An Honest Pros and Cons Look at Email Marketing

A common question we get asked about digital marketing is, “Is email still relevant?” The answer, yes, if you are using it correctly! So, how do you use email correctly? By email marketing!

At first email marketing may seem like a bad idea because you might think you are pestering people or that no one will read your emails, but, if done correctly, email marketing is very effective. If you want to know how to use email marketing effectively, click here. Continue reading below for an honest pros and cons look at email marketing so you can decide for yourself whether you should invest in email marketing. 

Is Email Still Relevant?

Email Marketing Pros

  • Opportunity For Brand Storytelling. Email marketing is great for brand storytelling because you can easily customize emails to represent your brand and reach lots of people if you have a big email list. Click here to learn how to build your email list. 
  • Develops relationships with clients. Like any type of mail, email marketing helps develop relationships. You can easily reach clients and they can count on you to hear brand updates and learn about products and services. 
  • Helps sell more products. If people buy your product and they receive an email telling them about a similar product, the chance that they buy that product is much higher than if they never received an email about the product. Email marketing is about selling more products and, when done correctly, is highly effective. If you are a B2B, the key to selling products is connecting with brands. 
  • Affordable. Email automations are pretty affordable for email marketing. The most common, mail chimp, costs $15 per month for their standard plan. If you learn to DIY, email marketing can be downright cheap. If you are looking to partner with an agency, email marketing still provides the highest return on investment of all the digital marketing tactics. 
  • Customizable. The great thing about email marketing is that you can customize it as much as you like to take in many different factors. You can send an email about a certain product to people who have not bought that product to pitch it to them or send an overview of your top products to everyone on your email list which is less personal but still highly effective. 
  • Can reach a large audience. Email marketing is the easiest way to reach your audience. It is a good way to spread the word about upcoming sales and events.  

The untold secret of email marketing is that it is the one digital marketing tactic that is not algorithm-based. That means that when you send an email, your recipient gets it. Your work builds a reputation for compelling emails that people want to open. Need help with that? Reach out for a complimentary digital marketing strategy session. 

Email Marketing Cons

  • Spam. Getting marked as spam is easily fixable. Try to avoid using spammy words, AKA words that sound like you are a robot or are clearly clickbait. Make sure your email won’t get marked as spam by using a spam checker or reading the rules about spam compliance. 
  • Reaching the wrong audience. Often, people worry their emails are reaching the wrong audience because they are not getting results. Luckily there is an easy fix. Have people sign up for your email list! This way they are clearly interested in what you have to say and will read and interact with your emails. 
  • Requires careful crafting. Is this really a con? Running a business is a worthwhile challenge.  Email marketing is part of growing your business, so of course it will require effort and thought as well. The extra challenge of email marketing is writing compelling emails so you don’t seem like a robot while grabbing your reader’s attention.

Email is Still Relevant

According to Forbes, the average person checks their email around 15 times a day. That’s a lot. It’s definitely not going to hurt your business to try email marketing because based off of those stats, someone will be reading it. There are some potential cons to email marketing, but there are fixes for each one. As far as we can tell, email isn’t going anywhere or getting replaced, so don’t shy away from it. If you want to reach a large audience easily and market to them in a personalized way, try email marketing. Your next step is to choose an email automation agency and decide what you want your email to look and sound like. That’s the fun part, so get working! 

If email marketing sounds right for your brand, now’s the time to reach out! Find us on Facebook or Twitter, or click here to book a free digital marketing strategy session.