The short answer is YES! Email marketing is a low-cost, simple way of connecting with your customers that has been around for years, and is still a highly relevant digital marketing technique. It’s an excellent tool for getting your brand, product or service out to people who are already engaged with you or interested in what you offer. They have either already purchased from you or chosen to receive your content, which makes them more receptive to what you have to say. Sending regular emails to your subscribers has multiple benefits, including customer retention, improving brand recognition, driving traffic to your website, generating sales, and keeping your customers up to date.
There are quite a few email marketing platforms out there now, some of which have free plans, so it doesn’t have to cost a lot. The main thing it will cost you is time, but even this doesn’t have to be a lot. Sending one email a month is a great place to start, and only needs to take an hour.
Another reason why giving email marketing a go is a good idea is because you shouldn’t rely solely on social media to connect with your audience – not everyone is active on social platforms, and your accounts can get shut down in an instant. There are too many stories out there about accounts being hacked and then shut down permanently, or Facebook disliking something and shutting your account down. So, if you put all your eggs into the Facebook basket you could come away with nothing and no way to get in touch with those loyal followers.
When you maintain an email list, you own those contacts and can move them from platform to platform, which means you never lose them.
You can also do some pretty fancy stuff with automations and customer journeys, depending on which platform you use and the type of plan you’re on. These can be very effective at nurturing existing customers, or helping convert new customers.
We have a number of clients that use email marketing very effectively and who have built up a large database of subscribers over time. And these regular emails, especially when done well, generate easy sales – it really is low-lying fruit!
The key takeaway from all this is that yes email marketing is worth it, as you have a captive audience at your fingertips who are ready to hear what you have to offer. You don’t have much to lose, so give it a go!