Email marketing revenue is estimated to reach over 11 billion by the end of 2023 (Hubspot, 2023).   If you aren’t marketing to your email list, you are leaving money on the table.  But what if you don’t have an email list to market to?  Growing your email list is VITAL if you wish to monetize your blog.  In this blog post, I am going to let you in on my explosive email growing secret-participating in bundle giveaways.  I am going to share why you need to add bundle participation to your marketing strategy, how to find bundles to participate in, and why the secret sauce is in the follow-up.

Disclaimer: This post may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission, at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase through a link. Please see my full disclosures page for more information.

Hosts will outline the bundle’s rules and it is important that you follow them if you want to be considered as a contributor, and asked to come back for another bundle in the future.  Be sure to note and follow deadlines for contribution submissions, promotion requirements, and rules regarding upsells (more on this later).

I think participating in bundles is pretty dang awesome (my email list concurs) and I am here to tell you why, but there are also some cons in participating that I have to tell you too. Buckle up buttercup.

1. Growing your email list: Participating in bundles has hands down been the largest referral source for growing my email list.  As I write this blog post now, I am currently participating in a bundle.  Look at these results: 

Related: Can you Make Money from a Blog?

1. December 14th was the first day of this bundle and you can see the huge spike I have had in subscribers over the last week, and it’s not even over yet!  Of course there are those few people that just came for the free product I offered and then immediately unsubscribed, but they really are the exception.  These screenshots are from my email provider Convertkit.  They make it super easy to track your stats and for readers to opt in to your email list.
2. New audience: Participating in bundles has allowed me to get my brand and my products in front of people that I would have never normally had the chance to.  I am introduced to the host’s clientele, and to the participant’s clientele, especially if there is a requirement for contributors to promote the bundle a certain amount of times to their following.
3. Brand Recognition: Along the same lines as #2, you introduce your brand to a new audience, and they begin to associate your brand with quality products and recognize you as an expert in your niche.
4. Show of your products and make more sales down the road:  It’s well known that once you make a sale, your customers are likely to come back and buy from you again. Even if you initially are giving something away for free in a bundle, the customer becomes familiar with your work and your product, paving the way for possible sales in the future.
5. Affiliate Commissions: If the bundle you are participating in has an affiliate program, you can earn affiliate commissions from promoting the bundle.
6. Reinvited: Once you participate in a bundle, the host may request for you to come back in future bundles, further growing your email and customer list.  What a deal for you!

Related: Skyrocket your Email List with Bundles Ebook

1. You are giving away something of value at a highly discounted rate, or for free!  This can be a blow to the ego, but I wouldn’t worry too much about this aspect.   The positives (having a chance to demonstrate your expertise to a new audience, and developing leads that may turn into sales in the future) outweigh the negatives in this instance.
2. Bundles gather contributions from many participants, and it can be easy to get lost among all of the others. It’s hard to stand out, so it can be difficult to get participants to sign up for your email list.
3. Some hosts require that contributors pay a fee to participate in the bundle, and this doesn’t even guarantee that you will be included in the bundle.  I personally stay away from bundles that I have to pay to participate in.

So, how do you find bundles to participate in?  Here are my top three ways for finding bundles to contribute to:

Join mailing lists of people in your niche to be the first to hear about bundle collaboration opportunities.  I am not even kidding when I say that I have signed up for so many email lists (for a variety of reasons, not just bundles).  I will occasionally search in my email inbox for the word “bundle” to see if I have missed out on any collaboration opportunities.  I still miss some on occasion, but I use that information to do #2 in this list: Add Annual Bundles to your Calendar.

If you just missed out on a bundle collaboration offer, all is not lost.  Write down the name of the bundle, name of the host, their email address and the dates of this bundle that you missed.  Bundles are frequently done on an annual basis, so keep your eyes open for this bundle opportunity again next year.  I just finished participating in a 3rd annual bundle and I plan to participate again in the future.  I actually have a whole calendar of bundle dates, for my reference this year and next.

Related: 2024 PLR Pink Digital Planner

Related: Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing Course: An Honest Review

They say the money is in the list.  Well the fortune is in the follow-up with this list.  Here are my top ways to monetize as a bundle contributor, even if your bundle product is free.

If the host allows you to add a tripwire/upsell to your bundle contribution, I highly recommend you do so.  Tripwires and upsells are essentially the same thing, but a tripwire is a small paid offer that appears on the thank you page after someone opts in to your freebie offer.  A upsell is a paid offer that appears on your thank you page after a purchase, and is typically priced more than than the original item purchased.  Whether the bundle offers free items or requires purchase, the thank you page becomes a sales pages for your tripwire/upsell product.  Genius.

After a participant opts in to your email list, don’t ghost them!  You have to nurture them so they will stay on your list.  Acknowledge how they got on your email list (the bundle name) and help them get the most out of your bundle contribution.  Address questions they might have, and how to get helped if they need it.  Stay in frequent contact with them, at least initially, so they don’t forget who you are and you don’t get lost in all the other products they opted in for.

Now you are familiar with how to grow your email list with bundles, how to find bundles to participate in and why following up with those that opt-in with you is ESSENTIAL.

Thanks for hanging out with me and reading this blog post.  Let me know what you think in the comments. And if you haven’t signed for access to my My Freebies Vault, do it below.  You don’t want to miss out on these freebies!