WHY email marketing is an invaluable tool for your service-based business

Facebook. Microsoft. Google. They know exactly how valuable your community is down to the penny.

Think about your own buying behaviors. People are legit more likely to give you money, keep in touch, and engage with your brand if they feel comfortable enough to give you their email address.

You are the one with the unique perspective that is attracting those followers, and the only thing stopping you from bringing them into your space is your lack of a plan to do so.

If you have ever thought of putting together a membership offer or offering courses of some kind, email marketing software is a high-impact, low-energy tool that could be the backbone of the audience journey you want to create. It also has the ability to help get the audience warmed up and drinking your kool-aid.

Reason 1. You don’t own other outreach channels

That new and exciting offer that you’re trying to get buy-in and feedback for? Your superfans and brand besties are more likely to receive messages you send to the inbox.

They may not even see that social media post. . .

Ask any marketing expert in these internet streets, and they’ll tell you ALL about the best way to game their fav social media platform. The key takeaway from any of those conversations and courses is this: your traction on social media will only ever be effective when your content aligns with the platform’s business goals. Your reach – the number of your followers that actually see your posts – varies widely. According to the scheduling software Hootsuite, the engagement of people who do see your content is probably WAY less than you think it is.

Announcements on paper are right out.!

I see your flyer. That pretty picture is cute, but it doesn’t encourage people to take action while they’re looking at it. Canva is delightful, and designers are vital, but the digital space is not the place for your entire outreach effort to be grounded …MIRED…in paper.

Employing a robust email marketing tool allows you to affect and measure the impact of your audience engagement efforts.

Reason 2. You’re not as productive as you’d like to be

Where’s that sticky note?

OH NO! I meant to follow up with . . . and send them . . .

I’ve searched my email history and still can’t find . . .

Checklists and to-dos are a whole other article, but email marketing CAN be put to good use when it comes to keeping track of the people you need to get in touch with. The whole point of this type of software is to help you send the right message to the right person at the right time.

A few ways that you can integrate email marketing into your system right now and breathe easier include:

• Define some tags to group the people that you connect with.
  Segmenting your contacts by interest, engagement stage, or purchase(s) means that you can send messages to a bunch of people at once when you need to.
• Set up your calendar, or scheduling system to automatically add or update your audience as you schedule new meetings.
• Create communications that notify you and your team when specific [potential] customer actions occur.
• Create communications to the [potential] customer as a result of their interaction.

For most business endeavors, a good email marketing suite will cover most of their customer relationship needs. For those where that is not the case, this software still does a lot of heavy lifting that enables marketing and sales people to really focus where their attention is needed the most.

Reason 3. You’re not running a marketing biz

. . . or are you?

If you are interested in sustainable profit, you need marketing. Even if your goal is not to grow or scale your business, you still must focus on maintaining your income.

Being maxed out on appointments today doesn’t mean that those same clients will be with you next year. Email marketing software …AND a solid marketing plan will help you connect with potential and current customers regularly.

Flexing your marketing muscles is like any new workout. It can hurt, but it’s imperative that you keep working at it for that pain to ebb and to start to see real gains.

I know you think that email marketing is just one more thing to put on your plate, but is it? Another great muscle to start working on is your delegation tendon…trust; it’s there connected to your knee bone or something. I’m a nerd, not a doctor. 🤓

Real talk! I have a very lean business [read Boss on a Budget], but one of my favorite meetings each week is the one with my editor. She and I confab, and she tells me that she removed legit from that sentence up there at the beginning of this article, and even though I put it back, we bond over that and make sure that my brand’s voice sounds – like me. You officially have my permission to employ more part-time people in your life. I promise this will not revoke your solopreneur card.

Conclusion.

1. Start writing.
   Whatever your Brand Bestie wants to hear from you, write those topics down with a few notes about them, then pick one to draft out. Finish a couple and you’ll have a head start.
2. Sign up for email marketing software.
   Mailchimp is free up to 2000 subscribers and if you use this link (affiliate link), you’ll get credits on your account if and when you decide to upgrade to a paid plan.
3. Decide how you want to grow your list.
   There are a lot of strategies for this out there. Here’s a reprint of my favorite article on that. I won’t lie. I didn’t take my own advice until a few months ago when I personally emailed my clients and friends a short intro and link to my first campaign. My list is small, but my open rates are ridiculously good because I’ve started with people that have listened to me prattle on about this stuff so they know exactly what to expect from me.
4. Start sending regularly and don’t stop.
   You’ll find that soon enough you’ve built your tribe and even if you never start that membership site, or the e-learning course, you won’t regret connecting with your people.