*This article may contain affiliate links, which means that I may receive a small commission if you purchase with my link. This is all at no extra cost to you! 

I'm going to be honest with you, I LOVE email marketing. Next to Instagram, it's my favorite way to market my business. Sure, social media is great. But what about being able to write as much as you want? Give value in a close community? Warm up leads and sell passively? Do the work once and see the results for months? That's a big "yes please!" from me. 

In this blog post, I'm sharing with you the top three reasons why I think that every business - large or small, online or physical, service or product based, should have an email list. So call all your business friends and gather around to hear the tops reasons why email marketing is the future of business in 2021.

It's Personal. 

Personal brands are huge. Not to mention, they're getting more and more popular. Forbes recently released an article entitled, "Ten Marketing Predictions For 2021". Three of these predictions apply directly to the point I'm trying to make - "Marketers will invest in direct relationships with their customers", "Informed buyers will want to buy from informed brands", and "The ‘new normal’ of remote work is here to stay". Everyone who gives you their email address is letting you into a warm, cozy, and vulnerable space. The addresses on your email list are all leads that you can warm up and convince to buy from you. People trust you to deliver educaitonal and promotional content they will enjoy, so stay friendly and create genuine relationships to add more income to your business. 

When people give your their email, they're basically giving you permission to pitch them. That doesn't mean to just go ahead and try to sell them your four or five figure offer right off the bat, but it means you can nurture them to get ready to buy from you. A seven step sequence gives people time to get to know you, consume the free content you've given then, establish yourself as an authority in your zone of genius, and then upsell them to a paid offer. Usually, this is a passive product or another lower ticket offer. If you want to learn how to struture this find of email sequence, along with a welcome sequence, then click here to learn more about my $10 ebook!

Another way to make it personal and hold the attention of your subscribers for even longer is through customization. Most email providers have little smart fields you can put in the subject line or first line of your emails to use the subscribers name. This creates a deeper connection, showing that you value them as a person and not just a number or statistic. 

It's Evergreen. 

Lots of us market our businesses on Instagram, and that's where we get the majority of our sales. However, I'm sure you'd agree with me saying that Instagram can be tiring. There is so much information to consume, the need for a consistent presence, talking on Stories, and don't even get me started on the algorithm *shudders*. Your content has such a short lifespan, and not even all your followers will see your posts. Instead of trying to keep up with the latest trends and Reels, email marketing might become your new best friend. 

With email marketing, you can create a sequence only once that hundreds or thousands of subscribers can go through. Now, your content is working for you instead of the other way around! Say goodbye to the days of being a slave to social media and start taking control with intentional email compaigns that convert. With that being said, let's compare the typical ROI of Instagram ads to email marketing. You've probably seen or heard the statistic that for every $1 spent, you make $42 - but how does this compare to marketing on your favorite social media platform? According to statistics, emails have an average conversion rate across all industries of about 7.13% whereas on Instagram, that number goes down to 1.08% - which is considered high for a social media platform! Now, we can see just how much more potential email marketing has for small business owners.

The best part is, you don't even have to spend money to start email marketing! There are free platforms like Mailchimp and Mailerlite that have free plans for you to get started. If you're ready to jump right in, then I suggest using Flodesk - especially if you're a designer and want to make an impact through visually appealing emails. Use this link to get 50% off for life! 

The other awesome part of email marketing is that you can be using more than one channel to get people onto your email list. This can include...

• Website home page

• Blog

• Pinterest

• Instagram

• Facebook
  

It's the Future. 

Let's revisit those Forbes marketing predictions for the year - all three of the predictions mentioned above are elements we can implement today in our online businesses. Times are changing more than ever, so by staying on top of things with the "new normal" of life online, we can set the precedent and support small businesses more than ever. People want to buy from informed brands, and since email marketing is personal, this is a great place to take a stand and talk about more than just your services. Show people how you're giving back, what you're doing to support others, and how you're making an effort to run an ethical business. An easy way to be a bit more ethical is to use a green search engine that plants trees for your searches! Click here to learn more about Ecosia. 

Personal brands are getting more and more popular than corporate brands, so by creating genuine relationships between yourself and the people on your email list, you're appealing to the emotions a person is feeling and not just asking for the money in their wallet. This is especially important if the name of your company or studio is your personal name, email marketing is something you should jump into! 

If you're not sure how to get started in email marketing or stay consistent, then my Build Your Email Empire bundle will help you to jumpstart your list and start seeing a high return on your investment this year. This bundle will help you if you're...

• Planning on launching a digital product

• Want to increase passive income sales

• Relaunching or launching your business

• Diversyfing your income and marketing streams

• Have a stale email list you want to do something with

Click below to get started and learn more about Build Your Email Empire!