80 | 6 ways to collaborate with other business owners & grow your email list
6 Ways to Collaborate with other Business Owners
This post may contain affiliate links. This means we may receive a commission if you make a purchase via these links.
Collaborating with other business owners is one of the best ways to expand your network and grow your business. In this episode, I’m sharing 6 different ways that you can collaborate with other small business owners and leverage each others audiences to grow your email list, build your authority and scale your online business.
LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:
🔗 Episode 79: The benefits of collaboration for online business owners
🔗 FREE: 18 Ways to Grow Your Audience Through Collaboration
🔗 Episode 56: How I grew my email list by 4k+ in one week (without paid ads)
🔗 Use Thrivecart to host your own affiliate program (affiliate link)
🔗 Create your own affiliate program (affiliate link)
🔗 Affiliate resources from Zoe (affiliate link)
want to listen instead?
Many online business owners spend too much time thinking about their competitors, comparing themselves and trying to compete with what others are doing. Instead, why not take advantage of the similar audiences you both have and team up for a strategic collaboration where you can leverage each other's audiences to grow?
Collaborations are a great way to grow your audience because they’re designed to…
Boost your brand awareness & visibility
Establish your authority & present yourself as an industry expert
Expand your audience & grow your email list
Build your credibility through referrals & word-of-mouth marketing
Connect with like-minded entrepreneurs
Speed up the audience growth process
>> Grab my free guide: 18 Ways to Grow Your Audience Through Collaboration
Collaboration Level: Easy
If you’re a bit of a newbie when it comes to collaboration, I’m going to begin with a couple of really easy ways you can start your collaboration journey, that don’t require too much effort.
1. FREEBIE SWAPS
Freebie swaps are one of the quickest and easiest ways to collaborate with someone. All you have to do is share your partner’s lead magnet with your audience, either through email or social media, and highlight how your audience will benefit from the lead magnet. Your partner does the same for you and you both get to grow your audience with people who are genuinely interested in your subject area.
Freebie swaps are becoming increasingly popular, and you can always find people who are willing to collaborate in free Facebook groups! Or, you could simply reach out to an online business friend and see if they would be willing to do a freebie swap with you.
2. PODCAST AD SWAPS
If you have a podcast and you want to bring in new listeners, what better way to attract those listeners than sharing your show with listeners of another podcast? You already know they like to listen to podcasts, and they’re already on the platform when they hear your ad, so it’s pretty easy for them to hop over to your show and subscribe if they like the sound of it.
To do this, you can reach out to other podcast hosts in a similar industry to your own (but not directly competing) and once you’ve found a host willing to collaborate, have them record a 30-60 second ad where they talk about your show and encourage their listeners to go and listen to your podcast, and do the same in return for them! You might agree to leave this live for a set number of episodes or weeks - iron out the details with your collab partner and you’re good to go!
Collaboration Level: Medium
If you have a little more time on your hands and you want to step it up a level, I’m going to share two more ways to collaborate that require more time and effort, but can bring really great results!
3. CONTRIBUTING TO BUNDLES
Contributing to free or paid bundles is a great way to grow your email list quickly! If you’re not familiar with bundles, it’s where a group of experts get together and all contribute one of their (usually paid) digital products to the bundle. Anyone who signs up for the bundle is able to get this paid resource for free for a limited time. In return, you grow your email list with anyone who opts in for your resource!
The best thing about it is that those who sign up for the bundle have a choice. They’re not automatically added to every contributor’s email list or given their gift - they get to pick and choose which gifts they sign up for. And this means that, as a contributor, you are only getting qualified leads on your list. People who are genuinely interested in the topics you teach on and likely want to learn more. So bundles really do allow you to boost your visibility and bring in new leads in such a short space of time.
4. SPEAKING AT SUMMITS
A virtual summit is an online event that brings together industry experts, business leaders, and speakers. These experts then have a slot where they can talk about or host a presentation on their topic of expertise. Summits can either be live or pre-recorded and may take place in a range of different formats from masterclass-style trainings to interviews with the host. Some summits may even be audio-only!
As a summit speaker, you’re given a platform intended solely for you to showcase your expertise and knowledge on a particular subject. When leveraged correctly, you can build your authority and present yourself as the go-to-expert for your area of expertise (particularly if you’re speaking at multiple summits). And with most summits, you’re given the opportunity to share a free resource along with your presentation. Those who watch & resonate with your talk are likely to sign up for your resource, growing your email list with targeted leads who actually want to hear from you.
Collaboration Level: Advanced
Now, if you’re a bit more experienced with collaboration and you’re able to dedicate more to it, there are a number of more advanced strategies you can try! These strategies will require a significant amount of effort, time and resources, but they will ultimately garner the best results!
5. HOST YOUR OWN SUMMIT OR BUNDLE EVENT
Instead of always contributing to bundles and summits, why not host your own?! I won’t lie, it will be a lot of work as you have to plan the event, find contributors, create all the assets, run the event… there is a long to-do list! But, the results are 10x better!
As the event host, everyone who registers is then added to your email list (unlike when you’re a contributor or speaker and you only get the emails of those who sign up for your gift) so you have the opportunity to add thousands of new subscribers to your list within a week or two (or however long your event promotion lasts).
I’ve never hosted a summit (yet), but I have hosted multiple bundles and every time, I add thousands of new subscribers to my email list! If you’re curious about my experience, I did actually talk about this in episode 56.
6. CREATE AN AFFILIATE PROGRAM
The beauty of having your own affiliate program is that your clients and students promoting your paid offers for you! They do the hard work for you so that your offers are being marketed and sold on autopilot, even if you’re taking a break from launching!
Plus, when you have an affiliate program, your customers are actively sharing about their experience working with you and telling their audience how great you are! This will work to significantly increase your brands credibility, build trust and establish you as the go-to person within your industry. And the only time you pay out is when a sale is made, so you can never lose money (unlike with ads).
If you want to set up your own affiliate program, I highly recommend learning from Zoe Pollard! I used her course (affiliate link) to create my own affiliate program and it was so helpful to walk me through all the steps and she provides all the resources you need and more! She has so many products in her shop to help you create and maintain your affiliate program, so definitely go and take a look! Click here to browse Zoe’s shop (affiliate link).
———
If you want even more ways and ideas that you can use to collaborate with other business owners and grow your email list, make sure to grab my free guide: 18 Ways to Grow Your Audience Through Collaboration.
PIN FOR LATER
Save this post to Pinterest so you can read it again later!
hey, I'm Tish!
I'm a multi-passionate business owner, digital marketing strategist, business mentor & part-time digital nomad ✈️
I'm on a mission to help you create more time, freedom & profit in your business through the implementation of sustainable & scalable business and marketing strategies!
let’s connect
work with me
The Simple Marketing Podcast is for ambitious entrepreneurs who want to build a sustainable & scalable online business. With bite-sized, actionable episodes, you’ll learn how to create more time, freedom & profit in a way that feels good to you.
