I’ve just updated my blog <snip> which documents my 90 day challenge and i have one burning question. Does having a mailing lists really matter to maintain a sustainable online income?
It depends very much on your business. If you generate a lot of leads where people are interested in keeping an eye on your company then it might be a very useful way to keep them involved and let them know of new products, services and deals. On the other hand, if it’s more of a “buy once and then move on” type business where you don’t expect repeat customers, or you have nothing to tell them, then there’s not a lot of point.
I tell you what…i can’t think of a single business that won’t benefit from repeat customers??? Can you think of one?
There is no situation where having a mailing list will hurt you. The more data you can collect the better 
It isn’t about whether the business will benefit from repeat customers, it’s whether customers will respond to the continued contact and become repeat customers, or whether they will (a) be unlikely to buy anything from you again anyway, and (b) are going to be irritated by the ongoing hassle. For example – I’m in the process of buying a new bathroom. Once I’ve done that, I don’t expect to buy another new bathroom for a very, very long time … and I don’t want the company to be pestering me by email in the meantime. It isn’t going to make any difference in the short term because I (hopefully) will have no need to buy anything from them, and it would just put me off using them in the future or recommending them to anyone else.
I know people that have mailing lists that are not responsive…so i guess giving value to the list is the important thing because if you can’t then there’s probably no point having one…
you may need another bathroom but what about a kitchen?..LOL just kidding…but you kinda see were that went…
I like Stevie D’s answer it was really helpful
I recently went to a local music gig, which had a huge turnout (about 400 people—more than twice the number anticipated). At the end of the show, the organizer asked the audience for a show of hands to gauge which form of advertising had been most successful. Options included:
- newspaper ad? [No hands]
- radio ad? [No hands]
- online advertising? [No hands]
- shop window posters? [No hands]
- printed event flyer? [A few hands]
- our website? [A few hands]
- Twitter/Facebook? [A few hands]
- word of mouth? [About 100 hands]
- email newsletter? [About 300 hands]
I thought it was a pretty interesting insight into the continued value of email lists. I was quite shocked, TBH. Email newsletters and word of mouth were the only real means of getting the word out. (Obviously, this won’t apply to all situations, as every business is different, but it certainly gave me the semse that email lists are worth having.)
Although the survey is subject to target audience, tech savvy people may more likely to receive update from social media. To certain extend, I believe only loyalty member willing to receive update and take extra step to validate email.
My blog news subscription gateway including RSS, newsletter, twitter, FB, G+, among all newsletter generate the highest traffic.
it’s by far the most vital asset you should get. How many times have you purchased something right on your first visit vs. later… having the ability to contact your subcribers directly works and email marketing still ranks as the marketing method providing the highest roi.
Having a mailing list helps you a lot. You can do direct mail marketing through this and reach to your customers directly. But there are some qualities that a mailing list should have. It should be highly accurate and targeted so that you can get maximum results from this.
It depend on your business, how much your lead is convert and reach to your customers directly. But mailing list should be quality based that get maximum result from lead.