Looking to build up your email list? Good call.
While email might feel old-fashioned amid the constant evolution of marketing tools and techniques, it’s still a top-tier marketing channel—especially for the flex office industry.
It gives you a direct way to keep nurturing your hard-earned leads.
But one question we hear all the time is this:
How exactly do you build an email list as a flexible office space operator?
Good news. You've got a ton of options.
In this article, we'll teach you ten ways to build your email list. These tips focus on collecting qualified leads and consider the local nature of coworking spaces, even for multi-location operators.
Create and offer e-books, guides, or resources in exchange for email addresses. The caveat? Like all great content, these resources should focus on topics your audience will be interested in. Consider things like:
Most importantly, this content needs to be so good that people are willing to give you their contact information to receive it.
People love freebies or discounts, and that makes them a great way to gather new email addresses. Luckily, in the flexible office industry, you have no shortage of options. You can offer:
And that's just to name a few.
These can be offered on your website, through your Google Ads or social media ads, or organically on your social media channels. The key is to ensure people complete a form—one that includes their email addresses—in order to claim the offer.
This is fundamental: put sign-up forms on your blog posts and throughout your website.
If you have a newsletter, include a promise of value with your subscription form. Explain what readers can expect to gain from giving you space in their inboxes.
Or, if you're not doing a monthly newsletter, your promise of value can be for the special offers and discounts listed in the previous point.
You can also leverage exit-intent pop-ups with special offers that appear when your website visitors are on their way out. You'll probably need support from your web developer to implement these.
In the simplest of terms, collaborative content is a way to tap into the networks of the people in your network.
At Talemaker, we do this for our clients all the time.
We feature and profile members, local businesses, and experts to inform our content. Then, those people share our content with their network, helping to provide exponential visibility.
Within the parameters of our collaboration, we often ask the people we've featured to encourage their network to sign up for our mailing list to receive content we create that we know they'll love.
You can do the same.
Not only does this type of content help provide added visibility for your brand, it also lends a ton of credibility for the information you're putting out into the world.
You probably host workshops, classes, and events at your space. While these are often just for members, opening them up to the public—or hosting events catered to the public—is a great way to:
The same applies for online/virtual events, panels, webinars, or discussions you might be hosting.
Whenever you host one of these events, ask attendees to reserve their spot by providing their contact information. Tools like Luma and Eventbrite are great for this.
You can also have a sign-in station at your front desk for walk-in attendees.
Is your coworking space at capacity? Good! Take this opportunity to create a waitlist—and gather emails in the process.
Make note on your website that your space is currently full. This creates a sense of FOMO among prospective members and makes your space feel exclusive.
It also gives you a chance to gather emails by asking website visitors to sign up for your waitlist to be the first to know when their desired membership tier becomes available.
If your coworking space offers guest passes, this is a perfect chance to collect email addresses. You can ask visitors to sign in with their contact information in advance or at the front desk when they arrive. This way, you're collecting contact information from people who have visited your space and know someone who already works there.
This also gives your team the opportunity to make personal connections and positive impressions with new people, learn about them and their businesses, discover potential office space needs—and segment your mailing list accordingly.
It's no secret that your members are incredible advocates for your space—and that applies to marketing as well.
So, you can think about launching a referral program for existing members and offer incentives like complimentary meeting room time beyond what's included in their membership.
For example, for every person your member refers, they get three extra meeting room hours for the month. After a certain amount of referrals, maybe they get a one-time discount on their membership.
While it might feel weird to discount memberships, think of it as a sales/marketing expense. Referrals are typically a good bet for qualified leads.
Whether they're guests, meeting attendees, or event-goers, virtually every person who comes into your coworking space will probably need to sign onto your WiFi. This is a great way to collect new email addresses.
You've probably seen this before, in airports, coffee shops, or event spaces. You go to sign onto the WiFi network and you're asked to share your name and email address.
If you haven't implemented this at your coworking space already, it's definitely a good idea.
This can be done using captive portals offered by WiFi management platforms or software.
This is super easy. Simply drop a subscription link into your email signature with the same promise of value we mentioned earlier. That way, if you're corresponding with someone and they're interested in staying informed, it's right there for them.
As your email list grows, the next big question is how to segment it and what you should share with your email subscribers. But that's a topic for another day.
Want to be the first to find out what you need to do? Subscribe for our newsletter today. We send weekly bite-sized content marketing insights to help you create a member magnet for your coworking space (see what we did here?).
Or, if you have questions about how to put content marketing to work for your coworking business, book a free consultation today.