This article is part of our series on Lessons Learned at South by Southwest 2010, a popular technology conference.
So, I was talking at SXSW with Chris Guillebeau and Pace Smith, two of my favourite entrepreneurs. We got to talk about email newsletters and why small businesses really should have a list. As you already probably know, I’m a huge fan of email newsletters, and statistically they convert far higher than many other forms of promotion.
The Big Picture on Why Email Works
I always knew email worked, but I didn’t hone in on the real reason why until Chris Guillebeau made it clear as day: it puts you in same spot as the big boys. Amazon sends their email news and you can do the same – you’re right there with them in the consumer’s Inbox!
A few people who were sitting there with us mentioned that this is also a problem, in that everyone’s signed up to too many email newsletters and it will never get read.
Not exactly.
Pace is an expert in communications (and a lot of marketing actually is about communications), and quickly jumped into point out the incorrect logic in this thinking. You’re assuming that person has too many email newsletters because you probably have too many of them. You just don’t know if someone has email overload or not.
As long as you’re not annoying your customers via email, you’re fine. So Just Do it. It works.
Building a list takes time, so the sooner you start, the sooner you’ll reap the rewards.
To Learn More
Want to work on building your own list? Then be sure to check out our email marketing and email newsletter resources. They’re popular, effective, and good value for money!
Photo by Steve
email
facebook
twitter
LinkedIn
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
I’ve neglected my e-mail newsletter for far too long and I apologise to those people who signed up because they really did want to read what I had to say every week; those who’s e-mail inbox is not as clogged up as mine.
Good point, that!
No worries, Michel, glad it was helpful!