21 Irresistible Types of Lead Magnets to Grow your Email List With (with Examples)
I had an interesting conversation with a good friend Sarah the other day.
Sarah is currently working in corporate America, she’s unhappy and she wants to start her own business online.
Sure, Sarah is fully aware of the 90% failure rate of most online businesses, but she is ready to move full steam ahead with her business.
I decided to check in with Sarah months after she launched her business online. She was pretty overwhelmed, confused and frustrated with her progress.
She hadn’t landed a single client, nor was she able to get any new solid business leads from her website.
I realized after following up with Sarah, that she was missing one of the most critical + essential components that every online business should have:
A lead magnet to help her build a sales funnel…
In this post, I will cover 21 types of irresistible lead magnets to build an email list with and get prospects into your sales funnels.
Why Adding a Lead Magnet to Your Site to Build an Email List Is Important
Here’s the thing:
A very high percentage of the visitors that make their way to your site may never return.
They are usually not ready to buy anything from you or do business right away — and are generally just browsing your site to find out more about you.
This is why having a lead magnet of some sort in place to offer your visitors to capture information from them to get them into your sales funnel is extremely important.
What is a Lead Magnet – Exactly?
Lead magnets are usually content based guides that solve a specific problem for your audience that you can offer from your site in exchange for a person’s email address or other contact information.
BlogMarketingAcademy – Lead Magnet Example
Here’s something that you need to remember:
The main goal of lead capturing is to secure a visitor’s contact information so that you can build a list of business leads and get them into your sales funnel.
I first discovered the concept of lead magnets after joining an accountability + marketing group 3 years ago and have added them to my sites for several reasons:
- To build an email list of potential peeps interested in my brand
- To effectively cultivate a relationship and build trust with readers that subscribe to my list
- To at some point, convert my email subscribers into customers
They key to getting visitors to opt in for your lead magnet is to offer them a resource with a very high perceived value — as in something that they can take, use and implement right away.
What Qualifies As a High Converting Lead Magnet?
Anyone can throw something together and try using it as a lead magnet. However, there are a few things that separate good lead magnets from bad ones and they are as follows:
1: Your lead magnet needs to solve a specific problem for your target audience.
This is simply a matter of figuring out what your audience is struggling with and creating a lead magnet that solves that problem.
2. It needs to be “valuable”.
As in something that your readers can use and implement right away in their businesses + more importantly get immediate results from.
3. It needs to have a headline that gets your visitors Attention.
As with writing blog posts, email newsletters, and other content on the web, headlines matter. Here’s a little secret, whenever I am writing any type of content:
I almost always work on my titles first.
Why?
Because I know that clickable titles will make or break whether or not your visitors take a closer look at your offers.
If you need help with creating great titles and headlines for your lead magnet check out this post. Huge thanks and shout out to one of friends and fellow bloggers @CandiceEllenCarter for letting me know about the EMV Headline Analyzer.
4. It needs to have visual appeal
Lead magnets with great designs are more likely to increase your conversion rates and compel visitors to opt in for your offers.
5. Last but not least, your lead magnet should have a very strong and clear call to action.
Simply stated, your lead magnet should clearly tell your visitors what they need to do to get access to it.
Some examples of calls to actions that you can add to your lead magnet are:
- Download the Free Guide Now
- Get Instant Access to this Free Toolkit …
These calls to action’s should be prominently displayed and tell visitors what to do to get access to it.
Tools for Creating and Designing Your Lead Magnets
There are a few tried and true tools and resources that I use to create most of my lead magnets.
The thing that I love about using these tools is that even if you don’t have design experience or access to more advanced graphic design software like Adobe Photoshop or productivity apps like MS Office, you can still easily create attractive and eye catching lead magnets for your site.
YourChicGeek Lead Magnet Example
Some of my favorite tools for creating and designing lead magnets are:
#1: Canva – a tried and true resource that I use to design 99% of my lead magnets. Canva is super easy to use and has a ton of templates that you can just download, edit and use to design lead magnets in a matter of minutes.
(Psssttt: If you want to learn how to design awesome lead magnets with Canva for your business, check out this Free Webinar)
#2: Photopea.com – the resource that I use to mockup the lead magnets that I create via Canva. Photopea is a photoshop alternative that makes it easy peasy to design mockups of your lead magnets like a CHAMP!
Photopea Screenshot: A Photoshop Alternative for Creating Mockups
#3: Google Docs – a cloud based word processing app for creating documents of all kinds. This is another resource that I have used in the past to create lead magnets and PDF’s.
Here’s a tip for ya:
Whenever I am looking for design inspiration for my lead magnets, I create a board in Pinterest and Pin images that I like and refer to them later for my design projects.
