The Ultimate Blog Podcast - The Truth About Email Marketing for Bloggers (And What Actually Works)

Episode Date: August 5, 2025

If you’ve ever felt like email marketing is dead, or like you need a huge email list to really dig into email marketing – you’re not alone. But the truth is that you can start utilizing your email list with just a few people on it – and in fact, you should! This episode of the Ultimate Blog Podcast is the final part of our email series. Amy is here to bust some common myths and share what’s actually working when it comes to email marketing for bloggers.Whether you're just getting started or looking to revive your email strategy, this episode is packed with simple, realistic tips to help you make email work for you (without feeling overwhelmed).Listen to Part 1 of our email series here: Episode 188: What to Send Your Email List When You’re Just Starting Your Blog! Listen to Part 2 of our email series here: Episode 189: 3 Easy Ways to Get More Email Signups this Month🎉 Grab our free guide, Your First 500 Subscribers: A Simple Guide to Growing Your List with PurposeCheck out the show notes for episode 190.Do you love this podcast? Say thanks by leaving a positive review and/or rating! 

Welcome to the Ultimate Blog Podcast. This podcast is the podcast we wish we had when we started blogging. I'm Amy Reinicki. I'm Jennifer Draper. Our episodes dive deep into how to monetize your blog, sharing unique insights and practical tips. We bring you in-depth interviews with successful bloggers and experts who offer valuable, actionable advice.

Our mission is to educate, support, inspire, and empower you in your blogging business. Welcome to The Ultimate Blog Podcast. So today is episode three in this series about email marketing that we have been sharing with you. I hope that you have checked out episodes 188 and 189. And today is the last one, like I mentioned, and it's just me, Amy here doing a solo just to share with you more about the truth about email marketing for bloggers and what is actually working these days. Hopefully, the last couple weeks have really kind of lit a fire inside of you and have given you the encouragement that you need to really be focusing on your email marketing. It is an essential foundation in regards to building

a blog that we feel very strongly about here. And so let's just kind of like reset what you've heard about email. And that's one that if it feels really, really overwhelming, or if it's something that only you think that big bloggers do, that is just simply not true. We believe here firmly that every blogger, big or small, whether you even have a blog yet, to be honest, maybe you're just an influencer or a content creator and you haven't built your website yet,

we believe you need an email list. So if you are sharing content online, like on social media, and you have not started your email list and you're wanting to start a blog down the line, start your email list and then let's get you blogging. But you really do wanna be capturing those people who are part of your community out of the gate. It's a really important thing.

And you might be asking yourself the question, is email even working anymore? Do people still check their email? Do I need a huge list? And is it too much to keep up with? Is this one more thing that I have to do in my blogging business? Really, do I have to?

Today we're just gonna break that down and we're going to talk about what really is important and why it is important. If you haven't downloaded it yet, we did create a freebie for you called Your First 500 Subscribers and it talks about building your list, growing it with purpose and growing it with intention, as

a reminder you can get that at theultimateblogpodcast.com slash first 500. So whether you are just getting started or wanting to revive your list at all, I really do believe that this freebie can help you create a list with purpose while also keeping things simple and I think that's the key here. So I wanna kind of dive into some myths today in regards to email marketing that I think can be encouraging for anybody who might be still on the fence or maybe it's not growing

in the way that you want it to and you just need that encouragement to keep going. So myth number one is that you need a big list to be successful. As with anything, you don't have you need a big list to be successful. As with anything, you don't have to have a big list. Sometimes big numbers, they mean something very different than what they actually are. I often refer to them as vanity metrics. So having a big list is kind of null and void if the list isn't doing anything for you.

So it's just really a numbers game. What you actually want is an engaged list. That's the goal is to have an engaged list that is wanting to hear from you, that is engaged with you, and they're wanting the kind of content that you're creating. So I want you to just imagine with me for a minute that if you have 20 people on your list and let's say 10 people open and then two people buy something. That's great, right? Okay, if you have 200 people on your list, two people open and nobody buys, what does

that number serve you? It doesn't really. Growing your list without actually having engagement and clicks and things like that and purchases. If you have a product or service to sell, that's something I would rather you focus on is that click rate that is coming through on email and making sure that people are actually getting the content that you are creating. So that click rate and that open rate is going to be really important because we want our list to actually be engaged. So instead of focusing on a big list, I would rather you spend that time focusing on how to engage your list more, how to encourage them to let them know, is your content helpful?

