How A Small Business Built An Email Subscriber List Without A Website

Posted by Karl Foxley on Feb 23, 2010 in Blog, Coaching, Email Marketing | 30 comments

Can that really be true?

Can a small business grow an email subscriber list without a website?

The short answer is, Absolutely.

This post is will not take you long to read but it will give you or the offline businesses you work with an introduction to the power of email marketing without the need of a website.

Building An Email Subscriber List For Offline Businesses

What you are about to read is a personal story of how a simple discussion between myself and a local offline (bricks-and-mortar) business owner increased her profits within weeks of implementing what I shared.

This all began with a trip to my local unisex hairdressers.

Whenever I’m getting my haircut, the salon owner and I always chat about family, the community and work.

During one such conversation it was revealed that sometimes ‘business was slow’, and although Friday and Saturday were always guaranteed to be super busy, Tuesday and Wednesday could often see only a trickle of clients come through the doors over the course of each day.

Being someone who likes to share useful information, I talked about email marketing and how, on those quiet days, an email could be sent out to subscribers that encouraged them to visit the salon.

This is how we did it?

Building Your Email Database of Prospects and Customers

Each time someone paid for their haircut at the till, they were asked if they would like to sign-up for the salon’s (new) email newsletter and to receive notifications of any special offers that the salon were to be running.

This required the customer to leave their first name and email address. In return, the customer received a 20 per cent discount voucher off their next haircut.

By providing customers with a money off voucher on a future haircut, a large number of people that were first-time visitors went on to become repeat customers.

Successful Email Promotions

With the email subscriber database growing, the business owner would send out a monthly newsletter that covered new hairstyles, products and forthcoming promotions.

In between the newsletter broadcasts, promotions were sent out to get people in on those days that were often quiet.

One of the best promotions they ran was ‘introduce a friend’. By bringing a friend (someone new to the salon) both people would receive 20 per cent off their haircuts.

By doing this the salon owner was able to add new names and emails to the database and it is a promotion they continue to run to this day.

The great thing about this story is that all you need as a small business owner (or consultant to small businesses) is an…

Email Service Provider

That’s it. You collect the name and email address and add it to the email service provider (ESP) that you are using.

You see, using an email service provider is very affordable and thus allows it to be incorporated into the tightest of budgets.

Let’s look at the following providers:

AWeber prices start at $1 for the first month and then $19.00 a month. You can save $34.20 if you pay for a year in advance at a total of $193.80. This price plan is for up to 500 subscribers.

Get Response is free up to your 10 subscribers and then the price is $18 a month. If you prepay for the year the price is approximately $177.12, saving you $38.88 (18 %). This price plan is for 11-500 subscribers.

iContact allows you to get started for free (I believe it is for the first 15 days). You can get started at just $9.97 a month for up to 250 subscribers, making iContact one of the most affordable options to getting started with a dedicated email service provider. The annual subscription at this level is $107.46.

After you’ve chosen the service that mostly fits your needs you can start writing your newsletter and promotions ready to be sent out by your auto-responder (a great way to turn prospects into customers).

In closing, getting started in email marketing does not have to cost your business a lot of money and the ROI can be astounding when you consider that email (newsletters) allow you to build a relationship with your customers through staying in contact with them.

Additionally, when the time comes and the business owner decides to purchase a website they can simply plug their ESP web form into the site to continue to build their database of prospects and customers.

What are your thoughts? Is this something that your business can benefit from using? What tips and ideas would you share with the business owners in your locality?

To your success,

Karl Foxley

P.s. Although I did not receive any financial reward for the information I gave to the salon owner, my family and I now enjoy free haircuts.

P.p.s If a hair salon can build an email subscriber list I’m sure you can too. Be sure to read this post, 3 Ways a Small Business Can Build an Email Subscriber List Without a Website, for extra tips.