This post was originally written in February of 2020. Things have changed since then, so I’ve updated the post with new information.
If you’re going to have an email list, you’ll need an email marketing service to manage that list properly.
Not all email marketing services are created equal. Some are very simple and work well for small businesses and solopreneurs. Some are incredibly complex and are really designed for medium to large businesses, even if they do promote themselves to small business owners.
But first, I will answer the question, “Why do I need an email marketing service?”
Why Do You Need an Email Marketing Service?
I’ll give you 3 good reasons.
Reason #1: To comply with the CAN SPAM Act.
The CAN SPAM Act (yes, that is what it is called) is the set of regulations around sending emails in the U.S.
It requires that you state that your email is an advertisement, that you only send it to people who have agreed to receive emails from you by opting into your email list and that you offer a way for them to opt out at the bottom of every email. Among other things.
If you want to read more about the CAN SPAM Act, go here.
Reason #2: To make sure your emails get to your subscribers’ inboxes.
If you try to send emails directly from your personal email account, it is likely that other internet service providers, or ISPs (like Gmail, etc.) will mark them as spam.
This means that eventually, every email you send, including to your grandmother, will be marked as spam and no one will get your emails.
Also, Google, Yahoo, and other ISPs are increasing their email authentication standards to prevent spam and spoofing (when someone sends an email with a nefarious link pretending to be you to hack into a computer system).
Sending your emails from a reliable email marketing service that requires you to set up a Domain-based Message Authentication, Reporting, and Conformance or DMARC record means your emails are less likely to get caught in the spam filters.
Reason #3. Your ISP will shut down your email account.
If you send bulk emails from your personal account, your ISP (the company that you send your emails from, like Gmail or Yahoo) can close your account for breaking the rules of the CAN SPAM Act. Those rules are set up so that you pretty much have to send all of your marketing emails from an email marketing service.
Now that you know why you need an email marketing service, there are 3 main things you want to make sure to look for before you decide to start a free trial or take the plunge and hand over your credit card.
1. Your Email Marketing Service Should Be Easy to Use
This may seem obvious but it’s a tricky issue. Lots of email marketing services claim to be easy to use, until you find out that you need to know CSS or HTML to create opt-in forms, change their email templates or create one of your own. If you do know CSS or HTML, fantastic. Go you. But be aware of this before you sign up.
Here are three functions you’ll want to consider.
Creating Your Emails
These days, most email service providers offer a drag and drop template builder or several email templates that are easy to customize. You want to look at how easy it is to use their template builder or how “customizable” their templates really are. HTML does have limits. That being said, you should still be able to make your template look the way you want to.
That includes being able to add images, format with columns, and add different sections. This last option is especially helpful if you send an email newsletter.
Creating Landing Pages and Opt-In Forms
The majority of email marketing services include landing pages and opt-in forms. Some even let you build what amounts to an entire website in their system. What you do want is the ability to easily add an opt-in form to your website and to create landing pages for various lead magnets or special offers.
Many third-party services offer this ability too. The nice thing about having it built into your email marketing service is you don’t have to worry about whether the third-party service’s integration works well and accommodates all of the information you may want passed through to your contact database.
Sending Your Email
In addition to being able to make your email look pretty, you want it to be easy to send.
Before you choose an email marketing service, take a look at the process to send broadcasts and automated emails. You want this process to make sense to you.
Everyone’s brain works slightly differently. If sending an email is confusing to you, you’re less likely to do it. This is bad for your business and bad for your subscribers. It’s worth taking a few minutes to watch a help video before you sign up so you know whether this system is right for you.
Email marketing services have been improving their usability because they understand that their customers (business owners) are busy people and don’t have a lot of time to spend on learning a complicated tool.
That said, it’s worth taking the time to go through more than the website videos to figure out whether you like the way the platform is laid out and if it makes sense to you.
