wealth or sex, you’ll probably be in the right market.

But if you’re selling trombone lessons for people who live in Connecticut, clearly you can see how this might not work.

The more specific your niche, and the narrower your niche, the more you’ll have to seek out unique solo ad vendors.

Does that make sense?

So if you’re promoting a mass market offer, you can have luck with solo ads just by buying solo ads from any reputable marketplace, but if it’s a very niche offer, you probably won’t have much luck, and you’ll have to put in more work finding a targeted list.

So, in summary, remember to always have and always be working from your paper doll, and always remember who you’re trying to target before you spend a red cent on solo ads.

And I want to stress once again knowing your end users. I have some killer tricks on

how to really dig deep and find out what your end users want, and I’ll reveal this in a later post.

For now, start thinking about your paper doll. Imagine what your end users want. What would make them happy? What do your end users need to believe to buy from you? What do your end users need to experience so that they like you, trust you, and open your emails regularly?

To be honest this one thing will make every entrepreneurial endeavor 10 times easier for you in the future.

So practice honing in on your end user demographic, and ask yourself what drives them. Spend time reading what they read, find out what forums they hang out on, and see what they ask. Check to see popular questions they ask on Yahoo Answers, and check to see what they deem to be credible advice. Read reviews for books your demographic reads on Amazon, read the good reviews and the bad reviews.

I tell you, reading a bad review can often times reveal 100x more than a positive review, because a negative review tells you what they hated, so this allows you to potentially fill some gaps in your marketplace.

Another way this helps you tremendously is with all of your copywriting, especially email copywriting.

In the future, when you practice writing a promotional email, or a relationship email, pretend like you’re writing one on one to your paper doll.

It’s something I’m doing all of the time.

It doesn’t matter if I’m writing a solo ad swipe or a blog post or an email to my list. I’m always talking to my paper doll.

And, if you like my content, then you are my 20{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5} target demographic.

The same goes with you. So never be afraid to target your end users in this way, because those who matter don’t mind, and those who mind don’t matter.

I’m going to into more detail specifically in regard to email copywriting that’s so easy to master and a copywriting strategy that will always work, so for now don’t worry about email copywriting but just remember that you should always be writing to your paper doll, because that’s your magical 20{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5}.

I’ll see you in the next post.

In this post I want to talk about everything that you need.

Now, quickly glancing at this list you might be having a heart attack because you never realized that solo ads had so many moving parts.

But the reality is that once you get a few of these pieces taken care of, you’ll realize that it’s all very basic and fundamental.

The reality is that you need a domain and web host for pretty much any Internet project these days.

It doesn’t matter if you’re selling baked cookies, or if you’re a Kindle publisher the reality is that you can benefit tremendously from having your own domain and host.

I know a lot of my end users still don’t have a host or domain even after struggling for years, so my advice is to head over to Namecheap, pick out a cool domain name that you like, and pick the cheapest hosting plan that they have at the moment.

I’ve been using Namecheap for years without a hiccup, and their services are dirt cheap. I’m sure you can get started with a cool domain that you like, and a host for around probably under $20.

Another thing I want to stress here is having WordPress.

I’m not sure if you have WordPress, maybe you’re already a WordPress guru, in which case you’re ahead of the curve, but maybe, you’ve never had WordPress, and are struggling trying to build your own marketing pages.

If that’s the case, I would recommend going over to Namecheap right now, and buy a domain, buy a host, and then, email Namecheap and ask them to install WordPress for you.

It’s that easy, and the Namecheap customer support is there 24/7 and they’ll help you every step of the way.

I know for a fact their support is good, because I bug them nonstop with very complex and advanced settings and they’re always happy to help.

So if you need a WordPress installation, and if you want to start buying and building your list with solo ads I recommend 100{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5}, work with Namecheap.

I’m not affiliate with them in any way, but they’re still my recommended resource

for both a web host and for your domain registrar, and their support is some of the best around these days and I say that absolutely confidently because I’ve had websites hosted on all corners of the web, I like Namecheap the best.

Have you ever heard Link Rot?