Example – Pinterest Design Inspiration Board
Adding Opt-In Forms to Your Site
In order to get visitors to opt-in to your offers on your site, you will need to first strategically place email opt-in forms or landing pages on your website to collect their contact information.
The key to your opt in forms is to make sure that you are making a specific offer tied to your lead magnet and not just a form asking your visitors to sign up for your email newsletter.
Three tools that you can use to create attractive opt-in forms for your lead magnets site are:
Sending Your Lead Magnet to New Subscribers
After you have created a title for your lead magnet, designed it, and added opt in forms to your site, you will need to setup an email autoresponder to deliver the lead magnet to your subscribers when they opt in for your offers.
Two of the most popular and reliable email marketing services that you can use to send your lead magnets to subscribers are:
- Aweber (aff link) – $19 per month
- Active Campaign – around $29 per month
This process normally works as follows:
Step 1: A reader visits your website and see’s your lead magnet
Step 2: The reader enters their contact information into an opt in form or landing page that you have added to your site to download a copy of your lead magnet
Step 3: You set up an autoresponder message via your email marketing service provider to send your new subscriber a link to download your lead magnet
Step 4: The lead magnet is then delivered to your new subscriber…
Easy peasy right?
Types of Lead Magnets To Build an Email List With (Plus Examples of Each)
Alrighty peeps, so we’ve come to the good part, the epic list of 21 types of lead magnets that you can use to generate new leads for your online startup. Here is the list (with examples) to get your creative juices flowing:
#1: eBooks
Example: AdEspresso eBook on Facebook Advertising Do’s and Don’ts
If you struggle with eBook design and want to use them to grow your email list, these ready made eBook templates will help you crank out EPIC ebooks in no time with Canva.
Ad Espresso – eBook on Faecbook Ads Dos and Donts
#2: Checklists
Example: The 60 Second Lead Magnet Checklist from Boom Social
#3: Worksheets
Example: Digital Marketer’s Customer Avatar Worksheet
#4: Workbook
Example: The Ultimate SEO Strategy for your Etsy Shop (ChristinaSEO.com)
Oh and just so you know, I have workbook templates available to help you create EPIC workbooks to grow your email list with. You can check them out right here.
#5. Audio CDs and Trainings
Example: How to Get What You Want Audio Training Marie Forleo
#6: Email Courses
Example: Dawn Murray’s Healthy Home with Essential Oils 17-Day eCourse
#7: Mini Courses
Example: Freebies that Serve and Sell Mini Course from Kate Doster
#8: Cheat Sheets
Example: John Morrow’s Cheatsheet to Writing Headlines that Go Viral
#9: Tip Lists
Example: YourChicGeek.com 10 Types of Branded Graphics You Can Create with Canva
#10: Tip Sheets
Example: YourChicGeek 15 Things Serious Bloggers Do
#11: FAQ Sheets
Example: Certified CCOF What Does Organic Mean?
#12: Video Courses
Example: Alejandra’s FREE 3-Day “Get Organized” Video Series
#13: Swipe Files
Example: Digital Marketers Social Media Swipe File
#14: Webinar Replays
Example: Brendan Burns from Mastering Instagram Webinar
#15: Planners
Example: What Mommy Does 2017 Blog Planner
#16: Calendars
Example: ThriveHive’s 2016 Marketing Calendar
#17: Action Plans
Example: Affliate Marketing Action Plan PLR and Guide
#18: Toolkits
Example: Insight Squared Building an Inside Team Toolkit
#19: Starter Kits
Example: Natalie Sisson Suitcase Starter Kit
#20: Industry Reports
Example: Social Media Examiner Annual State of Marketing Industry Report
#21: Product Samples and Demos
Examples: Free 30-Day Demo of Notion Software
As you can see, there are quite a few types of lead magnets that you can add to your site to encourage new visitors to opt-in for your offers.
Your Next Steps and Action Plan
Here is quick run down and action plan that you can use to create a lead magnet to launch your site with:
- Find one problem that you can solve for your prospects
- Decide what type of lead magnet you want to create (checklist, cheat sheet, workbook, eBook etc)
- Name your lead magnet
- Create + Design your lead magnet
- Add opt in-forms or a landing page associated with your lead magnet to your site to collect email addresses
- Setup an autoresponder to deliver your lead magnet to your subscribers
Here’s a printable and list of the 21 types of lead magnets mentioned in this post. I would love if you would share it on Pinterest with your peeps!
By the way….if you want to learn more about creating lead magnets to get new business leads into your sales funnel? The Lights Canva Action course shows you how. Click here to learn more about it.
Have Feedback or Comments that You Want to Leave?
Please comment below and also share this post with others on social media. Thanks peeps!
Exclusive BONUS: Do you have a lead magnet to help build your sales funnel? If you don’t then click to download my step by step checklist for creating + launching your first lead magnet.
This post contains some affiliate links….
