The best way to grow an email list is to do it slowly and organically, so that the contacts are really engaged and can become the top notch followers you want. Keep sending awesome and relevant content and you'll see your list grow.

The best practice

 If you just started your business, or just launched your website, you probably don't have an email list to send to. So, create a form on your website to collect new subscribers.

Once you have your signup form link you can share it.

• Link to your signup form from every page of your website (you might add a link to your footer, or side navigation).
• Ask everyone in your company to put a link to the email signup form in your email signature.
• Add your signup form link to your invoices.
• Offer free giveaways to one lucky subscriber.
• Post free whitepapers or helpful articles on your site, which contain "ads" for your email newsletter.
• Send out personal, one-to-one emails to all your clients, and ask them to please sign up to your newsletter.
• In your "Contact Us" form on your website, add a checkbox to "sign up for our newsletter".
• Add an "opt-in for our newsletter" checkbox in your ecommerce checkout page.

Already Have a List of Customers?

Even though someone is a current or past customer of yours, they may not want to receive emails from you. 

Let's suppose you have a list of customer email addresses and you want to start sending them email marketing, but you don't have their permission yet. Many people mark any mail they weren’t expecting or don’t want as spam, even if they know it isn’t spam. This can cause problems for email marketers, business owners, and ESPs likeTurbo-SMTP.

Send a "Re-Introduction Email" from your regular email address (not a bulk email servic like Turbo-SMTP). Put together a personal note like you would write to a friend. Include the link to your signup form in the emails. This signup process is effective.

It is not good to:

Purchasing or renting a list is the worst way to build a loyal following. Although it isn't illegal to purchase a list, it isn't permitted by turbo-SMTP Terms of Use. When someone sends bulk email to a purchased list, it's considered spam. Purchased lists don't contain loyal customers or friends.