Have you ever felt like your email list would be too small to even start? You’re getting the answer to that question and more in this podcast episode. We’re diving into list size, stats, and how often you should be sending emails.
Welcome to the show notes! Remember, this is a brief summary from the How to Market Your Horse Business podcast. You'll want to listen to the entire episode for all the good stuff!
If you’ve been with me on the podcast for the past few episodes, we’re in the middle of a mini-series on email marketing. In episode #65, we uncovered some common roadblocks that keep horse business owners from diving into email marketing.
This week I’m going to answer some of your common questions. Now that you’re past the roadblocks and you’re ready to give email marketing a try for your horse business, I want to make sure you’re equipped and have everything that you need to give it your best shot.
I don’t want you to feel like you’re drinking fire from a water hydrant, but I also want you to have your questions answered. So I have picked the most common questions that I tend to get about email marketing.
Of course, if there is anything I don’t answer for you that has been on the top of your mind, please feel free to reach out!
5 Common Email Marketing Questions
1. Does list size matter?
In other words, do you have to have thousands of people on your email list to see a return on your investment of time and energy?
Nope! You really just need to focus on having the right people on your email list from the beginning. I know it can be enticing to want to fill it up so that you have a big number. What you actually need is to get the people in there who are going to want to buy from you, be interested in your offers, or want to support you and your business.
Of course, I want you to make list growth a part of your marketing strategy. I just don’t want list size to be the only driving factor or the thing that’s keeping you from getting started.
So, if you are just starting out and your list is going to be your previous and existing customers that you have invited and they have said yes they went through your emails, then that’s great. Even if it’s 20 people, serve those 20 people with 110%.
Keep list building and growth as a key marketing strategy, and pretty soon you’ll see that list grow from 20 to 50 to 100 to 200, and so on.
2. Can you just take emails of your existing clients and put them into your list and start sending them regular emails?
Or better yet, can I have my assistant take anyone that I have ever emailed or that has sent us their contact for my website and add them to my email list?
The short answer is no. Email marketing is considered permission-based email marketing, meaning your email friends give you explicit permission to email them your marketing messages when they sign up. So, you can’t just put anyone and everyone on your list without their permission.
(There are actually laws about this because it’s considering spamming – do a quick search for CAN-SPAM, if you’re curious.)
What you could do is send them an email and invite them to opt-in or join your newsletter list and then make it super easy for them to say, “Yes, I’m in.”
3. Do I have to email every single week?
I have more good news for you. You do not have to feel pressured to email every week.
At the same time, when you do send emails at least every week, then you really are keeping your business, your services, your horses, whatever the case may be, on top of their mind.
And, when it is time for you to have a sale or promotional email or email series because you’re launching a new product or an online course or a workshop, they will be used to opening your emails, and they will know what to expect.
Now, as I said last week, I have seen monthly emails work really well because they are packed with value, and people look forward to them. So, if you are saying, “Denise, there is no way I can commit to once a week, but I feel like I could do a monthly email,” then do that. But if you stretch it out more than a month then you’re not going to enjoy all the benefits of having an active, engaged email list—because they’ll be neither of those things.
4. What stats should I be paying attention to?
Number of subscribers
Open rate
Click-through rate
(Listen to the full episode for the breakdown of why these stats matter.)
5. How do I get people to open my emails?
First, consider the “from” field, which is literally the name that shows up in the “from” line in their inbox. I’ve seen businesses forget this step and use a short-hand name or nickname. So, make sure you’re using the name that makes the most sense to your end-user.
Secondly, pay attention to your subject line. You can have fun with it, test it out and see what works. The goal of the subject line is truly just to get people to open that email and take a look at what’s inside.
Lastly, be consistent in the value you provide. Just like with everything else you do in your company, do email marketing with excellence, be consistent in your brand and in how you serve. As you do that, your email friends will keep opening your emails because they’ll know they can trust that it’s worth their time and it’s worth opening.
Of course, you'll want to listen to the full episode to dig into each of these questions and answers!
Links Mentioned In This Episode
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