• by Jess Nelson , March 30, 2016

A majority of small business owners who leverage email marketing say it is essential to growing their business, reports a new study by email marketing provider AWeber released Tuesday.

75% of small business owners and freelancers leverage email marketing to promote their business, according to a poll of more than 1,600 of AWeber’s small business customers. The vast majority of small business owners double as email marketers, with 91% fulfilling all of their marketing needs themselves.

81% of small business email marketers responded that email marketing is very important to the overall growth of their business, and 30% further attribute a quarter of their revenue or more to email marketing.

“The business owners who are rocking it with email marketing are those who recognize the power of email beyond just sending a message,” states Erik Harbison, chief marketing officer at AWeber. "They see the value in growing an audience of email subscribers as part of the overall growth strategy for their businesses."

AWeber’s report also suggests 2016 will mark a period of rapid adoption for small business owners of email marketing automation technology.  45% of respondents stated that they plan to try marketing automation for the first time this year.

“You have this fantastic relationship with a customer or prospect, and you should use it,” says Steven Aldrich, chief product officer at GoDaddy and head of GoDaddy Email Marketing.

In addition to sending emails on a regular basis, Aldrich recommends that small businesses marketers keep their emails short, succinct and mobile-friendly. He also says a call-to-action is essential.

“It seems really simple, but one of the things we find is that the SMB owner doesn’t drive all the way to what thy want the marketing outcome to be,” says Aldrich. "Make it very clear what you want that customer to do.”