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The Pros and Cons of Email Marketing

Are you using your marketing strategy wisely? Are there better angles to leverage? Before going all in on email marketing, consider the following pros and cons.

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The Pros and Cons of Email Marketing

Email marketing is one of the top digital marketing strategies. It involves using emails and promotional messages to:

  • Build relationships with current and potential customers
  • Increase brand awareness
  • Promote products or services

Email marketing has both advantages and disadvantages that you need to consider, so you can understand if it’s the right marketing approach for your business. 

Let’s discuss the pros and cons of email marketing – specifically from the point of view of a small business or startup – to determine if it’s the wise digital marketing strategy for your venture:

Pros of Email Marketing

Here are elements that make it a wise choice for some businesses.

Cost-effective

Email marketing is one of the most cost-effective ways to promote products or services, especially when compared to traditional marketing methods, like print or broadcast advertising. Small businesses can save a considerable amount of money by using emails to market instead of avenues like print ads or direct mail.

Sending an email costs very little, especially when measured against the cost of printing and postage for snail mail. Additionally, email platforms offer affordable pricing plans based on the number of subscribers, making it accessible to small businesses.

Targeted

Email marketing allows businesses to target their messages to specific groups of people, which can increase the effectiveness of their campaigns. This targeted approach increases the likelihood of conversions and sales. According to Campaign Monitor, over 60% of small businesses use email marketing to reach customers.

Up-Selling and Cross-Selling

Email marketing can be an effective way to promote related products or services to existing customers. By including upsell or cross-sell opportunities in emails, businesses can increase their revenue per customer. As a matter of fact, the average expected ROI is $40 for every dollar you spend on email marketing.

Measurable

Email marketing provides measurable results, allowing small businesses to track metrics such as:

  • Open rates
  • Click-through rates
  • Conversion rates

This data can be used to refine future email campaigns and improve their effectiveness. Other types of marketing strategies often require an extra cost to even obtain this data, but with email marketing, you can easily create a marketing report to visualize and analyze the data.

Customizable

Emails can be customized with personalization fields, making them more engaging and relevant to the recipient. By leveraging the power of customization, businesses can develop more effective email campaigns that resonate with their audiences.

Reach

Email marketing allows small businesses to reach a large number of customers or even potential customers at once. This can increase brand awareness and better promote products or services.

Customer Feedback

Email marketing can be an effective way to gather customer feedback and insights. By including surveys or asking for feedback in emails, businesses can gain valuable information about their customers’ needs, preferences, and satisfaction levels.

Increased Website Traffic

Email marketing can drive traffic to a business’s website by including links to products, blog posts, or other content in emails. This can lead to increased engagement and conversions, as seen by the data provided by Statista: it estimates that email marketing revenue will increase to $11 billion in the near future.

Cons of Email Marketing

Email marketing isn’t perfect, however, and it doesn’t suit all companies. Here are downsides to consider:

Deliverability

Email deliverability can be a challenge, as messages may end up in spam or junk folders or get blocked altogether. Email providers consider the reputation of the sender when deciding whether to deliver an email to the recipient’s inbox or not. You will need to maintain good email engagement rates, list hygiene, and authentication, so you can develop and promote a good sender reputation. This ensures that your emails are delivered.

The quality of an email list can further impact deliverability. Email providers appreciate lists that are composed of engaged and active subscribers who have opted-in to receive emails. Lists that include invalid or inactive email addresses, or have a high rate of unsubscribes or spam complaints, can damage sender reputation and minimize deliverability rates.

Unsubscribes

Email marketing campaigns naturally result in some unsubscribes, which can reduce the size of a business’s email list over time. You will need to develop a solid email-acquisition strategy to grow your list over time. Once that original strategy no longer works, you will need to come up with another one. Trying to persuade customers from unsubscribing is often an uphill battle, and it requires constant innovation and planning.

Limited formatting

Emails are limited in their formatting options when compared to other marketing channels, which can impact the visual appeal and engagement of the message. There are plenty of email templates available that help you create appealing emails to stand out in the recipient’s inbox, but they still follow a specific style and format that are standard for all emails.

Overwhelming

The sheer volume of emails that people receive on a daily basis can make it challenging for a business to cut through the noise and capture attention. About 33% of email marketers send emails weekly, and if your customers are subscribed to more than one newsletter, you need to be creative and keep up with trends to stand out.

Can be seen as intrusive

Some people may view email marketing as intrusive or unwanted, which can damage a business’s reputation if not executed carefully. That means all campaigns should be thought-out and balanced with the needs, preferences, and behaviors of the intended audience. 

Final Thoughts

Email marketing can be a powerful tool for small businesses to reach and engage with their customers, but there are also potential drawbacks to consider, such as:

  • The risk of being flagged as spam
  • Low open rates
  • The need for ongoing list management and content creation

The success of an email marketing campaign, of course, depends on careful planning, effective execution, and constant optimization. Plan your campaigns carefully, and you’ll be seeing the pros of this powerful marketing strategy more than the cons.

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