Is it supportive? Is the freebies that you're creating supportive and helpful? Those are all things that are going to add value to them and make it worth their time when they see your email come in to actually click open. And ultimately, that is the goal is that you want them opening the emails and you want them to do something with that. Right. You have a CTA, a call to action, usually at the end of an email, and you want them to actually be doing that. And so don't focus so much on growing this huge list. Focus on the engagement and building that community along the way. You are the only person who knows how many people are on your list. So if you're sitting down today and you have 10 people on your list,

and you're letting that number really get in your head, I just want to remind you that the only people that know how many people are on your list is you and whoever you decide to tell. And so you can gain confidence with every email that you send and with every connection that you make with a reader. That is an opportunity to grow and learn from them to where then the next email that gets sent out, you can offer more value. You can address a need or a concern that they need help with at that given time.

So quit focusing on the number so much as focusing on the engagement. Obviously, we want to grow the list. That is the goal. But as we are growing the list, how can we keep them engaged? So focus on that first. And you can absolutely find success. If you have those 10 people on your list and you had five people purchase a product, that's successful.

That is actually insanely successful if you had five people purchase something if you have 10 people on your list. So think about that. Just think about more of the percentages. Think about more of the engagement instead of just focused on that one number like social media followers, like email subscribers. Just kind of back it down and look at it more objectively and what that list is currently doing to serve you and your business. Myth number two is that you need all these fancy funnels and you need all of your automation set up before you can ever even launch your blog or that you're not actually going to be successful without them. Yes, they can be very very helpful, but they are not a necessity for you to start a blog or to grow. I would say at a basic level what you need is a simple welcome sequence that can be one to three emails where you want to

just welcome them to your list. You want to tell them what they're going to expect, what they're going to find, and maybe a little bit about who you are but also an invitation for them to tell you a little bit more about who you are, but also an invitation for them to tell you a little bit more about who they are. Because I think that that's a really important thing to gather as people are joining our lists is, who are they? What brought them to you? Was it a post? Was it something that you shared? Was it a guest spot on a podcast that they connected with you? Was it a blog post that you wrote, understanding why they're there and what they are hoping to gain

is extremely helpful to bloggers. So having that email sequence, that welcome sequence set up from the go, I think it can be very supportive, but I don't want you to overthink it. I want you to think of it very simply. Emails also don't need to be very long. I mean, you check email, you know, you don't want it too long either. We're not going to read it. So something that they can digest pretty quickly and they can, you know, take an action. They can quickly hit reply and respond to you. Just think about that and how that is going to allow them to communicate with you. And in turn, you are able to help support them further down the line

So I would say as you continue to grow your blog. Yes, you will absolutely create more funnels create more automations But that's not something that you need to do from the start But you do want like a one to three email series We call a welcome series to welcome them and just get them engaged, get them used to opening emails from you. Because when they click, you know, subscribe or join your newsletter or what whatever your verbiage is there, you want them to know that there is an there's a person on the other side and like you're ready to engage and to get them excited because when they do that, they are the most excited as they ever

are to connect with you is when they hit that subscribe button. So that's when they're most invested, I would say. And so you want to basically answer that call right away and let them know who you are and all of that. Myth number three, email is dead. Or maybe you think it's annoying. What I want to remind you of is did you wake up today and open your email? And I would have to say that the answer is likely yes. So people are still checking their email every single day. We might just be getting a little bit pickier with who we are actually opening

or who we are engaging from. So if someone signed up to join your list, that means that they signed up to join your list and they wanna hear from you. One, don't feel bad about sending them emails because they opted into that. Anybody who joins your list should opt into your list. So keep that in mind that you just can't add anybody to your list. They need to actually opt into it.

And so deliver them the value that they are there to find. Don't just send them fluff. Like why are they there? What freebie did they come in on? How did they connect with you? Understanding why they are there means that your emails likely will not be annoying because you're going to provide the value that they're there to receive. And so that's something I would just consider

when you're sending emails out to them is, is this valuable? Is this something that they can expect from me? And is this going to serve them in a way that is in alignment with why they're here? I think that's a really important question to ask yourself when you are thinking about maybe the amount of emails that you're sending or the kind of emails that you're sending, the consistency and all of that. So nobody wants to be annoying. That is not the goal at all.

