How To Start an Email Marketing Business?

How Does Email Marketing Work?

So, if you are asking how to start an email marketing business, first you need to understand that Email Marketing is the most Cost-effective way of promotion. You might have heard or read a thousand times the phrase “Money is in the List.” Well, let me tell you that this is not exactly correct.

(Notice that I highlighted the word “Exactly”. Just keep reading to see why I say this).

Email marketing is one of the best ways online marketers use to build a relationship with customers. It gives the possibility of reaching thousands of people at once and even expand the scope of your website traffic. – it’s a way to connect with people, develop their trust, and show the value of your business.

Just think those individuals who visit your website for some minutes reading your content and finally don’t buy anything. There you have a potential customer who is interested in your niche and product but decided not to buy (just yet). So, which is the best way to keep in touch with this potential customer?…. That’s correct, with an email marketing campaign!.

So, what does it mean that “Money is in the list”?

The most common mistake that most marketers do is think that all subscribers will buy your offers no matter what. It is true that money is on the list, but it doesn’t mean that by sending an email full of offers, without any content or any value, your customers will buy all that stuff. Absolutely NO.

But if you’re not collecting email addresses and following up with an autoresponder, you’re missing out A LOT of revenue. Just remember: keep in touch with people, be honest and add value.

HOW TO START AN EMAIL MARKETING BUSINESS?

If you want to start an email marketing campaign, there are 5 important things you must take into consideration:

    • Email Service Provider
    • A Sign-Up Form
    • Something of high value to give away
    • Set up autoresponder emails
    • Collect emails

Email Service Provider

An Email Service Provider has nothing to do with the most common accounts, such as Gmail, Outlook, Yahoo, etc. It is a service that is going to host all those email addresses that you are collecting in an organized way. This should be a server that people can rely on and which provides the possibility of unsubscribing in an easy way.

Key essential features you should consider when choosing a good Email Service Provider:

    • Customer support 24/7
    • Excellent quality and deliverability
    • Easy to set up your campaign
    • Tutorials and supportive team to help you with technical stuff.

The 3 main providers I used since I started with Internet Marketing are AweberGetResponse, and MailChimp.

Sign Up Form

A Sign Up form is where your visitors will submit their emails in exchange for something of great value that you will offer to them.

The most common areas to place your Sign Up form on your website is on the Sidebars, Headers or as a pop-up box. You can see on this site where I located my Sign up form. On the header with a tiny bar, on the top right of the sidebar and the pop up box.

Some things to take into account on a Sign Up form:

    • Message (what do you offer)
    • Image & design (colors, product image, fonts, etc.)
    • Call to Action (How would your Sign up Form button look like?)
    • Location (Pop Up forms or lightbox forms convert pretty well)

Something of Great Value To Give Away

Think of something to give away for free that can add value to your potential subscriber and that is exclusive. Think of something that people need, their problems, what are they looking for.

Some ideas can be:

    1. eBook
    2. PLR eBook (Private Label Rights)
    3. Personal 1-0n-1 coaching
    4. Guide or Tutorial
    5. Webinar

Set up Autoresponder emails

This is an email that goes immediately after somebody confirms their subscription to your list. Once a subscription is approved, your gift will be sent automatically to the new subscriber.

With an autoresponder, you will be sending daily, weekly or monthly valuable information, training, news or updates about your blog. This will enable you to build trust with your List, and they will start taking you as a point of reference in your niche.

The primary goal of an autoresponder is to automatize the email delivery, saving you time to focus on other important aspects of your business. It also provides a professional look to your business. Instead of sending an email to your Gmail account (YourName@gmail.com), you will be sending emails with your company name (Name@YourBusiness.com).

Which is the best Autoresponder?

This is my personal ranking:

1. Aweber

This is my current Email Service Provider, and I’m really comfortable. It’s very easy to use, and I like how forms can be customized and embedded on your website.

They offer live support 24/7 and in case you send an email; they get back to you very quickly. I highly recommend this service. You can read my article on how to build a List with Aweber Step-by-Step here.

Aweber offers 1 month free of charge.

2. GetResponse

This is another excellent service which I used some time ago before migrating to Aweber. You can set up landing pages, Squeeze pages and forms in a very easy way too.

They also offer live support but why did I change to Aweber? Simply because I wanted to test why people were saying that Aweber was the number 1 Email Service Provider. Now that I have tested it, I can confirm the rumor. Aweber is awesome.

Nevertheless, you can try GetResponse Here. GetResponse also offers  1 month free of charge with no credit card required, so you can try it out and see which best suits you.

3. MailChimp

This email service is well known and has a free version. Let me tell you that this is not my best recommendation. I have tried, and the user experience is a little worst than Aweber and GetResponse.

Also, the free version does not provide an autoresponder service. You have to send all the emails manually unless you pay the monthly or yearly membership.

You can check the free version here. Leave your comment or review about MailChimp below under the comment section.