Link Rot is when you send thousands or millions of emails, or even if you make hundreds or thousands of blog posts.

Eventually, a phenomenon occurs, where many of your links out there in the wild, become dead.

For whatever reason, maybe the affiliate offer you’re promoting dies, or maybe you stop offering some of your older product line.

But what happens when you have thousands of links in emails across the planet pointing to a dead link?

You’re essentially losing traffic in that case, right?

That’s what we call link rot, and it’s something that kills me. So, the best way to combat link rot, is by using a link cloaker.

A link cloaker is a simple WordPress plugin, that allows you to shorten URLs, cloak affiliate links, and shorten very big ugly affiliate links.

It also allows you to track your clicks, so you know exactly how many clicks you’ve had over time, and you can either see their IP address, and the referring URL.

So there are a million good reasons to use a link cloaker. It makes your links look better, it makes it so you can track your links, and remember how it can battle link rot.

It can battle link rot, because you can change the destination of your link in the back end of WordPress. So in other words, pretend that you had a long affiliate link, you could create a shortened URL for that link, and later on, you can change where that tiny link goes to.

So, all I have to do is go in the plugin settings within WordPress, and I can change the destination of that cloaked URL.

Does that make sense? I know this can be confusing if you’ve never done this before, so please leave a comment later on to let me know if link rot makes sense, and how having a link cloaker benefits you several times over.

Also, I wanted to recommend the free plugin called Pretty Link Lite, which is one of the few WordPress plugins that I absolutely recommend for all list builders.

It’s a link tracker, a link cloaker, a link shortener, and it battles link rot like nothing else can.

It’s a good idea to have a spreadsheet to keep track of all of your website URLs.

When you really start email marketing, you’re going to have a ton of affiliate links, a ton of your own links for your own products, and links to your funnel pages.

It can be a real pain if there isn’t a central hub with all of this information written down.

And you can really just use a free version of Apache Open Office, or Libre Office, however I personally prefer Microsoft Office 365, it’s only $10 a month and allows other awesome tools, such as Powerpoint and Word, but really Apache Open Office and Libre Office both offer comparable tools for free, I just happen to prefer Microsoft Office 365.

And you don’t have to be an excel guru to make a good list of all of your links.

I recommend having a tab for affiliate links, a tab for your own links, and a tab for any and all statistics that you track.

This will just make your life 10x easier, and as you buy more traffic, and as you have more links, I promise this will help maintain your marbles.

The next thing that you need is an email autoresponder service.

I recommend Aweber, because I’ve been using their services since 2011 every single day without a problem.

I’ve sent well over a million promotional emails with Aweber, and their deliverability is on point.

I’ve even asked Aweber for custom code once not too long ago and they were cool enough to help me out with that, so I can’t recommend them enough.

Also, I do want to clear up some confusion.

A lot of people get confused with what the word “Autoresponder” means, and that’s because it’s two different things.

An email autoresponder service is the actual service that stores all of your leads for you. An autoresponder service provides great deliverability and allows you to email your leads from their online-based software.

It also allows your leads to “opt- out” of your list, which is vitally important, because when your leads opt -out of your list, you really should never email them again, which is good news because Aweber automatically removes anyone who requests it from your list, immediately.

And that’s what an autoresponder service is. That’s compared to an autoresponder sequence.

An autoresponder sequence is a prewritten sequence of emails that are sent out at a set interval.

So, you could write 360 emails, and have those emails sent out every day at 6:00 PM, or whatever time you wanted, every single day.

You could masterfully craft these emails so that they build rapport, poll your audience, ask them questions, help them, and of course promote any offer that you want.

You also might want to have a page builder.

The page builders that I have used all work 100{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5} seamlessly on WordPress, which is another reason that you really need to have WordPress.

And I’ve used basically all of the different Page Builders over the years. If you name a page builder, I’ve probably used it and tested it extensively.

That being said, there’s one I prefer above all others, and the name of it is “Thrive Content Builder”.

And Thrive Content Builder is my favorite for a number of reasons.