We want to provide value to our readers, that is for sure. And so just continue asking yourself, how am I providing value? And how can I continue to do that? Because at the end of the day, I want to remind you that the purpose of email is to build that connection and keep it. Unlike social media, you do own your email list. I know you've heard us say that a million times, but you don't have to worry about the

algorithms. You don't have to guess. You own that list. You don't have to wake up, wonder if you wake up in the morning if it's going to be gone. You know that it is. And so think of that when you are building that list as that is your safety net. Like having an email list is your safety net.

You are allowing your business to stay connected to potential customers, to potential clients, to people who are going to come back and learn from you. And that is powerful. Time spent on email is always going to be more fruitful and more beneficial than time spent on social media. I'm not saying social media is a place

that you shouldn't spend your time, but I'm saying that building the ground in which you own, such as your blog or your email list, that is always going to serve you well because it's going to allow you to stay connected to the people who have opted in to do that. We don't have that control over on social media. So just a reminder there that it is very, very important. I wanted to share a little bit about what actually works for bloggers. And honestly, these are just basic tips.

These are things that you have likely heard before, but I think sometimes we can overcomplicate things, especially with blogging. And we can think that we have to do a million different things in order to be successful. But sometimes you just have to take a step back and ask yourself, what are the basic things that I really need to be focused on in order to build the trust in order to build my list and in order to grow it? Number one, show up consistently. You do not need to show up daily. In fact, depending on your niche, it's not likely that you would want to show up daily unless you're doing like, you know, news that has something to do with, you know, real time information that they need to know. But showing up regularly. If you have a newsletter, sending it at the same day each week or at the same time each month or whatever, when you show up consistently, you allow your readers to begin to build that rapport and they understand like, oh, I'm going to get this email then.

They know what to expect. And it's not like you've gone like six months without sending an email and then all of a sudden you email and you're like, who are you? Like if you've done that and now you're wanting to go back and connect with your list, I would strongly encourage you to have a few emails go out explaining, hey, this is why I've been gone. This is my goal moving forward and give them the opportunity to opt out if they're no longer interested

since they haven't heard from you in a while. So I know that some of you listening maybe have let your email list go by the wayside and maybe it hasn't been something you've been able to focus on, that's okay. We have all had seasons like that for sure, but just know that when you are consistent with your emails, that is going to serve your audience best. And the beauty of that is that you

get to choose the consistency. So you get to choose the cadence, whether that's weekly, monthly, bi-weekly, every other day, maybe it's always on like a Saturday morning or something like that. You get to choose that. And my advice when you are deciding like when you want to send out emails and how often is have it be something that you can do consistently for a significant period of time. So that's another tip is thinking long term in regards to emails. How is that going to serve them long term? Because your email list is building trust.

They might not convert right away. And that's, that's okay. That's not the goal. They need to learn from you and build that trust and see you as an expert most likely in whatever it is in order to purchase something that you may be selling or something like that. But it is one of your most important assets. So having an idea of like, long-term, this is how I want to serve my email list and this is what I hope to gain from it, I think is really important. And that's going to be really beneficial when you are asking yourself, how often can I show up? Can I show up weekly, monthly? What does that look like? And then setting that cadence for yourself moving forward.

The third tip and advice for what's actually working for bloggers is write like a human. I'm not saying that you cannot use AI tools. We use them here at spark, but make sure they sound like you. Make sure that you are not just copying and pasting from chat GPT and slapping it in an email and just sending it on. People are people are getting pretty good at understanding what's AI and what's not and they aren't there for AI. They are there to connect with you.

So I'm not saying that you can't use that as a way to provide an outline or whatever. But I would make sure you are definitely like engaging them, speaking to them the way that you would speak to them. People respond to real voices and when they feel understood and heard and when they know it's you, they're going to learn your voice. They're going to learn what kinds of things you're sharing. And so make that worth opening the email for. And I think that's just something to really hone in on in the world of AI

that we are definitely in right now and not being anti-AI in any way, but making sure that you're definitely infusing your own brand voice and everything into there I think is really, really important. The last tip I'll share today is to be generous. You're creating a lot of free content on your blog already, and so I want you to ask yourself how you can repurpose some of that content and then send it to your email list. But maybe you're providing something a little different there.

