Email newsletters are an important part of marketing, but how do you put an opt-in option on your website so that poeple can sign up to your newsletter?”

There are a number of different ways that you can do this yourself. Two simple ways you can do this are covered here.

First of all, if you want to manage your email list manually, you can add a simple form to your website that will collect the subscriber’s information - email address - and send you an email with that info. This is a simple solution if you don’t want to have to try to figure out how to use a mailing list program - but it also means that you have to manage the list, and transfer the email addresses from the emails you get into a spreadsheet or whatever you are using to build your email list. This may be more hassle then it is worth, or it may work perfectly for you. The main thing is to find what works for you!

Form Experts

To add a form to your website, I recommend using this service, Form Experts - the Fastest and Easiest-to-Use Website Forms, Guaranteed. Advantage Website Solutions uses this service for our forms, and for our clients, and we have found it to be exceptional! You can make as many forms as you need for your website, and the service is inexpensive at less than $50/year. The form building tools are easy to use. You can use these forms without any knowledge of html or any other kind of programming. You can set your own display options, such as color, font, size and form fields. You choose what email address you want the notifications to be sent to and whether or not you want an autoresponder to send an email to the subscriber automatically.

To put the form into your website, there are two different methods to choose from. You can let Form Experts host the form - for this option you would have a url to link to your form. We use this option a fair bit and just have the link open in a new window, so the visitor does not have to actually leave your website to subscribe. The other option is to put the form right into your webpage. Form Experts automatically generates the html code for your form, and you simply copy and paste it into your website, or link to the version of the form that is hosted by them. Both of these methods are easy and simple. Form Experts does all the work - you just get to sit there and receive the subscriptions in your email inbox!

Mailing List Software

Another option that we also use is mailing list software. Our preferred provider of this is BlueHost.com, where you can also get excellent web hosting, blogging tools, and many many other options for your website. We love that they have partnered with other programs and offer so many fantastic tools to their customers!

One of the software programs they offer is PHP List, which is a mailing list program that will manage your subscriptions as well as your actual email newsletters. You can do it all from this program! The set up is fairly simple and involves customizing your subscribe pages, and the emails sent to your subscribers to confirm, etc. You can add your own logo to the pages to customize it, as well. PHP List handles all of the details like adding new email addresses to your list, sending automated confirmation emails, as well as including easy links to unsubscribe as well in each email newsletter. You can design your newsletter right in the PHP List interface and automatically send it out to your mailing list.

To integrate PHP List into your website, you simply have to add your subscribe link (you’ll find it in the PHP List management page) to your website, wherever you want it, for people to click on - PHP List does the rest!

You can use PHP List by itself without signing up for a BlueHost account. If you do not need the web hosting or the other cool programs BlueHost offers, then you can go straight to PHPList.com and use it alone - but don’t forget that BlueHost has it all in one place - hosting, domains, blogging, mail list, photo albums and more, and it’s not expensive (less than $100/year for everything)!

Which option do you choose? This will depend on what you are comfortable with, and what works best for you and your business! But if you need some assistance, or suggestions, or just some coaching to help you set it up, don't be afraid to contact someone who can help you!