First, it’s the lightest, and cleanest page builder I’ve ever had the pleasure of using. Second, it’s a one-time sunk cost, so you don’t have to continually pay for updates.

Third, it’s ultra-fast, and ultra-sleek, and there are dozens upon dozens of templates you can use.

I honestly could rant and rave why Thrive Content Builder is the best page builder for years, but it seems like every couple of days they have an awesome update adding more features.

I mean you can create absolutely any type of marketing page with Thrive Content Builder.

You can create squeeze pages, thank you pages, review pages, sales pages, download pages, webinar registration pages, you can build any type of marketing page period with Thrive Content Builder.

I recommend it above all other page builders, and it’s cheap, a onetime cost, and it installs easily on WordPress, so you don’t have to write a line of code to have awesome and beautiful squeeze pages that are perfect for a solo ad funnel.

And, just a quick FYI – a page builder isn’t necessarily required, because really you can create all of these pages if you have a good enough theme.

The thing is, a page builder is designed for marketers, it’s designed so you can create beautiful marketing pages, and I highly recommend it.

The solo ad funnel is basically a combination of smaller components we’re about to get into and better define.

For example, a solo ad funnel contains your free giveaway, your squeeze page, a thank you page, a download page, and the overall theme. These are all components of your overall solo ad funnel.

A good solo ad funnel will build rapport, generate goodwill, and prestige, while allowing you to monetize your traffic, and of course build your list.

Your free give away should be something that actually provides real value to your end users.

You should very proud of whatever you’re giving away.

Historically, I have had the best luck giving away some of my best content for free.

This really enables you to go above and beyond, and over deliver like crazy to your end users.

So you can develop prestige, goodwill, and respect among your future tribe.

Of course I’m going to go into much more detail in future posts, but for now just remember that you should be proud of your giveaway, especially if you want to build a relationship that lasts a lifetime, which should be your goal.

Your squeeze page is the most important part of your solo ad funnel.

Remember that your squeeze page is the entry point to your funnel, and the gateway to your tribe.

Meaning, if your end users click on your squeeze page, but then they don’t subscribe, you’re missing out, you ultimately lose them as your tribe-mate, probably forever, because it’s unlikely that they’ll visit your squeeze page again.

For that reason, it’s imperative that your squeeze page is awesome.

Your squeeze page should be very short, to the point, concise, and it must load quickly.

And when I say short, it should be really short. It should be able to be consumed in less than 5 seconds, because if you give your end users too much content on your squeeze page…

Then you face the risk of them getting bored, and disinterested, and ultimately exiting out of the page before opting in.

The squeeze page should be designed in a way that presells your offer, and it can presell any offer, but never lose sight of the fact that it needs to be concise and to the point, so your end users read it and understand the call to action very quickly.

Your thank you page is the page that your end users see immediately after subscribing.

The thank you page, ideally, should be a video of you introducing yourself, thanking your end user for subscribing, remaindering them to check their email for the free gift that they requested on the sales page, and after you’ve done that, and thanked them dearly…

I would recommend talking about whatever offer it is you want to promote.

So, immediately after your end users subscribe on your squeeze page, they should be directed to your thank you page. Don’t direct them to their download immediately, because it’s better for your list long-term and short-term if you use this time to build rapport with your end users.

You can do that simply by introducing yourself. By simply saying “Thanks for subscribing, please check your email to get your free gift, but first”….

And then after you say “but first” comes your marketing message.

We’re going to talk more about your thank you page in greater detail in a later post, for now just remember that most people do this wrong, so they never build the prestige.

They never introduce themselves. They never make themselves special. They blow this opportunity.

And remember this one fact, the moment after your end users subscribe, is the one moment you are guaranteed their attention 100{2812a1b5701991a1db090a8ca53b2b2000efe8bbefec0c55335c900f6749bac5}.

Never assume that your subscriber will read your emails after they subscribe. The sad fact is, it’s easy for them to ignore you.

That’s why it’s important for you to REMIND them to check their email for their gift right after you subscribe, because it trains them to not only open and click your emails, but it also gives you an opportunity to help build more prestige, and gives

you a chance to get more clicks from the same amount of subscribers.

