As I’m sure you know, I am passionate about helping creative countryside entrepreneurs take their ideas to the next level and build thriving businesses. But here in the UK right now especially we are experiencing unprecedented uncertainty and challenges. Building a sustainable business as a creative professional (artist, maker, designer, crafter, grower etc) can be pretty challenging at the best of times and so I really wanted to share with you what I’m seeing happen in the marketing world with social media and content creation.

Building your email list should be your number one priority right now as a creative business owner. I'm not saying that because I want to make you feel anxious or overwhelmed but because I want you to see that there is a better way to do business.

Ways that are heart-aligned, that feed your creative soul and don’t require you to do silly dances in public, without even so much as a glass of wine to fortify you first!

Why do I think email marketing is so valuable?

There are several reasons:

• Instagram reach is down (really down, I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that).

• Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube and other social media channels can be great for connecting with your audience, but belong to them—not you. If they decide to shut you down, there’s nothing you can do about it.

• Your email list is your list. No-one can take it away from you.

• An email list gets you in front of your people—free or at low cost.

• You can build a relationship with your audience through your emails. People like to do business with people they know, like and trust.

• You can offer an incentive, the ‘ethical bribe’ (a lead magnet, freebie or opt-in) to new subscribers and turn them into customers much more easily than cold leads or prospects.

• When you take the time to build an email list, you will have a following that you can reach out to over and over again – existing customers that want to buy for you far more than people who have never heard of you.

• Imagine what it would be like to have a steady stream of potential clients in your inbox every day who are excited about working with you.

• Most of us don't need a website overhaul or an updated logo (unless it’s really bad or not aligned with your customer-base) - what we really need is more people coming to our site and seeing our work.

• Email is more personal and therefore more effective at connecting with your audience.

• An email list is the one thing that you can control and building it will help you build connections with people that last.

• Your email list is an extension of who you are as a business, so you can take the time to personalise your content.

And most importantly, you get to show up there how you choose – not as a slave to an algorithm or the way others think it should be done.

But why right now?

Aside from the social media algorithms we have also been hit by the introduction of iOS14 (‘apps are required to ask your permission when they want to track you across apps and websites owned by other companies. You can change your preference for any app or prevent apps from asking for permission entirely in Settings’ – Apple).

What this means in real terms is that if you previously relied on Facebook or Instagram ads or boosting, then they used the data collected by users to inform who to direct the advertising to. So if you’ve clicked ‘ask app not to track’, then you have removed the ability for advertisers to target the your data from that app. On a personal level you might feel reassured that your privacy is maintained, but as a business owner this means ads are less targeted and have become more expensive as it is harder to find the right people to show the ads to.

This has created a perfect storm whereby your organic posts and reach is hugely diminished, yet your ability to spend on ads to reach people has also been compromised (especially as small business owners who don’t have the huge ad spends).

It can be tempting to bury our heads in the sand and hope the Instagram will see the error of their ways and change the algorithm back, but I think we can all agree the heady days of everyone that follows you seeing your posts is long gone.

“small businesses saw a cut of over 60% of their sales, on average, for every dollar they spent when they weren't able to use their own data to find customers on Facebook” (Data, HubSpot)

Email marketing FAR outperforms social media, both in terms of eyes on, AND crucially, click-throughs to your product or whatever Call To Action you are presenting.

A path forward

Working on creating truly valuable lead magnets, and then sequences of emails that establish your authority in your niche, are truly helpful, always interesting, and offer social proof of your services or products is STILL the best converting channel for sales.

Here are some facts about emails that might help you decide it’s time to start investing time in them if you haven’t up until now:

• 99% of email users check their inbox every day, with some checking 20 times a day. Of those people, 58% of consumers check their email first thing in the morning. (OptinMonster, 2020)

• 84.3% of consumers say they check their emails at least once a day. (Pathwire, 2021)

• 50% of people buy from marketing emails at least once per month. (Salecycle, 2022)

• And, if you think of it this way, if you have say 1000 followers on Instagram, on average only around 60 of your followers will see your post, whereas a good open rate for emails is 40-45%, ie around 400 people on a list of 1000 (if you do more then even better!)

If you want help with creating a suitable lead magnet that gets sign ups, as well as support with all the tech/jargon side of things through my weekly group calls, then sign up to my ‘Build your email list’ course below and let’s begin!