Email Marketing is Hard

I recently returned from Affiliate World Europe, where I moderated a panel on email marketing. Our topic focused on why marketers and brands should consider the email channel if they aren’t already using it. We got a lot of great feedback on the session, but in a 30-minute panel discussion, we could barely scratch the surface of the conversation. Preparing for and then running the panel got me thinking about a question many of us in the email channel consider regularly. Why don’t more companies effectively leverage the email marketing channel?

As email marketers, we know the overwhelmingly powerful results that email marketing can deliver. Whether it’s that often-quoted ROI metric ($36 to $1 ROI is the current metric that AI will give you), the ability to deliver highly targeted content to your audiences, or any of the other well-established value propositions of the channel. We all know that email can be the centerpiece of just about any marketing strategy. And yet, many companies don’t seem to agree. So, what gives?

There isn’t a single answer, but the more I’ve thought about it, the more I come to the conclusion that a lot of it comes back to one factor - email marketing is hard.

I’m not suggesting that social, search, display, influencer, or any other channel is ‘easy’ to succeed with. However, I think there’s a strong argument that email marketing offers a number of challenges that most other channels don’t have.

You can’t just allocate budget, start an email program from scratch, and scale overnight

For a lot of marketing channels, especially if media buying is an aspect of the program, starting and scaling are largely a matter of allocating budget. Want to get a few million display ad impressions in a short period of time? It’s pretty straightforward. Just build your creative, build the campaign in your chosen ad platform, and set a large budget. While it will need fine-tuning, like any marketing program, you will start delivering ads very quickly.

In email, that approach doesn’t work. If you happen to already have a huge email database you can mail to, you do have a head start, but even then, you can’t suddenly start sending massive amounts of email tomorrow. The issues with that concept are too numerous to even list.

The point is, getting started in email is a slow process, especially if you plan to achieve long-term success. This makes email a larger and longer commitment than creating a huge social media campaign and making a sudden splash.

The channel has become very complex if you intend to achieve results

When I first got into email marketing, way back in the late 1990s, it really was a simpler time. Terms like deliverability and inboxing, IP warming, personalization, dynamic content, etc., didn’t exist or weren’t major concerns for most email marketers. The process of sending out a large email campaign was pretty straightforward, and in general, your emails were delivered to recipient inboxes.

Today, the entire process of sending large email campaigns has become extremely complex. You have to understand all those above terms and dozens more, and overcome the challenges associated with each one.

Then, there’s the tech stack. Sure, a company could just sign on with one of the large CRM vendors or ‘full-service’ ESPs and start sending emails. But the simplification many of those solutions offer can create notable limitations on what you can and can’t do with your email program. If your goal is to build a truly profitable email program, you’re likely going to need to connect with different technology solutions to help you with different facets of the process.

This topic came up during our panel, when we walked through just a few of the major decisions that need to be made to start up an email program. 

Expertise in email marketing takes years to build, and you can’t become an expert in every facet

This really relates to the overall complexity of the channel that has developed over the past 40+ years, since email marketing began. Once upon a time, in the early days of email marketing, you could become an email marketing expert and have a pretty good handle on the entire channel. Today, becoming an email marketing expert is far more challenging, and even if you are an expert, you still won’t master every aspect of the channel.

Want to become a full-circle email marketing pro? You’ll need to really dig a deep and wide path. Here are just a few of the key areas you need to master. 

• Creative - writing engaging copy, designing email layouts, creating graphics
• Database Marketing - analyzing/understanding your list, creating audience segments
• Performance Analysis - tracking and understanding all of your email metrics, designing A/B or multivariate testing strategies, constantly reporting on and optimizing performance
• Technology - maximizing deliverability, managing multiple tech partners and integrations, understanding sending IPs, DMARC, DKIM, etc.
• Legal - understanding data privacy laws, email marketing regulations in the US and abroad, and even knowing about state regulations that may add requirements to email campaigns

There’s more, of course, but just looking at that list it shows the depth of knowledge someone needs in order to become a well-rounded email marketing expert. We’ve reached the point where being a true expert across all of those areas isn’t overly realistic for one person to achieve. As the saying goes, it takes a village. 

It can be challenging to comply with all relevant email and data privacy regulations

Compliance! Everyone’s favorite topic (well, mine anyway). LOL! (Please note: I am not an attorney, so do not take any of this as legal advice. If you have specific questions or concerns about complying with any laws or regulations, I always recommend you consult your legal counsel.) If you’re marketing in the U.S. it starts with understanding the CAN-SPAM Act. Fortunately, compliance is very achievable for any legitimate email marketing program. The law has also been in place since 2003, giving the industry time to fully grasp the key elements of compliance (honoring opt-outs, etc.). But, if you think compliance begins and ends with CAN-SPAM, you’re in for a rude awakening. Over 20 U.S. states and counting have their own data privacy laws. As an email marketer, at a minimum, you’re storing email addresses (and probably a lot more data) which means you need to understand and comply with all relevant data privacy regulations. How are you capturing data? How are you storing and securing it? How are you using it for marketing purposes? While this may not all seem like a core part of an email marketing program, you need to get up to speed.

But wait… there’s more! Various states have additional laws and regulations in place that may touch on email marketing. CA Code and Professions 17529.50 is one great example. One aspect involves the domains used within the email. If domain privacy has been enacted, which is a common practice for many domain owners, that may run afoul of this CA code.

This doesn’t even consider non-U.S. regulations (GDPR, CASL, etc.) that impact email marketing and data privacy around the world. Don’t assume that the laws of the country where you reside are the only ones you need to understand.

Perception isn’t reality, but it still hampers organizational understanding of the channel

For many people (from marketing pros to senior executives) email is taken for granted. It’s an old-school digital marketing and communication channel that always seems to be on the verge of ‘dying’ or being replaced by something shiny and new. Everyone ‘knows’ the younger generations don’t use email. We see the articles every year with headlines declaring that email is dead or on its way to suffer the fate of the dinosaurs.

Who would put all the necessary effort (which all of the above shows is considerable) to build an email marketing program if the whole channel is in decline?

Strangely, stats still show that daily email volume is climbing worldwide. Up to 376 billion per day at the latest count, with estimates that it will reach 400 billion per day by 2027. It’s almost like the perception of email, and the reality don’t match up. While reality points to email continuing to thrive for years to come, perception still drives a lot of decision-making among companies and marketers. This can make it challenging for email marketers to advocate for more budget in their organizations and likely hampers building a new email marketing program in many situations.

If Email is this hard, why do it?

Short answer: Because it’s well worth the effort. Here’s where I point back to the beginning of the article, where I listed just a few key value props that email can provide for companies that make the investment in budget and time to create a long-term email marketing program. A well-structured email marketing program can be the core of a company’s entire marketing program. It can be the hub around which all of those other channels revolve, creating a multichannel marketing program that maximizes returns.