So maybe the blog post is kind of the hook, and then you bring them into the email list and that's where you can dive a little different there. So maybe the blog post is kind of the hook and then you bring them into the email list and that's where you can dive a little bit deeper. That's where you can get a little bit more vulnerable. You can share behind the scenes. Do not think that email is only to sell. It is also to engage. It is also to build trust.

And I would discourage you from constantly selling an email actually. You should be selling in your email if you have something to sell. Don't feel bad about that. But knowing that if people are going to ever purchase anything from you, or if they're going to click over to your blog, or if they're going to click an affiliate link,

they have to know, okay, like this person is really providing a lot of value and I trust them. And so I'm absolutely going to purchase the new mop that they recommend or the lighting picture that they put in their home because I love their style and all the things. Just think about that being generous with the content that you're providing an email making sure that you are giving them the value that you promised them when they signed up.

So if you told them what they're going to get, making sure you honor that promise and that you're being generous with that. You are building relationships. And I know that we're doing that online and it's not always a face-to-face interaction, but it has the potential to be incredibly powerful building these relationships. Bloggers have this opportunity to connect with people in a way that sometimes we can't even do in real life.

Because how often do we end up in a room with people that have a very, very similar passion as you do? And I want you to think about your blog right now and think about if it's niche down, for instance, and you have this specific group of people that you're talking to and that's something that you're really passionate about. The people who are coming there are really passionate about that also. It's not likely that we're in a room full of people like that often, but your blog is like that.

Your email list is like that. They're the people that get lit up about the same things that you do and they are excited to hear from you. Don't be afraid to engage with them. They're looking for community just like you are to talk about the things that make them happy or provide solutions for problems that they have and it's a really awesome opportunity to be able to find your people in a way that, you know, 20, 30, 40 years ago people couldn't do. It's pretty exciting that we have this way of connecting with people and like-minded

people and learning from one another and being able to connect with them via your email list and writing your content on your blog is such a gift. And I don't want you to lose sight of what an incredible gift that is to be able to do that So as a little recap here, you do not need a big list or fancy tools or anything to start Utilizing and engaging your email list. You just need some consistency and you need to have a plan have a plan for what you want your email list to be a Have a plan for what you want your email list to be. A reminder that it is a long game and that it's going to keep building as you keep growing. And the goal isn't to just like skyrocket to success and, you know, get as many subscribers as you can as fast as you possibly can.

But it is learning how to be intentional and build that list with purpose. My last piece of advice for a little pep talk today is please do not wait for a specific number of blog posts or maybe a certain amount of time that you feel. My encouragement is start now, start with the people who are already coming to your blog or coming to your social media, wherever you are in your journey, and engage them and get them on your list right away. Build that connection from the start, learn from them, listen to them,

engage them and consistently serve them and you will learn so much along the way that then you can utilize to serve the new people that will be coming. And I think it will be a very valuable way to spend your time when you're blogging, especially in the beginning, is to really truly understand who you're talking to

and what they need. And so I hope that these last three episodes have just really encouraged you in your email marketing game to reframe maybe the way that you're thinking about it. And if you haven't grabbed that freebie, please do so. We created it with you in mind. We wanted to have you feeling empowered

and giving you just the simple, encouraging guide to help you grow your list with purpose. Because like we've said, that is just really the ultimate goal is to grow a list that has purpose in your blogging business. So once again, you can download that at theultimateblogpodcast.com slash first 500.

I will also put that link in our show notes so you can quickly grab it there. If this episode inspired you in any way, we'd love to hear it. You can email us anytime, connect with us on social. If you're over on Spotify, you can also leave a comment on the episode itself. Let us know how this supported you and encouraged you in your blogging journey. And we will be back next Tuesday with a brand new episode. And we are excited to introduce you to one of our blog roadmap members who is going to share more about her story.

And so it's going to be a really great episode next week and can't wait for you to tune in. Thanks for listening to the Ultimate Blog Podcast. If you'd like to learn more about building your blog, visit theultimateblogpodcast.com backslash newsletter to get signed up for our email newsletter. If you enjoyed this episode, we'd love for you to share it with a friend, subscribe and leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts.

Thanks for tuning in today and we'll see you next time.