Many of these platforms offer demos. Sign up for one and get a salesperson to walk you through the system before you sign up, especially if you’re paying for it right away. This gives you a chance to ask questions and be reassured that this really is the right platform for you. Or not. (You also may get in on a deal that isn’t necessarily advertised on the website, depending on the company and what they’re offering at the time.)
Finally, if you have a list and you’re moving it from one platform to another, ask customer service about options for this transfer. Some companies will do it for you, depending on the size of your list. Others have import tools that are specific to different platforms, to make things easier on you.
2. Make Sure Your Email Marketing Service Has Automated Campaigns with Multiple Emails at All Pricing Levels
I know, this sounds crazy. But it’s a thing.
I have encountered a few email marketing services that will let you send a single automated email when someone opts in, but you can’t send a full welcome campaign, automate your sales emails or segment your list if you’re at a lower pricing level.
That’s craziness!
In my opinion, automation and segmentation are the reason to have an email marketing service.
I get that email service providers (ESPs) want to make money off of their products. However, businesses can’t grow if they don’t have the necessary tools to get more customers. Which means they’ll go with a different ESP and that company will miss out.
When you’re looking at a new email marketing service, make absolutely sure that you can send multiple automated emails, usually referred to as a campaign or sequence. Some platforms won’t give you access to their automation system at a lower price level, but you can set up a multiple email campaign to go out automatically using tags and smaller steps of automation. Confirm that you have this option, one way or another before you sign up.
Also make sure you can segment your email list with tags or another option. Different platforms have different ways of doing this. Tags are the most common, so make sure they are available.
You want your email marketing service to make it easier to promote your business. Make sure you’re choosing the right tool for your needs.
3. Does Your Email Marketing Service Include Website and Landing Page Tracking?
This is an awesome thing about email marketing services. Most of them include a JavaScript snippet that you can put onto your website and landing pages. This little tracking script shows you when people on your email list have visited certain pages.
You can trigger email campaigns, one-off emails or other automated systems off of these visits, making your life easier while doing a better job of promoting your business.
The other nice thing about knowing who has visited what web page is you can segment your audience based on their interests.
If you plan on having a sale on a certain product or service, you can send a slightly different email with a more persuasive offer to people who have previously visited the page for that product or service.
This may not be a function you use right away, but it’s one you want available to you as you grow your email list, so make sure it’s part of the plan you start on.
Choose an Email Marketing Service That Will Grow with Your Business
Regardless of the size of your business right now, you want to get more customers, more profit and more growth.
Consider that when you choose your email marketing service.
You don’t want to “outgrow” your service too quickly. Mostly because transferring your list to a new service can be a huge, time-consuming pain. Also because it means you have to set up all of your automations, tags and systems again.
On the flip side of that coin, most email marketing services charge by the number of subscribers you have. The more subscribers on your list, the larger your monthly bill. If you’re planning on growing a large (expensive) list, you want your platform to have everything you need to use that list for the betterment of your business.
Using Your Email Marketing Service Regularly
Now that you understand what to look for, I will remind you that the point of having an email marketing service is to send nurture emails to your subscribers regularly, so they become paying customers.
Which means you will need to write those emails.
If you’re like many business owners, the reason you don’t write those emails every week to nurture your subscribers and guide them to become customers is, you never know what to say. You end up staring at a blank page, struggling to find the right words and eventually, you just give up.
This is bad for your subscribers, because they don’t learn more about your product or service, which they’re genuinely interested in. Otherwise they wouldn’t have signed up for your email list.
It’s also bad for you, because it means you’ve put a lot of effort and expense into building an email list that isn’t making money for you.
To make this whole process easier on you, please click on the button below to download my list of 30 Subject Lines to Keep Your Subscribers Opening and Reading Every Email.
This list includes subject lines that are easy to adapt to your business, as well as writing prompts to stimulate your creative juices when you sit down to write that weekly nurture email to your subscribers.
That way, you’ll get those emails written every week and start to see more sales coming in. Which is the whole point of having an email list, and an email marketing service, after all.