Two quick questions.

Question 1: If you do not have a mailing list now and I offered to give you mine would you take it?

Question 2: If you had a list of 10,000 people and I offered to give you 10,000 more would you take it?

Of course you would!

Having a list, and knowing what to do with it, are THE keys to succeeding online. I’ve said it before – all successful online businesses have a list of their own. Period.

But HOW do you build that list? That is the question!

While there are many ways to build a list (and I cover many of them here on the blog) almost all of them start with a Lead Magnet.

NOTE: If you are not familiar with what a Lead Magnet is, and why you need one, click here to read my article about it. The article will open in a new window.

In a recent survey of questions I receive from readers and members, it became clear that most people struggle to create a great lead magnet.

Make no mistake – getting your lead magnet right is a big deal. BIG. I mean the difference between a 10% conversion on your squeeze page and 40% conversion. Many case studies bear this out.

So let’s look together at two factors.

• FACTOR 1 – What makes a great lead magnet?

• FACTOR 2 – How can you create a great lead magnet almost instantly.

FACTOR 1 – WHAT MAKES A GREAT LEAD MAGNET?

If you ask 10 successful marketers what makes a great lead magnet you will often get 14 different answers!

• “Give all you can – give until it hurts!” Say some.

• “Tease them but don’t please them.” Say others.

• And then there is the good old “Lead magnet quality doesn’t matter” crowd.

All wrong by the way.

So what SHOULD a great lead magnet contain?

Here are two lists. One of the types of content and one with ideas so you can make your own checklist.

LEAD MAGNET CONTENT FORMATS

• PDF Reports work incredibly well. PDFs live on our computers forever. I recently searched my Google Drive for a file and found PDFs going back to 2003!

• A Toolkit or List of Resources is very popular.

• A Quiz or Survey can work very well in some niches.

• Cheat Sheets are super-popular choices. If the name “cheat” sheet worries you, don’t let it. No one is cheating but rather using a common phrase for saving time. I saw a “cheat sheet” lead magnet on John Maxwell’s site yesterday. And believe me, he does not advocate cheating.

• Video Training works well when done right. The key here is to compare the FORMAT you choose with the PRINCIPLES below. So no super-long videos if you are targeting cold traffic.

LEAD MAGNET PRINCIPLES

This list is important, so please copy these down or print this out for your own use.

Principle 1 – Super SPECIFIC.

Your lead magnet needs to make ONE big promise. Solve ONE big problem. Offer ONE big solution.

Principle 2 – Something Your Market WANTS.

If you don’t know enough about your niche to KNOW what they want you need to do more research.

Finding out what people want, and will buy, is easy to do and oh so important if you want to make maximum sales while spending minimum marketing dollars.

Principle 3 – IMMEDIATE Gratification

Lead magnets need to be instantly consumable. While this is not a hard and fast rule, it does apply to 99% of marketing situations I encounter.

The exception is where you need to educate prospects before asking for the order. Even then a easy-to-consume followed by a mini-course is a better idea than a 100 page eBook.

People want what they want NOW. So give it to them.

Principle 4 – Get the VALUE Proposition Right

Your lead magnet must have both a high perceived value and high actual value. I give away a $47 eBook in one niche (I actually sold many of them at $47, so can say that with integrity) and it works very well.

No one doubts the book has value. And everyone is helped by learning what the book teaches.

And it sets up the sale of my product beautifully.

FACTOR 2: SO WHAT ABOUT CREATING LEAD MAGNETS INSTANTLY?

Here’s the fun part. You can create lead magnets all day long, and almost instantly, using this one simple idea.

Ready? It’s so simple it is easy to miss.

Take five of your best articles and put them together into a special report and make THAT your lead magnet.

Told you it was simple. And SO effective!

IF YOU HAVE ARTICLES TO USE NOW

If you have been writing articles (and you should) then you have it made in the shade. All you need to do is take your five best articles on ONE topic and make them into a lead magnet.

But don’t just copy the articles – take a moment and grab the real “nut” of the article (the most actionable part) and use that part.

Then string 3 to 5 articles together into one short but compelling plan of action about a SPECIFIC topic.

Now save that rascal as a PDF and you are good to go!

Do you need a fancy shmancy book cover? Nope. Just make a title page using a big font (like 68 point) and you are good to go.

HOT TIP: Make the second page of the report (the first page is the title) be all about you or your company. How you help people. Your URL. Your Facebook. This is branding you!

IF YOU DO NOT HAVE ARTICLES TO USE NOW

If you don’t have articles now search for PLR products you can buy for a reasonable price. All you need to do is Google your niche and PLR and you should find plenty.

For example, I Googled “Paleo Diet” + PLR and found 67,000 sites.

HINT: Notice how I added quotes to Paleo Diet? That’s because I want BOTH words (Paleo AND Diet) to show in the results.

So there you have it. Instant (almost) lead magnets anytime you want them.

I just counted and I have written 43 lead magnets using very similar ideas to this one. To be completely transparent, I use transcripts from my videos, articles and parts of my books in lead magnets all the time.

But my FAVORITE method of all is the one I shared with you today.

So go forth and build your lead magnet today. When you get the lead magnet right you will build your list faster, make more sales from that list and have happier readers too.

And those are beautiful things indeed!