Why You Shouldn't Use Gmail as Your E-Newsletter Platform
So you’re ready to start an email newsletter. Whoo hoo! Email is the most effective form of marketing, and definitely worth the time investment.
But it can certainly feel like an overwhelming time investment up front!
While using your Gmail account to send emails may seem like an easy short-cut, I’m sharing why that’s not a good idea.
You lose out on analytics
Analytics allow you to see open rates, click rates, demographics, and more. What this information does is shows you how engaged your list is so you can tweak as necessary. Maybe change up your subject lines or prune unresponsive subscribers.
If you link to your offer, you can also see how many people clicked on that link - and who - so you can track your conversion rate.
Plus, many email newsletter platforms allow you to re-send emails to subscribers who did not open the first time around.
There are very few formatting options
You can play around with the look of text and insert some images in Gmail, but that’s the extent of it. On a professional email newsletter platform, you can add buttons, better photo layouts, social media icons, and even your social media feed.
You miss out on helpful features
A welcome sequence, or workflow, is a pre-created series of emails that automatically sends to new subscribers once they’ve opted into your list. They’re excellent opportunities to introduce your subscribers to who you are and what you do, and many businesses earn sales from their welcome sequence alone.
I Use Flodesk as my E-Newsletter Platform
Psst! This is an affiliate link. ;)
It’s more time consuming
Using the formatting and features of a professional email newsletter platform is more efficient, but these platforms also automatically add and unsubscribe contacts based on their opt-in/opt-out. If you use Gmail to send your email newsletter, you have to figure out a way to get people to sign up (you cannot just add them), and then manually add them to your newsletter contacts list.
And as for removing people from your list…
You could face legal repercussions
All email newsletters need to contain an unsubscribe feature. In some legislature, including a “Reply to unsubscribe” line of text at the bottom of your email doesn’t cut it.
If the price of using an email newsletter software is holding you back, there are several reputable platforms that offer either free plans or free trials. Learn more about choosing the right e-newsletter platform for you.
Wondering how to grow your email list as well as how to create emails your contacts will actually want to open? Check out my Expand With Email online mini course. Psst! It’s included in my comprehensive Marketing 101 course.
