Email Marketing: Why Build A Mailing List?

You’ve got a business, you’ve got advertising, you’ve got stationery, you’ve got good word-of-mouth, you’ve got steady customers, you’ve got a website. Why do you need a mailing list?

It’s simple: unless you’re building your list and using it to intelligently funnel information to and from your audience, you’re leaving cash on the table. You’re saying “No!” to more business, better relationships, more word-of-mouth, more value for and from existing customers.

A smartly segmented opt-in mailing list is an opportunity to up-sell existing customers, broadcast new product offerings, schedule and automate article series’ that highlight your products, services, and expertise and draw customers into a tighter relationship with your business. It’s a chance to gain actionable analytics that you can use to better appeal to your market. It’s a way to drive traffic to your site.

Combined with a well-planned and well-built website, and the right approach to making the system work, it’s a 24/7 sales team, lead generator, and customer service department all rolled into one.

If you’re not building your list and working it, you’re ignoring a critical component of online marketing and crippling your own efforts.

Not convinced? Do you equate mailing lists with spam?

Check out these amazing Email Marketing stats:

What’s it worth?

1. For every $1 spent, $44.25 is the average return on email marketing investment. (Experian )
2. 44% of email recipients made at least one purchase last year based on a promotional email. (Convinceandconvert.com )
3. Email ad revenue reached $156 million in 2012. (Interactive Advertising Bureau )
4. 72% of B2B buyers are most likely to share useful content via email. (Earnest Agency )
5. 7 in 10 people say they’ve recently made use of a coupon or discount from a marketing email. (2012 Blue Kangaroo Study )
6. 40% of B2B marketers rated the leads generated by email marketing as high quality. (Software Advice Survey )

What about your competition?

1. 56% of businesses say they plan to increase their use of email marketing in 2013. (The Small and Midsize Business Email Marketing Survey 2013 )
2. 39% of marketers have no strategy for mobile email. (eConsultancy  2012 Email Marketing industry Census )
3. Email marketing spend grows 10% year over year. (Forrester 2011 )

How and why do users engage?

1. 64% of people say they open an email because of the subject line. (Chadwick Martin Bailey )
2. For B2B companies, subject lines that contained “money,” “revenue,” and “profit” perform the best. (Adestra July 2012 Report )
3. Subject lines fewer than 10 characters long had an open rate of 58%. (Adestra July 2012 Report )
4. Personalized subject lines are 22.2% more likely to be opened. (Adestra July 2012 Report )
5. Monday emails had the highest revenue per email. (Experian 2012 Q4 Email Benchmark Report )
6. Emails that include social sharing buttons have a 158% higher click-through rate. (GetResponse )
7. 64% of decision-makers read their email via mobile devices. (TopRankBlog )

Who’s paying attention?

1. 82% of consumers open emails from companies. (Litmus )
2. Roughly half of an email list will be active – either opening or clicking on emails. (Epsilon )
3. 27% of consumers say their favorite companies should invest in more email. (ExactTarget )
4. Women click 10% more often than men on mobile emails. (Tailored Mail 2012 Email Marketing Trends )
5. There are 3.6 billion email accounts in 2013. (The Radicati Group, Email Statistics Report, 2012-2016)
6. By 2016, that number will reach 4.3 billion. (The Radicati Group, Email Statistics Report, 2012-2016 )

Alright, you say. Great! I believe you but I have no idea how to get started.

That’s fine. We do.

Over the coming weeks and months I’ll be picking this subject apart in exquisite detail, so all you have to do is follow along.

Or, if you’d rather not wait for me to slowly expose the Broad Street Network team’s email marketing chops. You can hire us to do it for you. 😉

Contact Broad Street Network today to kick start your email marketing campaigns.