Email Marketing for Yoga Teachers: The Top 3 Ways to Grow Your List

If you’ve been following along here and in the Yoga Teacher CEO Community, you know that we are talking all about email marketing this month. If you want to catch up, I talked first about reasons I’m encouraging you to get started with email. Then, I introduced you to my favorite email platform.

Now that you’ve got email going and your platform is ready to go, it’s time to start growing your list.

I know… I know… another thing to worry about?!

You’re already planning out your classes, showing up to teach every week, and I bet you’ve got lots of responsibilities (and maybe even another job) on top of that. Then, you are doing your best to post on social media and you are experimenting with self-promotion. This whole thing can be quite exhausting and overwhelming — trust me, I get it.

But if you are anything like me, you are committed to your vision. You want to serve more people, carry the practice of yoga forward, and change lives. Me too! That’s why I tirelessly show up to do the work I do.

It’s my mission: To help yoga teachers build a business they love while embodying ease and abundance; so they can be of highest service to their students and ultimately the world.

The ripple effect of this work is HUGE! And that’s why I want to help you grow your list. Because it works; without the guesswork and algorithms of social media, without having to be online all the time, and without having to show up inauthentically.

Here’s Why Email is Our New Favorite Way to Market

I shared a post this week in the Yoga Teacher CEO Community this week about analytics. Because as a business owner and mentor for Yoga Teachers, I spend a lot of time looking at reporting.

You know, seeing what works… what doesn’t work. This way I don’t waste my time repeating something that really isn’t effective.

I was looking at the analytics for a spring retreat I hosted in 2022 and I was shocked to see where my sign ups came from:

• 10% word of mouth / print advertising (I had a poster at a local yoga studio)
• 30% from social media (specifically IG)
• 60% from my email list

I was like whaaaat?! I’ve been teaching social media for 2 years and now THIS?! The first thing I thought? I’ve got to teach this to my fellow YTs.

My email list consistently outperforms social media every. single. time. Plus, it’s automated, there’s no algorithm, and no guesswork. I know who is seeing my message and the people who need what I offer the most.

Having an email list makes marketing feel exactly like I want it to:

• Easy
• Authentic
• Routine
• Resonate
• AND Profitable

You can have it your way and serve more clients. You can have it your way and be successful. And after looking at those numbers I can confidently say that growing your email list is the key to unlocking consistency in your yoga business.

If you are ready to tap into that potential for yourself, let’s start growing your list. Scroll down to see my top three ways to grow your list today.

The Top 3 Ways to Grow Your List

1. The Signup Sheet Method

This might be one you are already familiar with and I’ve got to say, it’s an OG for a reason. Anytime you run an event, workshop, special class, or retreat, I encourage you to bring either a blank piece of paper or a prepared google doc that collects

• Student Name
• Student Email
• and Student Phone Number if you want to do SMS

If you’ve got a Facebook community or something else they can join, get them to check a box or write out YES if they want you to invite them.

This is a fail proof way to get email sign ups from people who already know and love you. They’ve seen your teaching style at the event and you’ve connected with them face to face.

Once you get their names on this list, very soon after, go home and add them to your list/platform.

Wanting to go the extra mile? Email everyone after the event thanking them for coming and send them a feedback form. You can get really valuable information from them about how they enjoyed the event and ask for testimonials too. All of these are tools that you can add to your toolbox when it comes to marketing in the future. Plus, it helps you improve upon what you are already doing.

Typeform is my favorite platform to create simple forms and collect results. Here are the questions I ask:

• Overall how would you rate the event? (out of 5 stars)
• Is there anything you would have changed about the event? Be as honest and upfront as possible. This will help me improve future events.
• Would you be willing to write a testimonial about the event for future promotion? If so, type it below and add your name.
• Are there any other events you would like to see in the future?

Alright let’s move to #2…

2. Use Social Media

If you’ve already built an audience on social media, why not invite them to come to your email party as well?

Here’s how to use social media to grow your list:

• Do a monthly post that says something like, “Working on some exciting events and classes right now. Who wants to get on my email list to hear about them first?”
• Use the waitlist method for upcoming events. Usually I will build some excitement about a retreat or something I am planning on social media. When doing this, I will say, “Give me your email if you want to be the first to hear about it when it’s ready.”
• Create a contest or a giveaway. Giveaways are such a great way to collaborate with other brands/teachers and grow your following. In order to get email involved here, add another step for someone to enter the giveaway. You can get them to follow you and visit a link to add their name to your email list. It’s a win/win!
• Just mention it! Anytime you are engaging with people online, be thinking about how you can loop email into the conversation. If you have resources that will help them, just ask if you can email it to them. This is a great way to organically and consistently add people to your list.

Now for my favorite… #3!

3. Create a Lead Magnet

There are many different ways that the marketing community refers to this type of content — lead magnet, freebie, gated content… I’m sure there are others.

Here’s the concept:

• You create a really valuable evergreen piece of content like a guide or a video
• In order for someone to get access to that content, they have to put their email into a landing page form
• Once they put their email in, you send them the freebie and add them to your list

This is an incredibly simple and effective way to get new people rolling into your list. Plus, once you’ve created one freebie, the process is automated and passive. You can do this time and time again with different resources in order to continually bring new people into your list.

There are many different ways to grow your list but I hope this gave you some good ideas to start implementing into your work flow.

The key is to continue adding new people to your list so you can loop them into all the amazing things you are offering. This is the type of thing that takes you from a Yoga Teacher to a CEO.

Want help growing your email list?

Check out the Yoga Teacher CEO Community for lots of resources to get going. I’m also dropping weekly Email Ease episodes on the podcast!