Advantages of Email Marketing

    • If they don’t buy your product in your website, don’t worry, you can do a Follow up with your customers with email marketing.
    • It increases traffic to your website
    • It’s targeted
    • It’s cheap and efficient
    • It can be easily measured
    • If your site crashes, you can still make sales with email marketing promotions
    • You can do a market segmentation easily

Final Tips

These are some free guides with useful information for your email marketing campaigns:

  1. Email Marketing – Getting Started Guide
  2. Email Marketing Walkthrough (Includes Video lesson)
  3. Free Pop-up  Email form with MailMunch Plugin
  4. Definitive Guide To Email Marketing Setup
  5. How to build a List Step-By-Step with Aweber

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14 comments

  1. Florencia Petrozzelli -

    I really enjoy reading your posts, the way you explain and suggest different options available is so practical and easy to understand that it’s really valuable for people that are new in the business (like me). I’ll follow your guideline and try using Aweber – tried to do it on my own but I don’t know why it didn’t work.

    is there any way I can contact you directly for assistance?

    Thanks again!

    Flor

  2. John -

    Great article about how to start an email marketing business Kevin.
    While I agree that it is not exactly true that “The money is in the list”, I do think it is extremely important as an online marketer to start building a list as soon as you can.
    It is a great way to keep adding value to your subscribers AND a great way to make a lot of money as well.
    I personally use AWeber as my email autoresponder and haven’t had any dramas with it!
    Great work 🙂
    ~John

    • Kevin Balcker -

      Hi John,

      Definitely, anyone starting with an online business should start building a list straight away. It’s a very good way of building a relationship and authority with your audience.

      I use Aweber too as they offer a fantastic service. You can take a look at my article on “How to Build a list with Aweber” if you still have any doubt with the program.

      Remember that I’m here for whatever you need 🙂

      Cheers,
      Kevin

  3. Ben -

    Kevin, thanks for the information about getting started with email marketing. I used to use Aweber years ago then turned it off when I stepped away from by business for a couple years. Now that I’m getting back into it I’m glad to hear that people still think that Aweber is the best. I just have to figure out what incentive to offer for the opt-ins.

    • Kevin Balcker -

      Hey, Ben.

      Yes, actually Aweber is the best option to do Email Marketing. It is very simple and easy to use and create campaigns.

      When I first started with email marketing, I used Mail Chimp and I was very disappointed with the service provided. It’s quite complicated to use, even for me that I have a certain expertise in this field.

      What I recommend you, is to offer something related to your niche which drives value to your customer. These can be: discounts, tips, newsletters, eBooks, etc. You just have to figure out something that helps your audience and that is unique.

      If you have any doubt or still struggle to find the best incentive, I can help you out 🙂 Just leave me a private message or a comment here including you website and niche and we can brainstorm a little bit.

      Hope to hear from you again!
      Kevin

  4. Torrey -

    I am currently using mail chimp as my email provider. Apparently, the reason I never noticed that they don’t provide autoresponder is because I’ve never had any signup yet.

    I’m glad you mentioned Aweber. I will definitely check them out,

    Torrey.

    P.S. I assume aweber is a paid service, right? What is their monthly fee? How long have you been with them? Are you impressed?

    • Kevin Balcker -

      Hi Torrey,

      I personally don’t like MailChimp too much. It’s not a user-friendly platform to work on (even for me that I have a certain level of expertise in this field).

      As regards Aweber, yes it is a paid service but they offer a 30-day trial version for new joiners. Nevertheless, they have very cheap plans, starting from $15/month. You can check my review here for more details.

      I’m currently using it because they offer a pretty decent service but there are other autoresponder services that you can try out, for example, GetResponse which is my #2 recommended autoresponder. Read my GetResponse review here.

      Hope it helps

      Kevin

  5. Cathy -

    Hi there Kevin,

    Thanks for this round up about email marketing. I have been wanting to set up one for quite sometime.

    My question is regarding landing pages. I am currently using a free landing page template, it’s okay, just a bit slow to integrate.

    Does Aweber provide any landing pages template? Do they charge separately for it or it’s all inclusive in the package? Thanks!

    • Kevin Balcker -

      Hi Cathy,

      Aweber doesn’t count with Landing Pages but they can integrate easily with other Landing pages programs, such as LeadPages, InstaPages and many more.

      There is another service called GetResponse that has free Landing pages templates to customize. You can read my review here . This is included in the most basic autoresponder plan, so you can check it out how it works.

      Cheers

      Kevin

  6. Kevin -

    Hi, I loved your post… I am trying to start an email marketing campaign but I don’t know where to start. Do you think that the first thing I need to do is to search for something of value to give a way in exchange for a subscription?
    Is really hard to think about something of value… which do you recommend for first timers?
    Any help will be appreciated.

  7. Winny -

    Hey there!

    I have to say…just an AWESOME article!!

    Yes, it is true that the rumor says “in the list is the money”, however if you only think about money and not HELPING people, well, guess what? You will NEVER make sales. Marketing is ONLY about helping people and the reward we get is money. A great way to keep the contact with your people is through emails. This will connect you two in a much deeper level, which you want to establish.

    Thank you for sharing this with us!

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