Are you looking for new ways to get new business, make new contacts, communicate with your crowd and drive sales? Well take a look at what is already there. There seems to be a misconception that email marketing is dead…but it is still very much alive AND evolving, and if you’re not building an email list for your business, you’re making a HUGE mistake.

If you’ve been spurning the idea of building an email list because you feel that it’s less effective than blogging, updating your website and interacting with your audience on social media – you need to think again…and here’s why…

If you already have a list and you are worrying about the implications of gdpr you can read more about that here: GDPR and what it means for your small business.

Here are my 5 reasons as to why you need an Email List…

1. Popularity

Pretty much everyone has an email address which they log into several times a day. Most people with smartphones are signed into their email accounts around the clock with push notifications enabled.

2. Purposeful contact

To get on your mailing list, a user needs to sign up to your email list and confirm their email address. Taking the time and effort to do this shows that they are already interested in hearing from you and finding out about what you offer and how it can benefit them. When it comes to sales lead generation, this stuff if gold dust!

3. Direct communication

On social media your message can fade into oblivion: consider that a Facebook page will (organically) reach only around 7% of its fans, and that Twitter streams are so busy that there’s a very short span of time in which you can get user’s attention, and it’s easy to see how your voice can get lost in the heavy traffic on social media platforms. But with email, your message lands into the user’s inbox. It’s your platform and yours alone. There is no algorithm curtailing your reach and you have a one-to-one communication with the recipient.

4. Ownership

Unlike your Facebook page or Twitter feed, you OWN your email list, and this puts you in control of the data, eliminating the risk of losing the connection with potential clients and current customers.

5. Targeted messages

You can use the information you have about the people on your email list to deliver pinpoint information and ensure that they receive the right messages. Segmenting your list will ensure that you’re speaking to the individual, not the crowd meaning you’re not running the risk of turning people off with generic, impersonal content. It doesn’t matter what kind of business you run, what kind of website you have, or what industry you’re in, experts agree that the most effective way to build sales for a small business is still email marketing. Considering the enormous benefits of building an email list, it doesn’t cost much, it’s relatively and you can measure results and tweak your campaigns to make sure your messages are hitting the right marks. To get started, decide on your campaign objectives, select an Email Marketing Service Provider – we recommend Aweber, Mad Mimi or Mailchimp (my favourite), as they enable you to send bulk emails, create and manage your database, campaign management and customizable email templates, and provide a very simple user interface.

Once you’ve started building your email list, you’ll soon see why it’s the most important tool you need to get your message heard!