Intro to Building an Email List for Small Businesses

A business’s email list represents one of its most valuable tools for connecting with potential customers. It provides a direct line to your audience, free of algorithms and the potential loss of your client list, and creates a stable channel for promoting products and turning interest into business income. This guide covers the basics of building an email list that small business owners need to get started.

What is an Email List?

An email list is a collection of emails and contact information belonging to individuals or sales leads who’ve agreed to receive regular updates, promotions, and product information from your business. Email lists are a marketing essential for companies seeking to nurture relationships with existing customers and kickstart connections with new ones, making them one of the best uses for your business email.

Important definitions to know

Before you start building your email list, it’s helpful to understand some common terms you’ll encounter during the process. The new terminology you come across will provide the context you need to make informed decisions as you grow your audience. Here are some key terms to be familiar with as you start building your email list:

• Subscribers: Individuals who have consented to join your email list, typically through a form either digital or paper, and agreed to receive regular emails from your business.
• Newsletter: A recurring email sent to subscribers to keep your audience engaged. A newsletter might include industry news, product updates, or educational content related to your business.
• Signup form: A digital form on your website or blog that collects an email address and basic information from a visitor and subscribes them to future emails from your business. This is the primary means of building an email list.
• Call to action (CTA): A content section, button, or pop-up screen that encourages users to take a specific step, like subscribing to regular emails.
• Audience segment: A portion of your subscriber list organized by shared traits like location, purchase history, behaviors, or engagement level. Segmenting helps you deliver more personalized content to each group.
• Incentive-based signup: A strategy where you offer a discount, free product, or exclusive content in exchange for an email sign-up, sometimes this is called a lead magnet.
• Email marketing campaign: A coordinated series of emails sent to some or all of your email list to drive traffic towards a product launch, announce a sale, or nurture potential clients to make a purchase.

Understanding these key terms will help you navigate the process of building your email list and judging its quality.

An email list works best when you’re communicating with recipients through a branded domain name, rather than a generic one. Register a domain with Northwest, and create up to 10 customized business email accounts to chat with clients, customers, and subscribers.

Basic concepts of email marketing

After you’ve built an email list of consenting and interested subscribers, email marketing is how you put that list to work. This is achieved by launching intelligent marketing campaigns like newsletter campaigns, event invites, promotional emails, or other forms of email outreach.

Unlike paid ads and social media, email marketing provides a direct line to your customers, allowing you to gain deeper insight through surveys and drive sales through seasonal marketing campaigns.

As you get started, remember this key concept of email marketing: don’t buy email lists! The key to a good, healthy, and sustainable email list for your small business is genuine connection and authentic interactions.

What Small Businesses Need to Build an Email List

When you’re starting a business, an email list is an invaluable tool. It allows you to stay connected with potential customers, promote your offerings, and grow your brand over time. Here’s what every small business needs to begin building an effective email list from day one.

Business email

To start building a professional email list and ensure people open your emails, your business needs a credible way to communicate. A branded business email is an absolute necessity, and for this venture, a basic Gmail or Outlook account won’t suffice. Most email automation and marketing platforms will require a valid business email to begin building campaigns, too.

The ideal email address will match or complement your business name, the same way a great business domain name will. A domain name is the address of your website online and the basis of your business email.

For example, Mick’s Custom Flooring LLC needs a custom email to begin building an email list. To do this, Mick would need to buy a domain name. Ideally, their business domain that makes up their email would be closely related to the name of the business, such as support@micksflooring.net or outreach@mickscustoms.com.

Business website

A business website is a digital storefront, product catalog, and sales representative all in one. Additionally, it’s an effective launchpad for your email list and can help establish credibility for your business from the very first contact with a potential customer.

While there are some must-have basics for every business website, even the simplest site can serve as a landing zone for traffic from other channels, such as social media platforms. From there, a signup form, a smart incentive-based signup, and effective CTAs can close the deal and drive visitors to your email list.

Email marketing software

In order to organize and house your email list in a secure place where you can customize what to send and who to send it to, you’ll need to use email marketing software to handle the workload. This is where specialized platforms and software come in to automate campaigns and manage your email list.

Platforms like Mailchimp feature a simple interface that’s ideal for beginners, while others, such as Constant Contact, offer more comprehensive tools and hands-on support to handle more complex campaigns. And there are more services out there to explore or you can stick to doing it all manually! Whatever works for you and your business.

Business social media profiles

Social media is one of the most reliable ways to drive traffic to your business website and, ultimately, build your email list. Social media platforms are typically a great way to start building your email list, as they already have a direct relationship with your audience.

Establishing a presence on social media platforms gives you the ability to make quick posts about your products, connect with your audience, and give a personality to your business brand (check out how Northwest uses social media: Instagram, TikTok, and LinkedIn). Each social media platform represents another unique way for your brand to communicate and connect with potential email subscribers.

Build Your Business’s Email List

You don’t need a limitless budget or a perfectly optimized strategy to build an effective email list. With the right tools, a thoughtful approach, and just a bit of personality, you can build a reliable way to connect with individuals who are genuinely interested in your business and what it has to offer. Set up a professional email, create a basic website, and establish a presence on social media, and you’ll lay the groundwork for long-term success.