What I mean by that, is since your end user will opt-in, and view the video on your thank you page, they will have a chance to click whatever offer you promote on the thank you page.

Then, they open your email, and click on the download page containing their free gift. And on that download page, you can offer even more of your offers, giving you a statistically higher chance of them buying something, and you can also use the download page to build even more prestige and rapport.

It’s important that you don’t direct your subscribers to your download page immediately after they subscribe.

Instead, give them access to your download page in the first email followup.

On your download page, you can give your subscriber access to their free gift, and you can also promote anything else that you want.

This allows you to generate prestige by following through on your word, because they get the free gift, and you can also promote any offer that you want.

This is so important because the more chances you have to sell your stuff, the more likely you are to recoup your marketing buy, so you can continue to buy more solo ads, and grow your tribe bigger and bigger.

Also remember that you could promote your social media presence on your download page. Maybe you could promote your Facebook page, your Twitter account, your Google Plus, or even your LinkedIn.

You might ask why would I do that, and remember that you want to build relationships with your subscribers that lasts a lifetime.

This is so much easier to accomplish if they see your Facebook account, if they see you on LinkedIn.

Other email marketers won’t be able to compete with you even remotely because you have such a grassroots approach to email marketing, and you prove that you’re a real human with real emotions, making it so your subscribers know you better and like you better than anyone else.

When I talk about your followup plan, I’m asking that this is the best part of building a list.

You should have fun with this. The more fun you have, the more creative you’ll be, and remember that creativity is more important than knowledge.

So you can build prestige, poll your audience, build rapport, ask your end users questions all via an automated followup.

You can monetize your followup plan also, you can include links to your network marketing offers, your affiliate offers, your own products, or coaching offers.

And, there’s one thing that you should include in your followup plan for the biggest impact, but I’m going to reveal that in a later post, so keep your eyes open for the best followup plan in a later post).

You also need a trustworthy solo ad vendor.

Remember that you could have the best solo ad funnel on the planet, but what happens if nobody wants to promote it?

That’s why you should get to know your solo ad vendor if possible.

Build rapport with them. Try to make it a two-way relationship so that you and the vendor benefit for as long as possible.

Be nice to your solo ad vendor! If they like you, they’re more prone to offer discounts, and they are more likely to send you bonus traffic, so you get more traffic than you ordered.

And finally, the last thing you need is something to promote in the back end. And what I mean by that, is what is your long-term strategy?

Do you have a recurring affiliate offer, or a network marketing offer, or a high ticket offer that you ultimately want to promote?

If so, plan on how you can do that. Plan the email followup sequences. Plan how you want to position your offer.

Maybe you just want to be an affiliate marketer, so you have no solid long-term strategy other than to promote affiliate offers?

Either way, remember that when you have a plan, you can easily track your results.

If you have absolutely no plan, it’s almost always impossible to track your results, so get a plan.

Even if it’s simple, please write down your plan, and your long-term goals, so that you can track them, and adjust them if your goals are not being met.

If you don’t write down your goals, it’s easy to lose sight, and ultimately you’ll never improve anything, because you won’t know whether or not you’re on target or not.

So I want to summarize this post by saying how overwhelming all of this can be. But I want to reassure that it’s less than what it seems.

In reality, I could craft a solo ad funnel in 15 minutes.

I already have a domain and a host, I already have an email autoresponder, I already have a page builder, I already have squeeze pages setup, so really, when I setup a new funnel…

The only thing I have to do is get cool give away that I want to offer, I’ll setup a thank you page, and a download page, and I’ll send traffic.

Of course, I don’t want you to get overwhelmed on any of these steps, because I’m going to show you the steps in greater detail in future modules.

In the meantime, if you ever get lost, or ever get stuck, remember that you can ask me and I’ll reply within 24 hours. I’m a real marketing nerd and I’m always around, so feel free to ask.

Also remember that you should return to this post any time you want, so if you ever get lost, or ever get stuck, refer to this post, because it’s the map detailing everything that you need.

Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next post.