Do you have an eye-catching subscribe button on your blog? Here’s what you need to look at …
When you start any new site and you start to invite others to visit your site you will want to decide what you want them to do when they get there. You probably want them to do several things while they’re there so you’ll need to write those out and number them.
If you have a product for sale then you probably want to invite them to a sales page where you have sales copy for your product and their options are either buy or leave.
If you want them to read your posts and find your content valuable then you want to make reading your posts your main focus.
If you are trying to grow a mailing list or RSS subscriber base … then you want those to be the dominant feature.
For my Bikini After 40 site I want my main focus to be on gaining RSS subscribers. Eventually I will offer some nice freebies to grow my mailing list but that will come down the road.
So if my main focus is gaining RSS subscribers I want to (a) put my opt in box in a “prime real estate” area of my blog, (b) draw some attention to it, and (c) ask readers to subscribe.
I put the opt in box in the area that’s called “above the fold.” That means the part of your page that you can see when the page loads without having to scroll down the page. Then depending on where your side bar is located you would want to put it at either the top left or the top right side. Research shows that our eye scans a page in a “z” pattern … starting at the top left side … moving straight across to the top right side … then down and left … and then back across to the right so you’ll want to keep that in mind when choosing the opt in location.
To draw some attention I like to use something animated in the opt in area. I hired Chrissy Jensen to design the opt in area for the site and I think she did a great job. I told her to use the one here on suzannefranco.com as a guide and to make it match the look and feel of the bikini site.
In the box I ask readers to subscribe. Seems obvious but sometimes I just see icons and a field to fill in … and I like to make it a little more apparent that I want them to subscribe. I’m still coming up ideas for something to dangle and a call to action but I’ll get it there eventually.
Here’s the screen capture video I made for you:
So what do you think of my opt in on the bikini site? Do you have some ideas for me? I’d like to entice visitors to subscribe … do I need a good freebie? What info do you think my readership would most appreciate?
Do you know what your number one priority is for your site? Have you focused your efforts and energy there? Is it obvious to your visitors/readers? Do you have any questions I can answer? Let us hear from you! *SmiLes* Suzanne
P.S. If you’ve enjoyed the post and video would you please take a quick second and share it with your friends on Twitter or Facebook (or your favorite social site) … I’d really appreciate it! 
Glad you're here! I wrote my first eBook, "Blogging Idol Secrets Revealed," and it's my FREE gift for those who supported me in the Blogging Idol competition (and for my new online friends too LOL).
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I promised I would be sharing the strategies I’m using to compete in this season’s Blogging Idol and I want you to steal these ideas to grow your own blog too! I’ll outline the basics for some of the methods I’m using and then throughout the month I will spend time going into detail for each. What’s that? Only some? You didn’t think I’d give you everything right here did you?
