garriewilson.com

In the past, I required people to opt-in to my list before I allowed them to receive their purchased item and in all my years online, no ever complained. That I can remember.

I thought it was a good idea. After all, I wanted to build my list and having a list of actual buyers is worth more than a list of freebie seekers.

Then one day on the Warrior Forum, the topic came up (as it does many times) and Paul Myers of TalkBiz News convinced me that the practice wasn’t a good one. I don’t remember all the reasons Paul gave me, it was well over a year go, but below are some that I have seen others state recently.

1. Requiring people to opt-in after paying, if not disclosed ahead of time, is changing the terms of the sale. Remember, the buyer agreed upon a price for the product and part of the price wasn’t being required to join an email list.
    
2. Opt-In is an option. If you require it, you are removing the choice.
    
3. PayPal & other 3rd party processors may terminate your account.
    
4. 3rd party email services may terminate your account if they get just a few complaints.

Now the question is how do you email your paying clients if you don’t require the opt-in?

The answer is pretty simple. You don’t have to require an opt-in. After all, they are now your clients and you can legally contact them. You just need to make sure you follow CAN-Spam and the terms of service for your host and/or email list service.

However, having them on your list makes it easier to manage, email and stay compliant. And there are, at least, three ways to put buyers on your list without requiring an opt-in and they are:

1. Automate it. Most of the payment systems pass the buyers details so you can use scripts to automatically add them in the background. If you use this method, you may want to let them know either on the “thank you” page or remind them in the first email.
    
2. Ask for it on the download page. On my “thank you” pages, I just ask for it in a step process. If you do this, just make sure you tell them exactly what they will be receiving. You can download a template I use HERE.
    
3. Use an optional squeeze page.This one works really well. It’s just a page with verbiage that says “To complete your purchase” and has a check box to bypass being added to a list. Of course it also has needs to state what types of emails they will be receiving. You can download a template I use HERE.

I use all three of the above methods and generally, I use method 2 with one of the others, and have great results.

Remember, there isn’t a good reason to require people to do something they may not want to and haven’t been told about upfront.

Take Care,

Garrie

Note: The template forms are for GetResponse and also use PHP code to pre-fill the name and email fields with data passed from ClickBank orders. You may modify them for your needs but they are provided as-is and with no support.

Garrie Wilson buyers, ClickBank, get response, getresponse, opt-in, paul myers, required, squeeze, talkbiz