Small business owners, are you neglecting your email marketing?
We know that between creating products, interacting with customers, packing and shipping, completing admin, running social media, and everything else you have to do (including taking long-forgotten lunch breaks!), email marketing might fall to the bottom of your priority list.
However, we’re here to tell you that it needs to change – right now!
Growing and nurturing your email list is one of the most crucial steps you can take as a small business owner to maintain an engaged and receptive audience that is more likely to buy what you are selling.
But if you don’t know where to start, don’t worry.
Here at Piece of Cake Marketing, we’ve got you covered. In this guide, you’ll find out why building your email list is so (so so so) important, what emails that cut through the noise actually look like, and the platform that we recommend to bring them to life.
The benefits of building your email list
Tired of screaming your message into the social media abyss? Build and nurture your email list and you can maintain a direct channel of communication with an engaged audience.
In a world dominated by social platforms and the increasing presence of AI, it’s never been more important to forge genuine relationships with potential customers.
By signing up for your email list, people are strongly indicating that they’re interested in what you have to say, share, or sell. Which makes them vital warm leads.
Essentially, email marketing…
- Helps you keep a regular drumbeat so previous and potential customers don’t forget about you
- Allows you to build relationships with your audience to gain their trust and loyalty
- Helps you target your sales and identify what works for different segments of your list
- Is a great return on investment, especially if you pay a fixed price no matter how many emails you send
- Gives you insight into what lands with your audience through analytics such as open rate or click rate
… and it’s your email list that helps you achieve this.
Think of it as an asset that you own. While you could lose your hard-earned social media following overnight (we’ve seen it happen!), your email list belongs to you.
But how do you encourage people to sign up to your list?
We’ve tried and tested many a method over the years, but these are our top five that get the best results:
- Give something for free – offer something that solves a problem for people in return for their email address, such as a checklist, cheat sheet, mini-course, or template.
- Create an interactive sign-up – share a quiz or challenge that requires a sign-up to get results or follow along.
- Run a competition – many people will hand over their email address for the chance to win something… just make sure the prize is appealing and appropriate to your niche.
- Offer a discount – exclusive discounts, like 10% off your order, is compelling for many savvy shoppers.
- Produce a newsletter – regular, useful content can entice people to sign up if you offer genuine value.
Identify what works well for your particular audience through trial and error and focus on building an email list to last.
What should great email marketing do?
Great, you’ve got subscribers to your email list… but what now!?
One of the toughest challenges of email marketing is getting people’s attention.
Let’s face it, we’re all INCREDIBLY busy. And we’ve probably all got at least a double-digit’s-worth of emails hitting our inbox throughout the day.
The best email marketing needs to break through that cycle of unopened messages and really capture the reader’s attention.
This can be done with:
- A well-crafted, eye-catching subject line (think urgent, shocking, clever, humorous – or all four)
- A strong written or visual hook
- Content that appeals to your audience’s needs or emotions
- A clear call to action to tell them what you want them to do next
Your email must scream, “stop what you’re doing and read this right now or you’ll miss out!”
The ultimate goal depends on your intentions – do you want to make people feel a certain way, drive them to engage with you, or even change their buying habits?
Experiment with these ideas to find out what works best for your brand. Hint: the more creative, the better – your audience wants to see something new and exciting, so find a way to give them that and your open rates will soar!
Flodesk – the marketing platform we love to recommend
Don’t get us wrong, none of this is easy. It takes hard work and a lot of trial and error to nail your email marketing.
However, you can make it simpler – and the number one thing we recommend to help is to use a creative and intuitive platform that allows you to build brilliant emails from the get-go.
SAVE 25% on your first year with this link https://flodesk.com/c/0WPZSA
Many business owners are not technical experts and many have told us that they feel like designing visually captivating, fully automated emails is way out of their reach.
But that’s absolutely not the case.
In fact, many clients who receive and enjoy our monthly newsletters have asked us which email marketing platform we use ourselves, and if we’d recommend they make the switch.
Which is how we became affiliate partners with Flodesk – the best and most simple email platform of them all (in our humble, marketing-expert opinions).
We use Flodesk for our own email marketing and that of many clients, purely because it has everything we could ever need to bring our creative visions to life. You don’t need to be a coding expert to make the magic happen, in fact, unlike other platforms, you don’t need to learn anything new.
Simply drag and drop a wide range of layouts and elements using their highly intuitive email builder and watch as your vision comes to life in real-time.
Some of our favourite and most-used features include:
- Highly customisable template designs to help you get started
- The ability to directly poll to your audience via email – and see your results in real-time
- Integration with Canva (and many other useful tools) to help you design flawlessly
- The ability to segment your audience and apply personalisation and automation quickly and easily to any journey
- AI subject line recommendations for maximum impact
- Multiple forms templates to help you grow your subscribers more easily
- The option to sell directly through email
- Detailed analytics to identify what’s working and what needs tweaking
Oh, and the best bit? Unlike many other platforms we’ve come across, Flodesk allows you to use unlimited emails and forms, no matter whether you use the Lite, Pro, or Everything pricing plan.
So, you can keep a regular drumbeat of compelling content without restrictions.
If you’re ready to take your email marketing to the next level, we’ve got a fantastic discount to get you started. Use this link https://flodesk.com/c/0WPZSA to get a full 25% off your first year of Flodesk!
You won’t look back – we’re sure of it.